Off Menu with Ed Gamble and James Acaster - Ep 31: Marcus Samuelsson

Episode Date: September 18, 2019

Top chef Marcus Samuelsson – the man behind Red Rooster in Harlem and Shoreditch, MARCUS Montreal and Marcus B&P – takes a break from the kitchen and lets the genie cook in the dream restaurant. And, for Samuelsson, location is key.Recorded and edited by Ben Williams for Plosive Productions.Artwork by Paul Gilbey (photography and design) and Amy Browne (illustrations).Red Rooster Shoreditch is now open – find out more here.For more info on Marcus and his restaurants visit his website.Follow Off Menu on Twitter and Instagram: @offmenuofficial.And go to our website www.offmenupodcast.co.uk for a list of restaurants recommended on the show.Ed Gamble is on tour, including a date at the Shepherd's Bush Empire. See his website for full details.James Acaster is on tour. See his website for full details.Watch Ed and James's YouTube series 'Just Puddings'. Watch here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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

which are exclusively available from Waterstones. But go and pre-order your copy of Glutton, the multi-course life of a very greedy boy, now. Please? Could I just get the rest of this podcast to take away, please? Welcome to the Off Menu podcast with me, Ed Gamble. My name is James Acaster. There he is. Good to see you. Nice to see you, mate. Ed, who got coming in the restaurant today? Oh, straight in, are we? Well, I was wondering who we got coming in. I kind of think we're at the stage where we don't even need to explain that this is a dream restaurant. We're going to ask them there. We get the guests to pick their favourite ever start, a main course dessert, side dish

and drink. We don't need to tell them that. No need. Today, also, we have an actual food professional chef. Me? Not you, James. You're there anyway. You're a given. We have the wonderful Marcus Samuelson in the restaurant. He is head chef of Red Rooster in Harlem, and they have recently opened a Red Rooster in Shoreditch. It's very exciting. He's got such an interesting culinary history from where he was born in Ethiopia, brought up in Sweden, moved to America. But we're going to cover all of that in the podcast as a really interesting guy. However, Ed, I know he's a professional chef, but I have no qualms kicking him out if he mentions the secret ingredient. And what is the secret ingredient

this week, James? Chia seeds. Chia seeds. They're weird. They're weird, and they puff up in your mouth and get stuck in between your teeth later on. If you eat them like that, they get stuck in your teeth, but sometimes they put them in like pudding or something, and they go all like frog spawn. That is unacceptable as far as I'm concerned. In any of its forms, I don't like them. I don't think they're necessary. I know they're meant to be a superfood or something, but it's not worth it. They're other superfoods in the world that are a lot nicer. You may as well eat dirt. Yeah. It's like a rubbish superhero in the

MCU. It's like the Falcon. Exactly. It's like the Falcon. It's the Falcon of the superfoods. Falcon's pretty good, man. It is quite good now. Hawkeye. Yeah, it's the Hawkeye. Chia seeds are the Hawkeye of the foods. It's the Hawkeye of the superfoods. Yeah. All the other superfoods are there, absolutely nailing it. And chia seeds is a little Hawkeye. So if Marcus Samuelson says chia seeds, he's out on his ear. Quick shout out, actually. We've been sent some, we've been sent some foods. We've been sent some coffee. I'm a coffee boy. I love that from independent coffee box, sent into a lovely box of coffee beans. I don't currently own a grinder. And what a lot of people would do if they received a bag of coffee beans, they'd

be like, well, I can't use these. I'll give them someone with a coffee grinder. Me, always looking for an opportunity to buy a new gadget. Yeah. I'm buying a bean grinder. Good on you. I won't be using them. I gave up caffeine a few years ago. If you tell the story one more time, you are going to get chucked out the restaurant. You're cool. Ladies and gentlemen, this is the off menu of Marcus Samuelson. Welcome, Marcus, to off menu and indeed welcome to the dream restaurant. Thank you very much. I'm super happy to be here. Welcome, Marcus, to the dream restaurant. Good to see you.

Was that the drum roll? It was me coming out of my lamp, but you are right. I do have a drum kit this time. For the first time, I've decided to bring drums into the equation. I thought you'd appreciate it. You know what I do appreciate that you guys, you went very mushy on me. I see tablecloth here. I see desserts and snacks over here. Yeah. And this is very nice. This is genuine as well. Sometimes when people come into the dream restaurant, they like to imagine what they can see in front of them. But our producer, the Great Benito, has genuinely laid out white tablecloths for Marcus's arrival. Which has never happened before. Genuinely never happened. And there's grapes. Yeah. You've got grapes and tablecloths. We're surprised there's not like proper

multi-candles like all over the tables. This is very good Benito. I do appreciate the foreign linen and everything. Very nice. Do you consider employing the Great Benito to furnish one of your restaurants in the decor? Absolutely. Absolutely. Thank you for the ironing here, but it's nice. Yeah. It's homely, I think. Yeah. It's very nice, fancy, but homely. Bit of a mix of the two. I don't normally like a white tablecloth in a restaurant. I'm going to put that out there. It feels too fancy for me. Tablecloth, can I just bring it up to the tablecloth? They're gone. There's very few restaurants. Are they over? Benito, you've embarrassed us in front of this. Marcus, I didn't mean to go back there. Tablecloths are over, man.

They're basically gone. They're basically gone. But I see the nod. That's easy. Someone told me once, I don't know if this is true, that there was a law so that if you have tablecloths, you have to have a toilet in a restaurant or a cafe or anything. If there's tablecloths, there has to be a toilet. If you don't have tablecloths, you don't have to have a toilet. You know, I don't know about that, but I do know that people think about restaurants, they throw this term out, but they actually don't know what the word restaurant means. It means to restore a community. Then you have all these different levels of restaurants that you might not think about like restaurants, proper restaurants.

Then you have a brassery. There is more big bar and certain selections of beer. Then you have bistro, which is that corner. Then obviously you have a pub, right? So when people say I went to a restaurant last night, as a chef, I'm most like, what type of restaurant? Because essentially, McDonald's is a restaurant too, right? So this is a term that people say so quickly, but they don't even think about it. And of course, as a chef, you just nerd down in this stuff. So the restore community thing, is that like what the word literally translates as? Yes, absolutely. I never knew that. I didn't know that. I mean, I try to think about that literally when in terms of in Harlem, where my restaurant is,

and I moved to Harlem in New York. I lived in midtown, moved to Harlem, and I try to commit to hiring everything locally, buying as much localism, and that eventually when you create jobs within the community, right? So we have music six nights a week or comedy even as well. So like, we employ 70 musicians. That's not a lot of restaurants. But it has, no, because there's a lot of bands and all that stuff. So it does impact, you know, the guy who washes the window, the guy who the person delivers the strawberries, we try to do as much as we can in the community. So we got to go back to that word. Because a lot of your place when you read about a lot of your restaurants, all of them in the short descriptions of them always mention the in terms of the food,

where they are, and like what cultures you're pulling from and stuff like that. And that seems to be the most important thing is like, yeah, like summing up the community and your food. Yeah, I mean, I've had, I spent a lot of time to cook for the one percent of the one percent. Right. And it was like chasing this thing, like, I have to go to the three-star Michelin. I have to work in this place. And after you do that for a long time, you know, my mom was always in my head, it's like, why do you only trust bankers? You didn't grow up with bankers. You grew up with, Ava, who worked at the post office or teachers and stuff like that. And I was like, well, I have to. And the other thing she always said, make something affordable, make something so we

can go to it, like on an everyday basis. So I was like, mom, you don't know what I'm talking about. I'm about to do this. And then after 9-11, actually, when I lived in New York, you just like, I just rejiggered my whole life. It was such a, you know, like, what the hell is going on? Right? It was like crazy. So it actually was a starting point for me to move from Midtown to Harlem, rethink the whole value proposition. And eight years later, I opened Red Rooster with a whole other, you know, more of the way my mom actually said the restaurant should be. And she came, she just passed away a year ago, but she did see the whole thing. And I really, it changed my life, you know, really changed my life. When you made that change, was it, was it,

did you feel like you're taking a risk or? I think I needed, you know, I needed to do it. As a creative, you have to transform yourself, right? If you're not transforming yourself at some point, you're phoning it in. And I, at that point, I became an executive chef really young. I reached all the stars and I felt like, you know what, I need to go in a different direction, not knowing what that different direction was, right? So, so I think that it really prolonged my curiosity and love for cooking even longer. You know, it's a weird way like I just had to do it, you know, transform it. That's probably how the Great Benito felt today when he decided to put the tablecloths out. Put the tablecloths out, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I think that's exactly what he

went through today. He knew he had to progress creatively. You know, it was a big, it was a big risk that you were taken today. You thought, I'm going to do it and I put the tablecloths out. It's paying off. Mark noticed it as soon as he walked in. Comedians very often, before you go out and do your biggest stuff, you do this, you're testing your materials, right? Yeah, for sure. We do the same as chef. We do tons of pop-ups before, right? Or we cook for our friends, right? And, you know, one way I like that, because you want to be prepped, but another way I don't like it, because there's a little bit of a level of that, you know, that there's an adrenaline rush that you want in cooking, right? You want anticipation. You don't want everything to be

perfection. There's another perfection. It's more alive, you know, it's a more alive gig than it is a super produced gig, you know what I mean? Right, yeah. So finding that balance between this beautiful chaos that a great restaurant really is when it's hitting on all cylinder versus this perfection where you don't know where to put the knife in the fork, you know what I mean? It's equating that. But I think there's kind of, there's parallels there, because I think quite a lot of comedians would say they come up with their best stuff, not when they're sitting down trying to think of it, but when they're on stage doing a big gig and it's a good audience, like that's when those things start firing. And if it's, yeah, it must be a similar

thing, if you're sort of rushing around in a really busy service. Yeah, no, I think about, a lot of the food I think about right before I fall asleep and I take notes, or when I, I flush them out when I travel more, right? Because you actually have to say, if I fly back to New York tomorrow, then I can actually, you know, sit and relook that idea. What is that idea? Like there's a note I want to hit. And I also think a lot of food from, from Africa, because there is a, you know, so much of the food that we eat today came from Africa, but the authorship of that has been taken away. So like you think about, oh, this is really good French coffee. Like where in France is the coffee bean? Or this Belgian

chocolate is fantastic. Like where in Brussels is the cocoa bean, right? So the authorship of Africa and aspirations always ripped out, right? So it would be like, imagine like Nigeria would own Microsoft and Google tomorrow. You know, that's an absurd idea, right? That's the same thing. If you're Ghana, you're farming cocoa beans, do you know what I mean? So I think a lot about that as like, how do I reframe that and introduce original food from Africa in a way that, you know, a London audience can eat it and get with it without it becoming headed? Because once you come to the restaurant, you just want to have fun and be with your friends. It's your, your job as a guest, it's gone by then, right? Just entertain you and, you know,

but it's good that it's still nice when you're, I went to a place yesterday in Brixton Village and I'd read about it online and it said all of the ingredients that they use are bought in the village from the different fishbuggers or something like that. So I was thinking about that all the way through the meal and it was really nicely gated at the end when I was paying the bill. I said, hey, I've heard, you know, it's all from the village here and they went, no. That's brilliant. We got you in. We got you in. A completely different experience when all I've been thinking about was, wow, this was like, just, they bought it from right across the right from that local fishmonger. Chef would kill that service. It would really be working like,

and then Antonio at 21 was like, no, it's not. No, no, no, no. That's absolutely bullshit. Thanks, guys. Love it. So here at the dream restaurant, nothing, it doesn't have to be local, of course. Well, because the genie, the genie can get it from wherever they want. So you want it in the world, so everywhere it's local. So wherever you want. Can I tell you a couple of stories about that? Sure. So when I was like in my mid-20s, whatever, I went to the, then considered the best restaurant by far in the world. It's called El Buye, and it's on the coast of Barcelona, and Ferran Adrià is our messy Maradona. He's like the god of this, right? And he's like the brilliant genius, right? And I'm like, I have my Spanish

friend there. He's translating, and I've arrived. I'm talking to the master, right? And he's like, are you from New York? I said, yes. Marcus, do you know Robert De Niro? I said, no, I don't. But he's like, but you're from New York. I was like, I am, and now I'm getting nervous because I don't really know how to answer. It's like, I don't know Robert De Niro. I like you. I want to be here. And then it's like, so do you know Madonna? It's like, no, no, no, there's two. But I don't, she's like, you don't live in New York. I'm like, chef, I live in New York. I live in New York, but I don't know Madonna, and I don't know Robert De Niro. And then it's like, well, then it's like, don't pay no attention. Then come back a little bit later. If I'm going to open in

New York, and my translator is like, we're going back and forth. I want Robert De Niro on Madonna's servers. Can you make that happen? Fuck it, I just want to leave. It's not supposed to be my biggest day. We just get for him, and he's asking me about De Niro and Madonna. Like, so that was the dream restaurant for me, but he didn't know. And then like 15 years later, I did take him out when he came to New York, and we had dinner together. I was like, don't bring up this De Niro, Madonna. But that was my God for Ron. That was my God. Since we're in the dream restaurant now, would you like to have your dinner with De Niro and Madonna? I can sort that out for you. I can tell you, you know, Robert De Niro comes to the restaurant

now. I've told him this story. He laughs. And he loves coming to Red Roots to Harlem because we set it up so he can just hang out. He doesn't have to worry about stuff. Oh, that's great. Did you immediately contact De Niro? How about this? I know De Niro now. So we start the meal, as always, with the choice of still or sparkling water? I'm going to go for a still, just very simple. We always go for still, or do you ever change it up depending on where you are, what the meal is? Fizz is nice sometimes. I like sparkling, but there's something like, I think I would go still. Every now and then, if I need to wake up, like, sparkling is a little bit better. Would you start it in the morning? Would you start the

day with some sparkling water? No, it's morning afternoon when I get tired. We have a big debate over this. James thinks that sparkling water wakes the mouth up and cleans his teeth. He thinks that if the bubbles clean scum off the teeth, sometimes I wake up and I have a scummy mouth and it's horrible. And if I'm in a hotel, there's often a bottle of still and a bottle of sparkling on the bedside. You're standing in fancy posh places. I don't stay in places like that. Me and Marcus get up in the morning and brush our teeth. I've never linked it to brushing your teeth. I do brush my teeth afterwards, I like to point that out, but it's just a good first thing on the mouth, some sparkling water straight away all over the

scum. And I've liked this to it before, but every time I dishwash or advertiser show the little tablet go in and all the bubbles go in and clean all the grime off all the dishes. That's what you think about it. That's what I think about every time I put the fizzy water in my mouth, that all the bubbles are going in between all my teeth. I don't know how scummy your mouth is in the morning. I don't know what you're doing at night. Oh, it's absolutely scummy. I feel like I'm walking and sleep eating, because it's absolutely scum-fest in there when I wake up. I like it. I've never thought about it from that point of view, but that's really smart. Yeah, thank you. Thank you. It is smart. I never thought you'd be called smart.

But look, you try to checkmate me there. I'm now a genius. So unlucky. Ice in the still water or just straight up? Straight up. Straight up. Yeah, no ice. No citrus. No citrus. I said this would be nice. I don't like the ice. It's just like, it gets QB and it gets like, it's a texture thing like no. You don't like to crunch the ice. What about crushed ice? Crushed ice in a cocktail is great. Yeah. And you get that first, second sip. I mean, so much about, I mean, again, as a chef, you overthink about this shit and I'm sorry to be. No, that's what we're talking about. So much of what we can, we can all taste the same thing, right?

Sweet, hot, spicy, umami, sour, bitter, right? We all have, we can all taste that. But how we taste it comes down to really aesthetic, right? If something doesn't look right, piece of bread, fish, you know, and then the aroma and then texture. And texture is part of like a cocktail, right? Like you have a glass of water, you have a cocktail, you have a big ice cube. Ten minutes later, that cocktail still has the same flavor. If you have bad ice cube, it's all water, right? So you can, that's really how chefs go through their sauces. What type of texture do you want? What type of mouthful? If you eat a dish like, let's say sushi, right? It's, for me, it's all texture. You know, good fish is really fish dish with a little bit of rice,

right? But if that rice, perfect sushi, the rice should be warm. It should be small. And the fish should be the perfect balance between rice and fish. And it's a texture dish. If you eat too much rice, it just becomes chewing gum, right? So texture is such a big part of how to enjoy and eat a dish. Yeah. Well, with the icing cocktails thing, absolutely, because like, I had a Bloody Mary on the tour at the moment. And the moment I'm just trying to find where to get the best Bloody Mary on tour, because you always have to choose a food or drink thing to kind of make the theme. And most Bloody Marys I've had have been good, but this one the other day had crushed ice in it, and it was a revelation, because it's so much better than all the ice cubes I've been having

everywhere else, because it was just like, I didn't know what it was at the time. But now you've said about the texture thing, makes me think that maybe it was that. Are you a Bloody Mary guys with garnish? Do you like the stuff that they put? Now, of course, the trendy cocktail bars are all you like. They put everything from jalapeno to shrimp, all of that stuff. Do you like that or you don't like that? Well, the best one I've had so far was with olives in it and olive brine in it as well. Nice. And that was the best one I've had. And I had thyme in it, too. And I had the most amount of stuff I've had in like. Most for your money. Yeah, yeah. It was a lot in there, but like, it was a good flavor.

That's the thing about ice cubes. Quite often, I'm drinking a cocktail with ice cubes in it. I'm thinking you've just put these ice cubes in, so there's less booze in it. I thought that was a paranoid one. It's just. And my people, I loved that. I had a phenomenal cocktail a couple of nights ago at a place called Inconito in near Carnaby Street. And it was a nori old fashioned. So they used like the seaweed in the old fashion. It was incredible, but it had three ice cubes in it. And it was in a little tiny glass. And I thought, take those ice cubes out. We could get another sip out of this. Yep. Oh my God. Do you feel like that sometimes?

So here's like a masterpiece, right? They thought about salt. They thought about umami. They thought about olives. And he's like, hey, can you put, top it off a little bit? I love it. This is brilliant. A representation of a difficult customer. Poor guy. He's got everything. Oh my God. With the biggest stages in the world. Yeah. Go on, mate. For it. Go on, mate. Come on. Let's pop those ice cubes out. Put a little bit more of the cocktail in, please. Pop it up some bread. Pop it up some bread, Marcus. Pop it up some bread.

Pop it up some bread. Bread. Bread. Bread. Definitely. Bread. Always bread. Yeah. I mean, I guess there's never an option really for pop it up some bread, but you would always. I love like the whole idea of breaking bread. And bread tells you also so much of where you are, right? Like I was born in Ethiopia and our bread there is also a staple. So like injera bread, you eat wheat with our hands. I love it so much. And that's dipping that so brown bread. That is, that bread is so, so, so good. We've had some good Ethiopian meals together. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Again, going back to Brixton Village, there's a place there and like, they get the injera bread ordered in. And it's just so nice. The first time I had it,

blew my mind. I've never had any texture again. Yeah. Never had anything that texture and the little sour note on it. And you're right. It's from the ritual of like, of ripping it and dipping it. So that bread is, it's probably the oldest bread in the world, right? Because it was started thousands of years ago and it's a fermentation. So it's teff that grows only in Ethiopia, actually. So you take the teff and then you put water into it and then it ferments for two days. Then once you have that, you can continue with it, right? Then you cook it like a pancake, like a crepe basically. But you're only cooking on one side. That's why it gets so bubbly and the fermentation. And if you flip it on both sides, then it gets crispy and then you can't break it.

So that is like the key to that. And it comes down to fully breaking bread, right? And it's one of those distinct things that if you've had Ethiopian food, you know that that's what you've had it with, right? It's almost like eating a couscous from Morocco or something like that. You know you've had Moroccan food, you know? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's just, as soon as you have it, it's a revelation you want to find out where Ethiopian restaurants are near you. Because like, you know, I think the first time I had it was in, I was in Amsterdam with my friend, took me to this place. And then I, when I got home, I was just looking for places what could happen. I love that. Like, it was really, you telling me that you really went to Amsterdam for the Ethiopian. We all know where you went to

Amsterdam. That was nice. It was a nice one. Good work there. Good. I appreciate it. I think Ethiopian I'll take it. Take it. Nice. Nice. Is that the kind of bread you would like for this meal? Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. So we come to your starter now. Yeah. This is where the big guns start. Can we talk about location first? If you want. Oh, 100. Yeah. Because I want to be in the Ethiopian savannah. I want to be where there's red clay and I want my restaurants outdoor. Because we all, at least me, when I'm so happy when we eat outside, whether it's picnic or outdoor, it's like American barbecue, whatever it is, it's just like nice to sit outside, you know? So we would be, I would, it would be a big party, big block party outside. And then

Jerebred would come out and then we have, you know, that's some good, good, maybe bourbon and some good liquor, you know what I mean? Just get it going because everybody don't know each other, you know? Are you having stuff right with the bourbon? Yeah. Are you having things with the Jerebred as well to get up a bit? Yes. There's a bunch of dip sauces. There's a little bit chickpea puree, some lentils. But then also just to create a conversation there, there will be some herring because I grew up in herring, I grew up in Sweden. And just to watch the faces of people like, you know, Ethiopians eating like fermented Swedish herring. Every brilliant. Every brilliant. It's like, you know, it's really like when you have kimchi the first time, right? Like it's like

so weird and strange. That's what that Swedish herring would be. Yeah. You know, so you were born in Ethiopia. When did you move to Sweden? When I was a kid, three years. My sister and I, we had tuberculosis and we were adopted to Swedish family. And then I, so I really grew up in Sweden and grew up right outside Gothenburg on a little island and a fishing village. My father was, he became a geologist, but he was really a fishing, like he grew up as a fishing boy and that's his DNA. That was his DNA. So going between these two worlds, between like the fishing village versus the city, that was been my life, basically back and forth. I saw, I saw a film recently set in Sweden and they tried to make someone eat a herring whole and it looked quite

I'm not sure the film Midsommar is comparable to what Sweden's actually like, James. Really? Yeah. I thought it was a good representation. I mean, they have meals outdoors in that film. They do have meals outside. Have you seen Midsommar? I'm not, but I will go and check it out. I mean, yeah, I don't, it's not, I would not say it's representational of what Sweden is actually offers. Well, I'll just describe. They are outdoors with eating herring. If you're drinking, it's not in Ethiopia. It's a good film. It's a good film, but I don't think you should view it. The herring bit, you know, is very, because it's like a horror film, basically. And when they try and feed someone the herring whole, it is quite horrible to watch because it's during this moment where, you know,

everything's quite uncomfortable for her. She's not sure she wants to be there. And then they try and force feed her a herring whole down her throat while she's sitting there. And she's a bit drugged up as well. That's when you said that's you'd have some herring before that's all I could think of. And it makes me, this is the scariest man we've had so far. You know, it is interesting with herring and fish and bones and all that stuff. So for example, if you've ever had Nigerian food, you know, the fufu, basically the mashed potato, right? Like the fufu people eat. And it's also called swallow, right? So you take a piece of fufu, like, think imagine like mashed potatoes, right? But it's done with, can be done with plantains, it can be done with cassava, whatever, right? And then they

put a stew on top of it, which has fish and bones in it and okra and all that stuff. And you, so you just dip that and you swallow, you just swallow in one bite. And the very first time you do that, like it's all bones, it's all that stuff. And you're not supposed to kind of like, if you are like, you know, going like this, it's a lot of bones and stuff like that. You're like, dude, you got to go. You got to go. So the very first time I did that, so I can relate to the, I was her, but you know, we were listening to Fila Kuti. I was deep in Legos and I, I wanted to be the cool guy, so I was like, I'm going to do this, but a bunch of fish bones in my throat. It did not work out well for me. And do you get better at eating that over time? I did not. Like it's one

of those things like you, you're there, this is what everyone is doing, and you're clearly the odd one out. And you just have to accept it, that end of the day, Swedish kid, you know. So already, before we even started your meal, you've established like, you know, it's a, you got Ethiopian bread and Swedish fish going on. Is your starter like also following this pattern of places you've lived in growing up? Yeah, I mean, I would go with, I will start with something very like ceviche, like like a Peruvian fish, just clean and like, but just delicious with citrus and and just so people can just eat. There is something about when people eat fish, like people always curious, can I eat this raw? That's a question. Yes, you can. I mean, like people drink a coca-cola

with all kinds of shit in it, never question like, this is good for me, but there's fresh fish from the ocean. Like, can I eat this raw? I'm like, what? What are you talking about? You eating stuff out of a tube or a jam? So anyways, I will do that. That's a good one. And yeah, we're outside and people will still pick up. Quite a light, fresh start to the meal. Yes, light, light, light. And then yeah, we'll definitely have, you know, Swedish aquavit, so vodka with some, you know, toasted caraway seeds and maybe some citrus and cucumber in it, you know, so you get that, the cucumber makes it go down really, really nice. So and we've already had some bourbons, so people are really getting to know each other now. Yes, yes, yes. A bit fuzzy now by this point.

Getting a bit fuzzy. This is all mixed in with the ceviche or the vodka. Yes, yes. I mean, like you want, that's clean and light. Yeah. And yeah, that would be fun. Is there a place in particular you've had like just like this fresh fish that's been at least sticks in your mind has been the best or the first time you had it? I would say, I mean, the way fish was treated when I worked in Japan, it's something I always think about how that is the moment where I would think about how can I replicate that, the cutting of the fish, the treatment of everything, how they hang it, everything. But then I want very little on it. I'm like salt, lemon juice, leave it alone. Yeah. Yeah, just keep it so clean. And that is probably today we consider maybe more

Peruvian, but like for me, I love crudo or ceviches or I grew up with grovelach, cured salmon, but just less is more, you know, really good fish. Yeah. Is that, I think that's a bit of a, as soon as you start eating more food or pen attention to what you like, that's when you start realizing that, yeah, the best stuff is the less stuff on it, the better it is, because I used to always on the menu, I'd look for what's got, yeah, I'd go for what's got the most amount of stuff and it's on all that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's a simple word, it's probably. No, but I think it's all ingredient based too, right? So if you have an incredible piece of fish, you don't want a lot on it. You want to texture that, it might be a

little bit creamy, so maybe you put a little bit of avocado underneath and one piece of salted cucumber and that height, that's the whole dish, right? So it's really, stay out of it, right? Like treat that fish and then just a little support. But then on the opposite end of the scale, if you've got a fish, which is like full of bones and all of that, then you want to put it in a stew where there's like, it's part of another flavor. Yeah, so make a curry. Choke it. Choke it, exactly. We're back to the Swedish Midsummer Umi and Lagos. Yeah. No, and at least in Lagos, I looked apart, right? I had the pants, I had my filla kution, I knew exactly how to do it, but then when it came to swallow, I was like, just get adopted, this is good. And you got thrown out.

So yeah, yeah. That's a good, it's a good starter because you've gone light. Too often I make that mistake. I'm going to a restaurant and just going all guns blazing from the starter at the time. Every time I go to, have you been to the Hawksmore before? It's like a steak restaurant, it's a little chain of steak restaurants in London. There's some in Manchester as well. But they've got the best starter I've ever had, which is pork, it's pork belly, essentially, but it's pork belly ribs and they come out and do two of them for a starter with the nicest sauce on them. And every time I get that, I eat that and I think, well, that's my meal done now. So much delicious fat in it, but I'm like, I'm full and I've just ordered a Tomahawk steak.

It was an absolute disaster. I love it. You ordered a stop predictable. I love it. Because you are that guy. Where is that guy? He's here. I love it. I'm like, I'm full. I'm full already. Take that ice out of my cocktail. Can I, can I, can I tell you like at this dinner party though, I would invite Arsene Venger. Okay. I'm so, I'm Arsene Venger, huge Arsene Venger. I'm so miserable right now, right? Because Arsene was doing so bad. Right. And we don't even have an approach coming up to the season, right? And you every day is depressing

because if you go on your, your sports and like every day you see Manchester City buying a new player or Liverpool buying a new player or even United is getting the act together and Tottenham is now better than Arsene, right? Out of all places. And I was like, I can't, I'm like, I could escape this shit. It's, it's, it annoys me so much. So I was like, screw it. And I don't want to fold in and just become a Manchester City fan. You can't do that. You can't do that. You can't do that. You can't do that. We don't know that much about football, but we know you can't do that. Oh my God. Even me and Ed know you can't do that. Yeah. So, so I don't know who knew that or whatever, like you just can't do that.

Yeah. So what do you think I got where I was gone? I came back to my restaurant. What do you think I got from my guys? A brand new Manchester City shirt with my name on the back. I was like, that's horrible. So now I guess it is. Like, yep, yep, yep, yep. That'll be able to tell though. People like when you're eating that hair, that all the fish bones down your throat. The Man City fans will be able to tell that you're an Arsenal fan. If you could try and style that out. But it's a little bit like restaurants is the same thing, like anything like everyone want to get Orson Wenger out. They got him out. And now that he's wishing he would come back because like it's the same with restaurant or whatever you go to.

It was always better back then. No, it wasn't. Yeah. So if Orson Wenger's at this big outdoor meal that you've got going on, what are you talking to him about? Are you going to try and convince him to come back? I just be like, what happened, man? For 20 years. And it's just like, you have no idea how it is to be an Arsenal fan. You're almost always there. But it's like you're swimming. And you just can't quite get to the end. And you've been in the pool for a long time. I love the idea of you inviting Orson Wenger to Ethiopia to come for a dinner party. So excited, sitting outside, beautiful surroundings. And it's just you with a bottle of bourbon going, what happened, man? What happened? You and your friends, they calmed down.

It'll give you honest answer. It's the start. I mean, he's already had like his body weight in booze. So you're going to get some pretty honest answers. I would invite Gaston. He would definitely definitely. He'd bring his own sandwiches as well. So we come to your main course. Now, what I like so far is that your starter, so a lot of people would be like, oh, I had this great thing somewhere else. So I'm going to be like, here's my very favorite dish. Because you're a chef, you've basically created your, you've made your own starter there. So is that what we're doing with the main course? No, with the main course, there's two stations. There is a barbecue station where we're just

roasting and you've been cooking it for all day. And as a chef, you enjoy that. You're setting up. There's a smoke in the fire. You have your bourbon and your aqua meat. And with that, it's tons of vegetables that we just roast and grill. And then the other part of it is actually very traditional Ethiopian thing where you eat raw meat. You basically, I remember when my wife and I got married and we had a party in Ethiopia and all these like Westerns, like Swedes and Americans came and you basically have a butcher station where he just butchers the meat in front of you because most of the food in Ethiopia is vegetarian food. So you only basically eat meat at big occasions. So to see in these like New Yorkers coming with their plate and his butchers

carving raw meat. And it's not like a tartar where it's like actually finely chopped. It's actually cube of raw beef, right? And it's such an obscured, it's such a different way of eating. Yeah, totally. And there you are dipping like a good, you know, like cube of raw beef and you're dipping it into a little bit of berbera, this spice plant, right? And Ethiopians loves it because it's like, oh, we don't have meat that often and it's just like a big deal. But then I would love to see Arsène dip and you know, it would be brilliant. It would be brilliant. And is it a dish that like, do you like the taste of it? Is it something that you would look forward to? So I like the other, the chopped version of that is called kitfoil and it's like a beef tartar.

I love that version because you can swallow it, back to swallow it. You can swallow a little bit different. The very first time I had the big cubes, I was like, would I do that? And everybody else was just like eating this big, chewing on this big. It's difficult, but that's also what's great with traveling, right? It's so foreign to you. And you're really somewhere else, you know, and that would be cool. So you've gone from like opposite ends of the spectrum. That would take a long time. Yes. And I got to get the pork belly for my man. So there you go. You get to eat at the bit. So you say you're roasting vegetables and stuff on there. What sort of vegetables are you going for? I would probably go for like, let's say corn, a little bit of cabbage, like big things,

you know what I mean? Like, you just like get a little texture to it. And it's just lovely, like sweet corn, but with some, you know, cabbage or you just glaze a little bit and put a little bit maybe of honey on it or something like that. Nice. Nice. So we always talk to me and Ed, watch a TV show on Netflix called Barbecue Pit Masters, where people just, you know, competitive barbecue, basically. And it's a lot about who's the best at barbecuing. If you're like, because, you know, this is your dream meal. I don't want you working. I don't want you having to do it yourself. Thank you. I appreciate it. I've all the people in the world, all the pit masters or the people who do barbecue. Who is it that you want managing that barbecue station?

It's my man, Rodney Scott. He's the best barbecue guy in the world. Tell us a bit about him. No, Rodney is amazing. His father actually started in Livingstone in South Carolina. He's a mop guy and, you know, they smoke it all throughout the whole night. Now he moved to Charleston, but Rodney is amazing. He is, every barbecue guy knows like Rodney is the guy, what is it about his barbecue? I mean, it takes a long time. He does it with pork, you know, it's South Carolina, which has better fat content than beef. I would say my two favorite barbecue in the States is LA Barbecue in Austin, Texas. Somebody's incredible women. And then, and Rodney in South Carolina. Right. And I got to give it up for him to my man Rodney. Like Rodney

cooks with me. He comes to Harlem and cooks with me. We put him outside. He has his barbara, barbara, barbara. And the whole community comes up and he's just there carving and we give away for it. It's just everything. You listen to great music and it's his night and you just step aside and like, wow, this is special. This is cool. Yeah. And so your, your meal, he's doing some pork, and there's some beef, there's some raw beef. Yeah, exactly. But he would not have to do anything with raw beef. That would be like, I would like, like a real authentic Ethiopian butcher. Yeah. I don't know if he's going to stab me or it's like, you know, it's, it's, it's brilliant. You know, I probably have someone like, uh, I wanted Mark Pierro White there too. Like the old, the,

the young Mark Pierro, you know, like when I was coming up as a chef, right, there was, there was no, forget finding, I mean, it's before internet, right? So it's like, there's no connectivity. You have the French chefs, right? And Paul McClews and all that stuff. And all of a sudden you started to read about this guy from London. Like he had long hair, he, he, he smoked. I was like, fuck, this is unbelievable. And then one day my sister's actually given me this book called White Heat with a picture with him, long hair, cigarette. I was like, this kid is just like 10 years older than me. And for a black kid, it's like, he's not French and he got long hair. That was my level of diversity. Like if you fucking do it because he wasn't French.

And it was a true, I opened it for me like, oh fuck it. Sorry, I'm, I'm sorry. So if he can do it, I, I, you know, I, I, that was a big eye opener for me. It was like, it's really been three, four people in the world that really for me opened, you know, the door from change, everything from, I remember hearing Marco Pia White being interviewed once and it blew my mind because we're talking about like steak and dishes like that. And then, and he said, I never, if I'm doing steak on a menu, I never offer the diner the choice of how it should be cooked. I'm the expert. I tell you, that is brilliant. What a bad boy. Yeah. No, I love, and I, I mean, that book for me made me even more, you know, there's Charlie Trotter,

he passed away as an American chef. He changed American food scene also. Mark Pier White, there's this lady, she just passed away, Leah Chase. She just died 95 years, 96 years old. She just died like three, two months ago in Orleans. Like she set up a restaurant in the 40s and it's still open. And she set up the restaurant at a time where black and white people couldn't eat together. So the first 15 years of having the restaurant open, she broke the law every day because she invited everybody, all the musician, Kane, Frank Sinatra, Miles Davis, everybody. And I mean, she really took risks to stay open. All the things that we take for granted or like, you know what I mean? Like she sat, you know,

like she, she was arrested, all the civil rights movements was planned in her basement. It's like people, so Leah has always been somebody that completely changed for me. It's like, I went there, I knew her, I cooked with her. And Charlie Trotter, again, it was this idea of you don't have to be French. Like, you know, I was coming up that everyone was French. And I was like, how do I, how does, how does like a black sweet fit into this mix, right? And looking at Mark Pierro and looking at Charlie Trotter, that was like, wow, this is, you can actually do it. And I remember I saved up enough money to go to, I think it was called Mirabelle at the time, Mark Pierro's white high-end restaurant here.

You know, and I'd like borrow a like a jacket and, you know, I'd like waiters pants on and all this stuff. And I went there and it was horrible. It was all the money I had, right? And like, you know, they looked at who's this guy. Clearly, I couldn't afford wine. I mean, like, forget that. I was like, I'm here for the food. And it wasn't horrible. It was just like, you know, the kid that served me, right? He, he poured something on top of me right away, right? And you could tell like, he had no intention of cleaning me up. He just looked over and made sure that he would not be get yelled at. Like, I'm like 22. This kid is maybe like 23. He's looking at me. If you don't

say anything, I'm looking at the fire and I'm sitting there with sauce and my borrowed uncle's jacket. And I'm like, I'm eating the whole meal through that. And no one comes up and checks if I'm okay. They're only making sure like Mark Piero don't find out. And I was so confused about like, like, is this fine dining? But I am. I surely paid that was fine dining. This is the regime of terror because of one chef. And it was, but it was still amazing. And I, you know, I checked it off and I've had these epiphanies a bunch of like, you know, when you have no money and you're a young chef, and anytime you have a little bit of money, all you do is to go to that place and spend all your

money. It's just weird. You might work nine months to have one meal. And one time I went to France to eat at Alain Ducasse because I read that he served vegetarian tasting menu. And I was like, whoa, you can have multi-course vegetarian meal. I didn't believe it. I'm like, this is unbelievable. Like, I have to go. So same jacket rolling into Monte Carlo by myself. And I had a vegetarian tasting menu at like 20, you know, 23 broke again, of course. But this is unbelievable. Like it opens. It's like hearing Prince for the first time, like you hear like the wedding band and then you hear Prince like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, what is this? You know what I mean? Yep. I went for a meal recently with my family and the waiter spilled a load of stuff all over my dad.

But he spilled it and the waiter immediately, I'd never seen a waiter react like this before. I've seen waiter spills, but he spilled all of my dad and then he instantly went, oh, fuck it. Holy shit. That's all over you. But what happened to your dad? My dad was a sat there with stuff on it. And then eventually the guy was like, oh, do you want me to clean that up? And my dad was like, yeah, if you could just give me a cloth or something, that'd be great. So he got in the cloth. But at the end of the meal, the same waiter, we were paying for it. And the waiter went, but wait a minute, they should take that off. Yeah. Yes. We actually did get money taken off the bill at the end. And the waiter said,

said to us at the end, yeah, I've taken that money off for those dishes were free. Also, I just wanted if you could give me some tips. I've just started on the open mic comedy circuit. And I was like, brilliant. Given this guy tips, I was like, well, first of all, I know you thought that joke was funny at the start of the meal, but no one else laughs. So you got to really work on your own stuff. Yeah, make sure that slapstick doesn't really work in the club. Yeah. Yeah. Don't go. We just like, that's great. That's really good. I'm still checking out. I'm still thinking about your dad and all this stuff. And that would be even fun if he met his dad. Yeah. Yeah. Best person for it to happen to.

A very serious man, especially when the jokes on him, he does not like it. That was bad. Did you practice on your own, your family when you guys were coming up? Like, was your sister or brother's like, no, not again. I think I naturally have my brother and sister's sense of humor. They're so nice if my brother and sister come to see me. And there's some jokes in the set that have always been in the set, never really got laughs. Yeah. And I've been like, but I keep them in because I like them. Yeah, they're great. And then that night, my brother or sister is the only one I hear laughing and I realize that's why it's here. But it is, it's interesting because my, I grew up in a family I was the youngest

and my, my sister, she was always more talented than me, like whatever it was, right? Even cooking, even to this day, like I think about food and I go through it and emotional. My sister can come up with shit, right? Like in a different way. And so, you know, when you try it out stuff, you still have the dynamic of older and younger sister. So she's like, she's not a chef, but I try out it. She's like, you know, it's okay. But I'm like, what are you talking about? You don't know anything about this thing. But then she actually, we're the summer house together, right? She does a version of the next day. I'm like, fuck, it's good. She's like naturally gifted. And she's like, what are you going about? My dad, my dad will speak to me like he knows more

about comedy than I do. Because then that's the thing with comedy as well, is that everyone thinks they're an expert because everyone's made someone laugh in the past. Listen, that's cooking. And I'm like, everyone thinks they can cook. I'm like, you should just eat. You should just eat. I'm happy to fill that role. My dad will always come to us and go, yeah, it was a good show, better than last year's. And you're a little bit edgier this year. And I enjoyed that. You're well done. Oh, my dad is crazy. Is that fair enough? Pretty crazy. He would also be hilarious to drop a full tray of stuff on. Oh, I'd love to see someone drop a full tray of stuff on your dad. You're your side dish now. We come to your side. Nice. Now, you know, I'm quite excited because

obviously you've got, you've got this like barbecue there, raw meat there. Maybe the start is going to be like the bridge between the two of them. Maybe like her. And then there's this guy from Adria walks around asking Robert De Niro is coming. He knows also coming your dad with, you know, with the stuff, he's got to bring the stuff. My dad will be sitting in the splash there. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely tired of waves of food. Someone drops a whole cow on him. Yeah. Look at that. Look at that shit, he's got a whole cow on you mate. Oh, my God. Yeah. He'll be there. Oh, we go, my dad rarely gets invited to these dream restaurant meals. So this will be a good one for him. And I know he likes it. He likes that bread. So like, he'd be happy to start with.

Absolutely, so no sides. I would probably just do a lot of the vegetables that is there and then maybe something like really simple, but like a good pasta like a Good, not key or something like that just like because it's it's always comforting to having something like that just like You know based on potatoes, maybe some roasted garlic and then adding in Good olive oil some almonds and just like garlic and Maybe a little bit. Okay, I look greens. Just that's it I'm not you something that I've like probably only got into in the last like I know five years and study it and like

So I really like it, but I'd say I wouldn't know what makes a good one So you can make we can go through it. It's very yes You you want to you want to roast a potato for if you want to start there, right? So they don't get mealy and watery so you just roast sweet potatoes or potatoes just roast them until they're soft and you scrape them out and Then you add it you don't want you don't want them heavy. So that comes down to don't use too much flour, right? So this is your potatoes a little bit of olive oil a little bit of flour salt Maybe some nutmeg you want same time as you roast the potatoes. Maybe you roast two three pieces of

Garlic as well. You just mash that up. That's your knocking So the key thing on something a knock it gets heavy It's because of too much flour in it as you just want a little bit of flour to bind it Maybe an egg yolk just tie it all together. That's your knocking then You put a pan of water on and you just blanch them real cuz you drop them in Once the water is brought to a boil you lift them out and then you just put a hot pan on with olive oil Or clarified butter and then you just sear the knocky and then you add in a little bit of butter in the end salt pepper Do you know what I think that description there is gonna be our most re-listened to

The entire podcast we've ever done. I think a lot of people are gonna re-listen to that They'll be pausing it and doing that bit Me why did it go in? I wanna listen to that again So it's a drink. There's already been a few drinks. Yes, we've got there's some drinks rolling around Yeah, there's two there's two cocks two drinks that we're bringing in and it is would be There is a honey wine from Ethiopia called edge Which is basically looks like orange juice, but it's it's a honey wine and has that Super bright yellow and it's if you're not Ethiopian it it's it's weird, right because it has that fermentation

smells different and then but it's super delicious drink and Because it's so hot in Ethiopia, you're gonna get hammered You think like this is oh, it's just real sipping the wine and I actually I Drank yeah, one of the first things I was lucky enough to travel with Anthony Burden to Ethiopia Oh, wow one of the first things I did we went to this all honey wine bar And this is this is it's like a poor man's drink, right? So it's like you're in a marketplace and Tony is just so amazing like he He loved he doesn't want to stay at the hotel

He doesn't want to be any fancy stuff So one of my happiest memories with Tony is sitting in a honey wine bar with all these Traders and workers and you know, like just really rough place, right? And he's just sipping down honey wine and you know, we're getting hammered and we just having a good time You know, I mean yeah for you as well with with meals So like because it this is probably the first meal we've had I might be wrong But where there's a point where it's like and now we get hammered. Yes No one else have said that so why don't I think I don't know because this is the thing

Like for you does the meals get the taste differently as it's experienced it like what what is it about? Drunk dining that is more appealing. Well, I think dining a little bit Version of intoxication just you're outside your Ethiopia and there's a red will be dance and will be Ethiopian dance And if you're not coming from Ethiopia if you're from Ethiopia, it's natural. There's never a meal without dancing But since I will bring a lot of like you lot your dad is now there you will need To be hammered to hang with Ethiopia because it's all shoulder dancing

So it's a lot of that and I just think Actually just learned on the way over here. I just learned a new English word. We what was the word you're talking about? That's what we talked about Really only Jamie Oliver uses it Like it isn't like an old cockney turn So how would you say so I feel pucker today or is Like we use it like he'd eat something he's cooked and be like oh, yeah, that's pucker. Yeah Oh, that's maybe what if someone said how are you you wouldn't necessarily go I'm pucker

I am an immigrant I can actually do this because since you guys throwing us all out now anyway Not if you're trying to stay that would be the worst oh my god coming around going are you English you go? Yeah This is a pucker show today or yeah, you could show was pucker. Yeah Yeah, that's okay. I think Jamie Oliver's show that say this show was pucker. I'm gonna say someone's hair looks pucker I didn't notice her. I was like this brilliant when you can learn Jamie Oliver still says it. Does he still say pucker Jamie Oliver? I just picked this word up today. Thank you very much

With this video be an accent. I'm saying pucker Yeah, I've come to America just fuck Hello and stuff tablecloth by the way, I know it's a podcast people are gonna see it Awesome pucker tiny puffs that wait, but it was laid out for you. It's a pucker job. So we've got some pucker Ethiopian Yes, I realized that I told a lie there when I said that you're the only one who's like had let's get drunk at the meal The other person is Tom Kerich who's the other chef chef So maybe it's a chef thing because I was also telling a lot stories about chefs going out for meals Yeah, getting hammered. Yeah, every time and having meals together

I know maybe it comes back to what you're saying earlier about restoring the community It's like a sense of everyone together. Yes being drunk brings everyone together a bit more Yeah, you you want it also chef like you wanted to be a little bit of a shit show, right? Yeah, it's good It's delicious like you look you want you think imagine you like You go to a good concert. Mm-hmm. It's always a fight somewhere, right? Otherwise, it's not really a concert like I'm not talking about Carnegie Hall. I'm talking like Pitt like this Yeah, people gonna have a great time So you want a little bit of that you won't kind of your crazy uncle in the car

I grew up with a drunk uncle an amazing man. Yeah, my drunk uncle, right? And he was always in fights. Yeah, and my dad and my parents love was like don't go with him So of course you go with you realize like my uncle touchdown was brilliant because he is he Realized he was the only adult I knew that never was allowed a car, right? But when you're 11, you're like, oh, he bike I bike so I like my uncle better, right? And it's like at four o'clock in the afternoon. He always had a nap, right? And that's when he I took he gave us fish to sell and that's how you picked up your own, you know You know your little pocket money and he was always always in

Semi-fights with people always arguing about money or liquor or something like that But once he came back from his nap, he forgot everything what he was arguing about He went to the same people and we were biking and I met the whole fishing village through him, right? And my mom was always like is he the touchdown and she was always so worried But it was my the best time because you know, he's like the talk of the town He was it's just like so you need that when you have a dinner part touchdown is definitely there probably arguing with Arsene Venger and Touched and probably like saying like, you know what screw Robert Nero

I can be I'm an actor too or something because he was in America You know, when you're a kid you don't know if your uncle's a lion or not, right? But for me it was a big deal like my uncle have been to America I didn't know if he'd been there on vacation or He actually lived there like the story never finished because he was drunk all the time But he's like I know someone that was a big deal like someone to the state, you know, you like at 11 At least I probably spoke more English than him. Yeah, but you never check your uncle No, so do you need a little shitshow? Yeah

Yeah, we're getting we're getting a bit drunk. We've got the honey wine. Yeah, did you say there was gonna be another drink as well? Yeah, it's this it's this So we now have Swedish aquavit we have bourbon and then of course we need just a really nice beer like it Beer in Ethiopia is called Tella and it's it's also I love these type of alcohols Well, you have no idea like like when you're in the West like like 5.4% alcohol like in Ethiopia. There's not gonna be anyone measuring how much And I love that right and You know because people also don't always in the country. They don't go into the cars

I might have they still have maybe a pony carriage or just it doesn't mean anything like you can drink as much as you want So I would have Ethiopian Tella like Ethiopian beer and it it's it's almost like a It has sort of it's the feeling of a pale alien way, but it's more sour Okay, right. It's homemade. It's homemade and you're very often you have to take off the skim off the first layer Right there's some funk Little bit like shoes and mushrooms. Yeah, once you're we can And you know, you say like pucker beer So here we are wish it faced yes, what's next James the dessert's coming out the dessert

You know, which is my favorite course by the way As a starter boy, I like stars Where do you put all this I'm not sure I think I think my actual skin and bones are made of pudding Oh That's brilliant. I would go there in Sweden going back to the midsummer movie, you know, Sweden We have a dessert called Princess cake right so this ask all kinds of question. Was it the princess who made it? Why is it called so this is marsupine cake green marsupine food coloring like, you know whipped cream

So the layers you have sponge cake then raspberry strawberry jam and then you have a little bit of Cream and then you do this dome and it's when your kid is delicious, right? It's so many layers and colorful as well. Colorful is why is it green? So I would do like princess cake for everyone. I think that would be a lot of fun And of course it has to end up with a food fight in the end Imagine or some vangers throwing prince of cake at your dad My dad's like by that point He's covered he's completely covered anyway the food fight starts he's just absolutely getting in there

Amazing that would be a good restaurant Who makes the best princess cake in your lifetime? Who's giving you the best? Is it when you had yeah, my grandmother? Helga she was She was a really good cook, but It's the way she took time to show me how to do it, right and I wouldn't be chef I wouldn't be here to talk to you guys Having these incredible tablecloth here if it wouldn't be for my grandmother Helga, I wouldn't honestly she was one of those

This is like different but when I when I so I started to travel a very young for cooking So with Japan and then to Switzerland and then to France and all that stuff and I remember back then like on Sundays I called my grandmother and she first looked like Marcus calling long distance hang up. I'm like no, it's okay Like I'm putting my coins in and I had to explain the food that we did like imagine like It's like minute by minute like here are the carrots and the fish looked like this and that was how we connected We really talked about oh, what do you mean they have like tuna is that same as mackerel? And it was purple and like I did describe everything that we did and it's a draw

Like how can that be wrong like it was like and that was one of my favorite conversations ever And like, you know, you had like at that point Maybe it was Swiss Franks or 20 Swiss Frank whatever then it was just erupted and at the same time You have your grandfather in the back And it is back and forth between the two of them and yeah So let's read your order back to you see if you're happy with it Yeah, you feel about it. So what are you would like some still water? Yeah begin with You would like some injera blip bread from Ethiopia with some variety of dips

Start you'd like ceviche and you got vodka in the ceviche and what else were you having in that? We have bourbon at the same time Mine you would like what bourbon by the way, I just want to nail that down. I mean, I think we will actually go a little bit like it would be a Bourbon from Kentucky and then I would actually put peanuts caramelized peanuts in it. Oh, that's a really cool like I'm glad I asked that question. That sounds absolutely amazing in the bourbon. Yeah, delicious Your main course you have what he's got man in the barbecue. Yeah, and then you've got Marco Pierre white Cut up some Ethiopian war beef for people. Yes. Yeah screaming at people

Smoking away. Yeah side dish got some knocking roasted with garlic almonds and kale your drinks You have if you open honey wine and some teller Yeah, if you open beer and dessert your princess cake made by your grandmother. Yeah, feel good about that That's a party party that I think out of all the menus we've had that that meal is a full journey as well It is you took us through that. I feel the whole the whole way there Yeah, I felt I think everyone was sitting in the desert during that That was incredible. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. There's a lot of fun See you guys in shortage. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, sure. That's a little pocket time. Yeah, that's a perfect

Marcus Samuelson. Oh, okay. You didn't tell me you were gonna say scrum diddly-umptious there. That's how I felt Yeah, that's how you felt. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it was a great meal and featuring things that I didn't even know were things Things I didn't know were things people didn't know were people It's the best sort of episode. So many people this big party in the desert I never would have thought on this podcast. We'd have raw raw beef raw beef Chunker raw beef and like on the opposite end of the spectrum some beef is being awesome pork has been cooked for ages Yeah, I love it. I like is really Fascinating delicious sounding menu. Thank you very much. I'm not a chia seed in sight

Thank the Lord for that because I was enjoying his company so much But if you said a chia seed, he would have been out that window felt so bad. So sorry Marcus I'm really glad that no chia seeds popped up there Um, if you like the cut of Marcus's jib his restaurant red rooster is open in Shawditch And if you like the sound of that, you can go on to redroosterldn.com Check it out. You can follow Marcus on Twitter at at Marcus cooks Can people follow you on Twitter? Oh, they can at a gamble comedy mate. What about you at James A. Caster? Yeah, so there you go. We got a full to fully follow this episode on twitter. You can now

Also, uh, if you live in London and you feel like come to see me do my final performance ever of my blizzard show I am doing the shepherds bush empire on december the 20th Very nice. The perfect way to kick off your christmas holidays. I should cocoa What's that mean? I don't know. Is that I should say so? Is that what? Yeah, oh, I should I should cocoa very much. Yeah, so pop along to the shabu amps to come and see me december 20th Go on to my website at gamble.co.uk for information on tickets My books just come out perfect sound whatever it's about how 2016 is great this year for music of all time

And uh, may I say I've read it and I loved it. I'm thinking about me in the future now. Yeah, yeah Yeah, because james won't send me a Preview copy. Um, if you like this podcast and you haven't subscribed to what the hell are you playing at? Subscribe on wherever you get your pod shops far from the pod shop Go down in the pod shop Sling in a review give it five stars. Lovely stuff. Thank you so much for listening again and say goodbye james. Goodbye Hello, it's me Amy glad to you might remember me from the best ever episode of off menu where spoke to my mum and asked her about seaweed on

uh mashed potato and Our relationship's never been the same since and I am joined by me and smith. I would probably go bread. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna spoil In case get him on james and ed, but we're here sneaking in to your Podcast experience to tell you about a new podcast that we're doing. It's called northern news It's about all the new stories that we've missed out from the north because look we're too northerners sure But we've been living in london for a long time. The new stories are funny Quite a lot of them crimes. It's all kicking off and that's a new podcast called northern news

We'd love you to listen to maybe we'll get my mum on get glills mum on every episode That's not the news. When's it out? Ian? It's already out now. Amy. Is it? Yeah get listening. There's probably a backlog You've left it so late