Ep 199: Celya AB

Hello, it's Ed Gamble here from the Off Menu Podcast.

Hello, it's James A.

Caster here from the Off Menu Podcast.

And before the episode starts, we'd like to talk to you about All Our Relations, a non-profit co-founded by your friend of mine, comedian Jen Brister, and Georgia Takax.

Yes, All Our Relations was originally started to support 15 families in Gaza when the genocide started, but now supports 21 families and funds several mutual aid projects, including two seven-day food kitchens and two mobile food parcel delivery schemes, as well, feeding hundreds of families in Gaza every single day.

They've created an absolutely amazing thing.

And we feel like, you know, it's the off-menu podcast.

We talk about food and we are very lucky to eat wonderful food and have access to absolutely brilliant food all of the time.

And I think we need to talk about people who have access to no food, James.

Absolutely.

So if people would like to donate, please go to allourrelations.co.uk or look at the links in Jen Brister's bio on Instagram.

Every penny raised go to supporting people in Gaza.

Thank you so much and enjoy the episode.

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Welcome to the Off-Menu podcast, taking the pork of humor, all the other nasty bits from a pig, mashing it all up in a blender of the internet, and piping it into the sausage case thing of friendship.

Sausage.

That was a gamble.

My name is James A.

Caster.

We own a dream restaurant and we invite a guest in every single week.

Ask them their favour ever.

Starter, main course, dessert, side dish, and drink, not in that order.

And this week, our guest is...

Celia A.B.

Celia A.B., a wonderful comedian, James.

So funny.

I've been gigging a lot with Celia these past a couple of years.

A couple of years.

I'd say.

Always has a fantastic gig.

Yes.

Brilliant gangsmith.

Brilliant gangsmith.

So many jokes in James.

Seljuk has turned into a terrible comedy critic.

Also, Celia has house sat for me.

Yes.

A little bit of trivia.

Cat sat.

Cat sat.

Got some kittens, needed them looked after.

Yep.

Selya loves his kittens now.

James got kittens, realised he didn't have the capacity to look after them.

No way.

And then had to get someone else to do it for him.

That's the way I do it.

And I only trust gagsmiths to look after my kittens.

Yeah, real gagsmiths.

Looking forward to chatting to Celia, James.

Very much so.

However, as with every episode, if Celia says the secret ingredient, an ingredient which we deem to be unacceptable, we will have to kick Celia out of the restaurant.

See you later, Celia.

And this week, the dream ingredient.

The dream ingredient?

No, not the dream ingredient.

The secret ingredient.

The dream ingredient in the secret restaurant is

Pana Shokala.

Now, it's quite...

I know a lot of people love Panachocola, but I had a big routine about Panachocola in my show.

Yes.

And Seli came to see the show, and I did a French accent for a long time, and Celia is French.

Yes.

And she found it offensive.

It's a little bit of an in-joke.

Yes.

It's a bit of an in-joke.

But now we're making it an out-joke.

We love Panachocola.

However, Ed is very critical of the English...

breakfast buffet pano chocolas that you get in hotels in this country not enough chocolate not enough chocolate too much pan it's a good bit so i would say it's specifically

those panachalas those those ones are too much air in them yes the airy panachocola that we would go and air is a french band they are a french band and moon safari still seen as a classic yes i did there was originally a joke in the routine about the french band air but i found it very difficult to make it work yeah yeah i mean even my audience aren't going for that mate no no no that's no that's very difficult so if sellia says panachocola see you later see you later but hopefully that won't happen We'll see.

We'll see.

This is the off-menu menu of Celia A.B.

Welcome, Celia, to the Dream Restaurant.

Hello.

Welcome, Celia A.B., to the Dream Restaurant.

We've been expecting you for some time.

Where did he come from?

Where did I come from?

That's a good question.

Yeah.

Oh, please explain the format to me.

I'm not familiar with it.

Sometimes when people come in and they're not familiar with the format, and i have to explain that james is a genie i never feel more like an idiot looking really imagine i feel in that situation you feel you just sit there looking being a weirdo i feel i felt i feel silly you're just describing him being a genie yeah and you feel like an idiot yeah i feel like an idiot

sitting there going i have to pretend to be a genie in front of an adult and i try and say with my eyes just go just go along with this he lives in a fantasy world

so much tech actually way more than i expected way too much way too much tech actually for a podcast

can you describe to the the listeners what you saw when I burst out the laugh?

Oh, yeah.

So, do you know at the um when you do live at the Apollo, there's like a big smoke machine.

Yeah, you've got the exact same one.

Yeah, it's like I can't see you anymore.

There's so much smoke around.

It's just that.

It's just the Apollo smoke machine.

It's just the Apollo smoke machine that rent it out every week.

It's too much, in it.

That smoke machine.

Yeah.

Oh, God, it's far too much.

I can't relate.

I feel absolutely fine, actually, from the seats when you watch it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It feels pretty great.

Well, let me tell you, it is too much.

And when you do it, all you'll think about, when you should be thinking about doing Live at the Apollo, you'll be thinking about James as a genie.

So bad luck.

It's really going to put you off.

Has anyone ever come out vaping?

Oh, yeah, they should.

That's a good plan.

That would be funny.

Yeah.

Write it down, Benjamin.

You just got yourself booked.

I know.

You'll be getting a call from them.

We heard you got a pretty good gag, huh?

Smoking a cigarette.

Yeah.

We heard you got a pretty good idea.

We need to get it down at the Apollo.

So hold on.

Are they smoking a cigarette when they're talking to you?

Everyone smokes.

They smoke everywhere, apparently.

My idea of booking Live Video Apollo is the whole process, there's a man with a tiny mustache smoking in the room.

Yeah, there's actually not a smoke machine.

That's just their meeting room.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, so when it opens up, they're all just sitting there going, the shell's going okay.

I'm going to make you shtar.

That's good.

Yeah.

I like when Selia does

characters.

Oh, there's a lot to come.

It's funny when I do characters because I've got an accent.

So it adds, I think it adds a bit of layers, actually.

I mean, we've all got accents.

Yeah.

Whoa.

Do you like when Ed does characters in his stand-up show?

I did not talk about it.

That's really come up early.

I was going to ease that in.

Yeah, but then we got into doing characters on stage.

I did pre-warn you before you came to see my show that I end by doing what I considered to be a French accent for 10 minutes.

Well,

the story is Ed said, oh, you're French.

Here's a little anecdote that relates to where you're from.

In my stand-up show, sometimes I do a bit of a French accent.

and then I was like, do you know what?

Ed's a nice guy.

That's fine.

It's probably no more than 60 seconds.

And then I went to see your lovely show at DiApollo.

So much longer.

So much longer.

So much longer.

I absolutely loved walking into the little bar afterwards.

My friends and family were there.

Well done on the show, Ed.

And then I looked around the room.

Selia was stood there like a, like a pissed off teacher looking at me like, how dare you?

Do you know it was so long that for a bit it changed my accent?

look it's good stuff good accent though 10 minutes he's pretending to be a panachocola yeah holding his uh extended fingers out where his nipples are for the whole thing i haven't been able to have a panachakala since no and it's because every time i walk past one i see your your face as you follow holding your little fingers like this i'm actually stood behind you the whole time oh no you can see me reflected in the bakery window that's why i can hear the accent i thought it was my memory did you think ed's observations about panachakala were valid at least here's the thing uh i I was fuming,

but then I looked at my stand-up

and then realised that, in a way, the 10 minutes that you did is very little compared to the 20 minutes I have about Britain.

So, you know.

Yeah, you destroy us.

I do.

Although I don't, it wasn't the destroyer.

I'm actually really lovely.

I'd say

it wasn't about French culture.

You know, it was more about British culture, my bit, about breakfasts in British hotels and those tiny.

Oh, is it an essay?

Is it?

Yeah, it's a video.

So No, it's actually very intelligent and clever, by a bit.

It's more of a, this is more of a note sap thing

when he's got in trouble.

Yeah.

Oh, there he is.

He's opened a Cherry Pepsi Max.

There we go.

This is the first time a Cherry Pepsi Max has been drunk on the podcast, I believe.

Oh, that is a lovely drop.

Have you had a Cherry Pepsi Max before, Sally?

Yeah, I think they taste like medicine a little bit.

Can I smell it?

Medicine for the soul.

You have a little sniff of my drink.

Oh, hello.

Nice to meet you.

How would you describe the bouquet there to the listener?

Bouquet.

I think it smells floral, like a bouquet.

But it also smells like if you had an entire one, it would kind of re-upholster your entire body.

It makes me feel a bit sick, actually.

Yes.

Yeah.

What if someone in this room...

naming no names, has a litre bottle of it at home right now.

I'm just looking forward to drinking it when they get back.

Would this person be drinking the whole litre bottle?

No, no, they won't be be drinking the whole eater bottle because they had two pints of it last night.

I've seen the inside of your fridge, James.

Yes.

Yeah, that's true, actually.

And a lot of condiments, a lot of sweets, and just a big litter of Diet Coke or Coke in any way.

Pepsi.

Yeah.

This is great.

We've never had like an inside James's fridge review.

Sethia's been in my house, you know, on her own

for a week.

You were living in the walls, weren't you?

I was living in the walls.

I think I hung out with the cats.

yeah yeah it was the best week of my life to be honest it was it was lovely i thought like you you looked like you had a good time i had a lovely time we had a group chat yeah you and the cats yeah but i had a group chat with uh james and uh his lovely girlfriend where i sent pictures of the kittens but then i had a group chat with the cats where i sent pictures of james

because they were missing us yeah yeah yeah yeah

they appreciated that actually they did it's good to keep them remembering who we are as well that was my main concern coming back from holiday was they'll have forgotten us and they'll think sell you as their new like mutton.

And I was very, very worried about that.

The great thing is that cats absolutely couldn't care less.

Yeah.

Every morning I'd wake up, I'd put an episode off menu, being like, that's daddy.

But yeah, so you've seen the fridge.

Yeah.

I mean, sweets and diet coke isn't going to surprise anyone, I guess.

No, condiments.

A lot of condiments because...

Initially, when you got halfway through that word, I thought you were going to say there were condoms in the fridge.

Yeah.

I like to keep my dick cooled.

A dick can be too hot.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I want to cool it down.

I think when it starts smoking, that's a problem, isn't it?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Steaming.

But the steam coming out of it.

Oh, no.

Yeah.

Live at the Apollo.

Yeah.

Well, I tell you.

For a long time, James was backstage at Live at the Apollo, putting a cold condom onto his hot dick, and that's what was...

What communicated condom up is like is Live at the Apollo?

Down now, down, down, down, down, down, down.

Please don't be on the stage, lost voice guard.

Do you know when everyone was saying that James had stopped doing stand-up because he was tired of having his dick warm all the time?

My dick is too warm.

I can't do it.

No, okay, do you go back there?

And you show them.

Here's a question.

Debecca, this is my favorite question to ask.

Like, top 10.

Do you think in your life you've had more ketchup or more mayo?

Mayo.

I was going to make fun of that being your favorite question to ask.

Never remember, this is how we make a living.

Fucking shut up.

I think probably Mayo.

Yeah,

i'll never be like oh i need ketchup with chips i need to have ketchup in that but mayo i definitely i prefer mayo

big time big time bad ketchup is worse than bad mayo correct i think i've had more ketchup yeah you're a ketchup boy yeah yeah yeah ketman ketchup boys yeah that's what they say yeah about ketchup boys yeah yeah i think the catman ketchup crew yeah i think yeah the cat oh Do you have ketchup and listen to last ketchups as well?

Yeah, yeah, we do.

Yes.

I'm on tweeting about that.

I think anyone listening from Ketring will have the same answer as me.

I think they'll all be Ketchup, not Mayo.

Yeah.

I've been to Kettering.

Have you?

Yeah, I did a gig in Kettering.

I did another gig in Corby.

Yeah.

Which is the enemy of Kettering.

Yeah, yeah.

If there's anyone listening from Corby, fuck you.

How do the gigs compare?

Kettering, I can't remember it, but Corby was at the back of a holiday and on like DM1 or something.

Oh, yeah.

And the manager was at the front of the gig.

It was like in a veranda.

And she didn't didn't have shoes on.

The manager didn't have shoes on.

She took off her shoes.

It's because what people don't know, Ketrin is like a, back in the day, we would make shoes.

That was like the main industry in Ketrin.

So Corby hates Ketmin so much that they refused to wear shoes.

When do you wear Kettering?

Tomatoes.

We wear fucking shoes in Ketrin because we're proud.

And so that was a ketchup.

The first pair of boots up Everest were made in Ketrin.

Wow.

No, it's not.

Yep.

First pair of boots.

Edmund Hillary, top of Mount Everest, was wearing boots that were made in Ketron.

I feel like...

Benito's googling that.

I won't fucking lie, man.

I feel like my disbelief is suspended somewhere.

Oh, no.

Sartre.

Sartre.

I think

we can all agree Sartre was French.

Oh, fuck off.

I would appreciate it if someone could pronounce it correctly, Ed.

Sorry.

Sartre.

John Paul Sarty.

Benito's nodded his head.

It's true.

Yes, it's real.

No.

Yeah.

Hey, it's good because you laugh and you learn.

It's good.

Tell us about this Corby gig.

So she had no shoes on.

She had no shoes on.

Which is quite ideal.

That's quite French.

I'm surprised you didn't feel at home.

No shoes.

I forgot.

I forgot to take off my shoes.

She had no shoes on, and we were, my friend Danny, and I were doing both half an hour, which I was too new to do half an hour anyway.

And I tried to do crowd work with her about how she wasn't wearing shoes.

With the manager of the venue, yeah.

Within like six months of doing stand-up.

Obviously, it went really well.

No, she didn't like me at all.

And then I I had 28 minutes to go.

Did all the material I'd ever written and then my friend Danny, which we used to call Crowdwork King.

The Crowdwork King?

The Crowdwork King.

And Danny was in the back having a cocktail where this was happening, just like swirling his drink, going, oh, wait till she sees me.

The crowd working.

The crowd work king, having a cocktail, swirling his cocktail on the back.

My friend tell me that sometimes I add whimsy to memories.

He was sweating as it would drink.

And then went on stage, first thing first, he said, weren't you wearing shoes?

The king.

Watch and learn.

Why are you not wearing shoes?

Long live the king.

We always start with still a sparkling water on the podcast.

Do you have a preference?

Yes, I do.

I would like,

are we already in a dream restaurant?

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

There's a preemptive thing that I want to say about the dream restaurant.

Please.

I want the dream restaurant to be exactly a 20-minute walk from my house.

So I can walk to the restaurant, have a lovely stroll, think about what I'm going to have.

But then on the way back, 20 minutes is the perfect time to kind of start digesting.

But you're like not home straight away because that weirds me out when you're home straight away after a minute.

That's a really, really good point that no one's ever brought up.

A nice little stroll,

but also to eat and then suddenly just be back in your it feels weird doesn't it feels weird like if you ever eat in a hotel that you're staying in oh yeah no that's and then you're just suddenly in your room it's like it didn't happen yeah it's like you've dreamt the whole meal yeah maybe this holiday in in court that manager did have cheese

shoots from kettering no way no way shoots from kettering we won't conduct ourselves like that

So a nice 20-minute stroll after the meal, pre- and post-meal.

Yeah, and an hour before the meal, I want a packet of

Walker's crisps the plain ones that's what i want an hour before the meal why because i really like them and i've i've started dipping them in soy sauce so it's extra salty wow and it's delicious but why is this an hour before the meal why because because i'm gonna get hungry and i'm gonna be like i can't eat a full meal because i'm gonna go for a full meal yeah so i want something light that will satisfy me yeah and it's always a packet of walkers they're delicious

in soy sauce soy sauce on on birthdays soy sauce on birthdays yeah on big days soy sauce.

When did you start dipping up in the soy sauce?

It was on a coach between Wales and Edinburgh

in 2018.

I remember it vividly.

It was really sad because I had to leave the fringe before to host a gig that didn't, in hindsight, pay me enough to leave Edinburgh before.

And I got a meal deal and had some sushi.

and then some crisps and then there was a bit of soy sauce left and then i thought you know what live a little i bought a coach back to edinburgh yeah give it a go.

Tried it.

And then I just had to stop myself from telling the rest of the coach.

Getting on the microphone.

It was so good.

Were you sat next to someone?

No, I think if I was, they would have moved.

Yeah.

The crazy woman, they've been stuck in the middle.

Yeah, that's very, it's a very coach thing to do.

You always see someone doing something like that.

And in fact, no shoes.

No shoes on the coach.

You see that?

Does it annoy you when people take off their shoes on long coaches?

Yeah, I hate it.

Really?

When they do it on a a plane, I hate it.

Yeah.

Really?

Well, not on a long.

Hang on.

On a long flight.

Do you have slippers?

Surely.

Disgusting.

On a long flight, surely you're taking your shoes off, Joe.

I'll undo my shoe later, so I'll loosen my shoes.

I ain't getting them.

Well, that's weird.

But you love socks.

Surely you want to show them off.

You love socks.

I do love socks.

Hold on.

What?

I've got it in my head that you love socks.

I've never seen that then.

Yeah.

You do love socks.

I don't love socks, do I?

You wear wacky socks, then.

You love...

He's a bit of a wacky guy.

Yeah.

I don't know.

And you wear socks to show everyone how wacky wacky you are yeah you got to wacky from from from head to toe are they wacky those they're not that wacky actually got a little pattern put your shoes on james

so on like a 10-hour flight you wouldn't take your shoes off i'm loosening them i'm not that's weirder that's not weirder like it's a tie and you're a businessman who's just finished work i know take them off the businessman who just finished work

that's so do you sit with your coat on as well and gloves yeah i loosen them big i loosen all of them so they're like kevin in home alone too

Well done for just naming another cool person.

So

far your attempts to make me look dumb have all failed.

Trying to eat your in-flight meal wearing mittens.

Wear mittens.

Look,

I'll take my coat off, sure.

But then it's like, I'm not, you know,

nobody wants your cheesy feet.

No, but cheesing up the plane.

My feet aren't cheesy.

Thank you very much.

I don't know.

When we came back, when you've been house sitting, the whole house stacked cheese.

Walking into a big cheese house.

James being like, but she is French.

So maybe we should just be eating loads of cheese.

Yeah, she should be just eating loads of cheese.

She should be bringing every fucking room in this house.

No, she has.

I told you that would happen.

Are you going to listen to me?

Stuffed the pillows with goat's cheese.

Livid.

Chevre.

Chev che Chevre.

Chevre.

Wonderful.

Chevrere.

Chevre.

Don't even know what that means.

It sounds like Deborah when you say.

I don't know if Chevre is the cheese or the pillow French for pillow.

What?

You don't know what Chevre is?

Chevre.

Sorry, Chevre.

Chevy cheves.

Chevre.

Chevre cheese.

It means goat.

Oh.

Yeah.

No, of course I don't know that.

I never had to say goat in French before.

Do you want to try?

Chevre.

Chevre?

Yeah, Chevre.

Perfect.

Chevre.

Perfect.

Chevre?

Chevre?

Chevre.

Oh, fuck, I'm not doing that.

I prop a panic when I have to try and speak another language.

Do you?

Yeah.

When I was a kid, I was 13, learning French at school, and then we went to France for the first time, my family, I'd never been abroad before, and stopped at a service station on the way to the holiday home.

And my dad was like, right, you're learning French, so you just got to get your stuff yourself.

And so I had a train in the service station, had to queue up, this windy queue, went to the front, said what they'd taught me to say in school.

And then the guy came back with a whole load of stuff that they hadn't said in school.

I didn't know what to do.

And I panicked.

And everyone behind me started getting really impatient.

It was the most horrible feeling.

ever since then,

I don't even try.

You don't do it anymore.

No way.

No way, Jose.

That was another language.

You're rhyming in different languages.

Look at you.

I can rhyme.

I'm like a rhyming in other languages.

Yeah, you could go to Spain and, you know,

you could muddle through with No Way Jose.

Yeah, I could muddle through with that.

I could muddle through with Ferejenka when I go to France.

So it's not really a rhyme, they rhyme it with its own words.

No, it's a banger, though.

What it's on every morning.

it on.

Ah banger, brother James.

Brother.

In France, when I was learning English on the last year of high school, my English teacher was Irish and she was from Cork.

And she had the strongest accent that I've ever heard in my life.

So for a whole year, there were French kids running around with French Cork accents.

Great.

And she taught us that bloody was

a swear word.

So she was like, oh, don't say bloody because that's a swear word.

Of course, we're 17, we just started saying bloody.

Running around saying bloody as a 17-year-old.

old most pathetic pathetic act of rebellion ever

like the tough kids at school uh would be like bloody and then i was like oh wow that's that's a big guy

big guy that's like that's a gangster i'm scared of him i was rubbish at french at school you wouldn't believe it given my accent now but we had to watch laen i love that film yeah but it's fucking depressing and it really puts you off learning french yeah it's a brilliant film yeah i hate it actually plus we all fan it's a teacher so that was it's a great film oh yeah

Did you see it?

No, I've not heard of that film.

So it's called Latin, which means hate.

And it's about like kids, three kids in the suburbs of Paris, like the Bon Lieux, and what they're day to day is like going into Paris.

And it kind of links to like police brutality.

Really fun stuff.

Yeah.

It's a really good film.

You'd love it.

Yeah, it sounds nice.

I think I'd like it.

Yeah.

So we learned loads of great stuff, loads of great vocab from that film.

Police brutality and sort of racism in France.

It's great.

We've found quite in that film.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We haven't even found out if you want still a sparkling water.

We asked you like an hour ago.

But we know

you want it to be 20 minutes from your house.

You want the walkers

ready salted with the soy sauce.

An hour before.

An hour before.

Yeah.

So I want a big pint of really, really sparkling water with ice.

I almost want no water, almost just bubbles.

Okay.

And I want that before the meal.

And I don't want to drink the whole thing.

I want maybe four or five sips.

And then throughout the meal, I want tap water.

And crucially, I don't want to have to ask for more tap water to be refilled because I always feel like a dick when I do it.

And they never notice it.

And I just want someone to notice as soon as they see the bottom of this glass,

they top it back up with tap water.

Right.

Got you.

That's what I want.

Straight away.

But when it's at the bottom.

Because I don't like it sometimes if you're in a restaurant and I'll have a sip of my water, put it down, and they're, look, they come around and they top it up.

Why don't you like that?

Because I don't like them when they're hovering all the time, constantly popping up.

I'm trying to talk to the person that I'm having dinner with.

They're popping in, topping up, topping up.

I can't even have a sip of this without this person.

So they do that with food as well.

They replace it.

I told you what my dad does.

I've told you this before.

I think you probably.

If people are hovering and topping stuff up, he'll go, no, leave that there, and you don't need to come here anymore.

Yeah.

I respect it.

I'm going to be, when I grow up, I think I'm going to turn into Ed's dad.

I want to see a version of this podcast with both your dads.

Listen, the idea has been floated.

Yeah.

Oh, not with both our dads.

It's not.

We've talked about the idea of having your dad on.

There is absolutely

just my dad and your dad talking.

Yeah.

I wouldn't even listen to that.

I think we would have to have a guest doing their dream menu.

Who's going to be the guest?

Our dad was someone famous.

Bonito's dad.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Benito's dad is the guest.

No, Benito's dad is the producer.

That's perfect because Benito's dad is so kind yeah

such a nice man our dad would destroy it

he mints me oh brilliant this sparkling water you said you want it to be almost no water mainly bubbles yeah is that not air Do you know how like honey has like holes, but then there's like little bits of honey?

Or like Montal cheese has like, I want

yeah, I want big bubbles and the reason for that is I really like how it feels on my teeth.

I really like how the bubbles surround my teeth.

It feels like they're brand new.

Yeah.

Yeah, I relate.

Yeah, you think that too, don't you?

Yes, I think it cleans your teeth in the morning.

Yeah, it feels like

a little spa day for the teeth.

Absolutely.

100%.

Spa day for the teeth.

Spa day for the teeth.

But you want it's like so many bubbles that like this sounds like it would feel like an electric toothbrush.

No, not this many bubbles.

Sorry.

Right for your mouth.

So in between lame sparkling water and electric toothbrush, on the spectrum, there I want it to be maybe like 20% almost to electric toothbrush, but not painful.

And I want it to be very cleansing.

Do you think you can get too bubbly of water, though?

So, does it get to a point where it doesn't feel cleansing?

What if you took a sip of this water

and then you opened your mouth and realized that it'd turn your teeth back into baby teeth?

What if that?

So, what if that?

What if that?

Let's think about that for a a while, actually.

What if that, though?

There we come to a section of the podcast called What If That?

What if that with Ed Gamble?

Where's James?

James not involved.

James not involved.

Yeah.

No guests.

Yeah, just me saying, what if that?

What if that, though?

Well, let me, let me swing in the pot here.

Let me put this in.

What if?

What if this?

What if?

That's a good twist.

That's my version.

What if this?

What if this sparkling mortar that's really, really sparkling?

Yeah.

It will feel the best you've ever...

That good feeling that you're talking about, it will feel the best it's ever felt.

The best feeling that you've ever got from sparkling water.

But it will turn your teeth back into baby teeth.

What is that?

What if that?

I'd have to say, no, I like my teeth.

Yeah.

I'd have to say, if it's half and half, I'll do it.

What if you had half baby teeth and half your teeth now?

Top half or bottom half.

What you choose.

Oh, no.

I was imagining it.

Oh, left and right.

Left and right.

I would happily have to.

Alternate?

Yeah.

It's up and down or higgledy-piggledy.

Yeah.

What if that?

Don't get the chance to say that I think that might be the first use of higgledy-piggledy on the podcast.

I've never heard that before.

I like the sound of it.

Can you say it again?

Higgledy-piggledy.

Oh, it's lovely.

That English teacher didn't teach you that word.

No.

Busy teaching you all the effing and jeffing.

I think I'd go for bottom.

Bottom baby.

Bottom row, baby.

It's got to be bottom row baby.

Bottom row, because when you smell, you don't.

Now, these guys could stay hidden their whole lives, really.

That's part of what they look like.

Yeah, it's got to be bottom row, higgledy, piggledy, baby.

Yeah.

Then I'd get

then I'd get lip fillers just for the bottom to make sure.

Yeah, a huge lip to cover it.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

So

in short, sparkling water.

Yes.

but i only go into sparkling water when i stopped smoking and my theory is that it feels like having a cigarette in your mouth wow because it i don't know what it did to me it did something to my tongue and it it hit the spot of like what smoking felt like yeah i haven't i haven't looked into this interesting we've not heard this before no we've not having a sparkling water is like having a cigarette hot ciggy i have i have a sparkling water when i go to stuff on the way

sparkling water after banging yeah

you don't mind if i do do you have to to nip outside a pub to have a sparkling water.

In the morning, I have a coffee and a sparkling water.

I have a sparkling water after banging just to cool my dick off.

Oh, no, you've got to be careful, though, man.

If you dip your dick in the sparkling water, it could turn it back into a baby dick.

Oh, no, oh no.

I got a baby dick.

Please don't leave, baby.

Don't leave.

I swear.

I didn't know it would happen.

I put my dick in sparkling water and I got a baby dick.

Please don't leave, baby.

What if that?

Can I ask you a question, though?

I think about that.

That's another one of my questions.

Do you think it would feel nice to have a whole bath filled with sparkling water?

Like, how?

Because, you know.

I mean, if someone offered it to me, I'd definitely say yes.

I'd want to know what that felt like.

Yeah.

I think it would feel nice.

I think it'd feel incredible.

Like a jacuzzi.

For a bit, but then would it would it feel a bit weird and sort of stagnant?

It would flatten out.

Yeah, it would flatten out.

But then you could.

What's that thing that makes bubbles?

That thing you can buy?

Soda stream.

Soda stream, yeah.

You would have a a soda stream like um like where the taps should be yeah like you're a hamster

thing is soda streams don't work so i think if you made a soda stream

it would probably flood your entire bathroom yeah because they don't they tend to like explode a lot

yeah so that's a no for that is it yeah yeah it's a no for me if you had a bath of sparkling water i'm imagining it with a slice of lemon in it would you do that oh hello hello how many lemons i'd have a lot of slice of lemon cucumbers in it yeah cucumbers yeah you'd feel great yeah You'd feel like a drink.

You'd feel like a little umbrella.

A drink.

Yeah, I do think you'd feel like a little umbrella.

I think it would be fun to wear one of those hats that makes your head look like an umbrella as well.

Yeah.

So I think if you had loads of slices of lemon in there,

great.

One slice on its own would feel dirty.

That would feel like there's litter in the bath.

Yeah.

Loads of slices of lemon, weirdly, would feel clean, luxurious, great.

One slice of lemon, someone's dropped some lemon in my bath, it feels dirty.

Would you let someone drink it?

Yes.

If anyone wanted to drink it, they could drink it.

there's people out there who would who are going to be messaging benito saying i'm up for that oh yeah there's a few creeps would love to drink my bath water

definitely sparkling or otherwise yeah yeah real shame yeah um so yeah that's a drink sparkling sparkling and then tap throughout the meal please tap topped up yeah whenever it gets low yeah and i want the person that taps it up to disappear as soon as it's tap no change who do you want to top it up is it me or is it uh as the genie or is it um someone else it can be anyone in the world I have opinions about waiters.

Yes.

I want the waiters to be happy.

I want them to be like on a fair wage and happy.

Yeah.

But I don't want...

It sounds awful.

Do you know when you go to a bar and you try and get a drink, but you can tell that two bartenders have like a flirt going on?

Yeah.

That bothers me.

No, because sometimes they're like, they're creating their lovely memories.

of like, haha, do you remember when we met at bartending and they're really flirting?

And I feel like I'm in it.

It makes me feel dirty.

I completely agree with you and I feel bad that I completely agree with you.

I don't like going into a shop and the people who work there are clearly friends.

And they're having a laugh about something else that I'm not involved in.

They are colleagues.

They shouldn't be friends.

I'd like to say that I don't agree with what you just said.

But you're going in there having a laugh.

Yeah.

No.

Well, it depends how big of a laugh they're having.

If they're having a laugh to the point where it's unprofessional, they're not doing their job.

Sure, I'll get annoyed at that.

I laugh.

Also, I think I like it if the bar staff are flirting.

I like to stick a bit of a will though, won't they?

You little perv.

Yeah, you are a perv, actually.

Hey.

Room for a third one in this?

I don't mind.

So here's the thing.

I don't mind them being friends, but I don't like when they've got clearly like

there's a sex vibe going.

And that's what I call it.

Sex vibe, yeah.

There's a sex vibe going.

And they,

it makes me feel like I'm an extra in the the beginning of the romance of what they'll remember later on.

You don't feel like the main character anymore.

I just like, I want it to be quick.

I want, I want this.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.

And then you can flirt.

But like, no one, oh my God, that's so funny.

You went to my yorca.

That's crazy.

Just like, I don't want any of that.

Oh, I don't want it holding up my drink.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's what I want.

You can't hold up the drink.

But you don't also, if they get together and they're like...

together for ages.

Yeah.

You don't want them to be sitting around one day going, do you remember that time that woman came into that?

You don't want to be like a little tiny part of someone else's story no and that happens to me all the time at your show I was sitting next to a couple and um sorry about that that that's okay uh and didn't have a good night did you no

I was sitting next to a couple and they were like really cuddling and every time something made them both laugh they'd laugh really hard look at each other and then look at me like this like I was part of it that makes me feel sick yeah yeah I also I don't want people in shops to be friends and I don't want couples to share a moment together over one of my jokes.

No, don't worry, I don't think that happens that often.

Most of your jokes are disgusting.

Popped up's ordered, pop-doms or dead.

Better tell you, baby.

Pop-doms or bread.

I just say pop-doms are dead.

That's the first pop-adoms or dead of the first pop-adoms or dead.

It's taken a long time to get to pop a doms or dead.

We should have done that for a Halloween special or something.

We should have done.

Poppadoms or dead.

Popadoms or dead.

Goth menu.

Yeah, golf menu.

Oh, come on.

We're doing that in the future, Benita.

okay

i don't know if it's allowed

but i would like popadons to start with with the um but specifically from a a birmingham restaurant i used to go to every every week it's called milan next to snow hill station it's an indian restaurant and they had the best the best little sauces that you get with the poppadons and sometimes i just go there for that um so i want that before the meal but then throughout the popular in there oh actually there was a bit of a scam going just kick just orders a pop-ups and then leaves again oh my god just for the 40p bill

sally used to live in birmingham

i would commute though for it i think

yeah just next to the station uh i've really

i really enjoyed um that restaurant because sometimes they'd give you like they'd have like a little competition where you write your name and then whoever they pick gets a free meal on it and because they really liked me every time i'd write my name the waiter would be like they're gonna get it that sounds like that waiter probably thought there was something going on, but

he thought, this is our love story.

This is our story.

And you were just thinking, I'm just, they liked me to win the competition.

Everybody was so nice and on a fair wage and normally.

Yeah.

Every time she comes in, she writes her number down.

No, I came with my, I was coming with a person I was dating, and I think he just really likes our vibes.

I've been watching you, and I like your vibe.

Five, five the next day for saying that.

Yeah.

So you want these, you want these poppin' with the dips.

Yeah.

But then also you're going to.

I want, yes.

Okay.

I want two types of bread.

There's a lot of bread incoming.

By the way, I don't know what the secret ingredient is, but I feel there's a bit of a French minefield happening.

I'm absolutely terrified.

What do you think if you were to guess, if we've done a French one?

I'm not falling into that hole.

No, if you say it, we're not going to kick you out.

It's going to be snails or something.

Like, I know you like to have a giggle about.

You do also have a giggle, too.

Correct.

Like,

it's a very serious meal.

I think it's going to be something obvious or like a a snail that's holding a French flag.

I don't know.

Snails that hold enough.

So the bread that I want

is from a French bakery in Paris called Dupin desidé, which means some bread and some ideas.

And I got...

You know the one with the domes.

They put domes over

all of the macarons and stuff.

I don't remember that.

Oh, that might be potisserie de rèves, actually.

What about

panquotidienne?

Or pancotidienne.

Or pole.

I do like it in a pancotidienne.

I enjoy it.

Yeah.

It makes me feel happy.

Makes it at home.

Anyways, so I got reading to Anthony Baudin in lockdown and I watched so much of it.

And every episode, I would take notes of where it was going.

And if I happened to be there, I would go to that place.

And that's his favorite bakery.

And I had it once, and it's by far the best bread I've ever had in my life.

It tastes so rich.

It was so good that we bought it, took it on the plane back, and by the next day, it was still as delicious as the first day.

Wow.

It was incredible.

God, nice.

It was so good.

And is this like just classic, you know, a white bread loaf of brown bread?

What kind of bread was it?

I wouldn't say it was like a baguette or anything like that, which, oh my God, I've almost stepped on a minefield.

I fear.

Get out.

That would be so unfair.

It's like, it's almost like just a loaf.

I think we bought a whole loaf.

And it's brown, but it's got little bits of

seeds in it.

But it's, I don't know how, I can't even describe the taste of it.

It just got really rich and almost meaty.

It was delicious.

And I think about that bread a lot.

So it wasn't a sausage roll?

It wasn't.

No, it wasn't a sausage roll.

So you got that bread, which I want.

First sausage roll you've ever had.

Yeah.

This bread's amazing.

Oh my God.

When I first moved to England, I went to Wetherspoons and then went back to France and then was telling everyone about this amazing.

Were you really?

Yeah, so you should check out this Wetherspoons.

It's amazing.

Two breads, though.

Yeah, the second bread will come in the starter.

Oh, nice.

Okay, so you know, you found that.

Well, this sounds very nice.

Are you having any butter with this?

Burr.

Burr.

Burr.

What?

I would like a bit of burr.

Phil butter.

Take a bit of butter.

I want.

Fuck your butter.

Fuck your bread.

I'm the fucking butter.

How's it going?

I want Bill Bear to be trying new material

in the back of the restaurant.

By the way, the restaurant, I want to be sat in the booth side of the thing.

I don't want the chair.

That's important for me.

So I want butter and I want it to be softened and I want it to be...

I want salted and unsalted so I can have a bit of fun.

Go back and forth.

Yeah.

Have a bit of fun.

Have a bit of fun.

What are you spreading them on alternate chunks of bread or are you getting them on the same one?

Oh my God.

yes.

That's the very basic of what I thought you were talking about.

You just decided I'm going to have some fun and at no point thought, what is this fun going to be?

What I want is.

Are you going to make them have them separate?

Oh, hello.

What the fuck?

Okay, let me wrap my head around this first.

Okay, here's my idea.

I want a slice of that bread and I want it to be, have a bit of unsalted, salted in different areas, then no butter, because it's so delicious that it doesn't need butter.

And I don't want to ever feel full throughout this meal.

So I i can just have one of these and like my i can still eat the rest of it yeah so that's what i want also i have to ask you a question that we've asked a lot of guests on the podcast i know you haven't chose a baguette you mentioned a baguette you mentioned paris obviously uh spent a lot of time in france we've never we've never we've never asked you obsessed with the place we've never asked an actual french person this question go on then uh when you go to a bakery a boulangerie very good and get a fresh baguette on the walk back to your house.

Yes, I do.

Yeah, yeah.

Yes, I do.

Yes, eat the hat of the baguette.

Yes.

I think that should be the only question to judge whether someone's a psychopath or not.

If they don't buy the hat off the baguette,

then they're wrong.

Put them to jail, I think.

Yeah, straight away.

And then the jail can make them forget.

No way they're getting out.

Oh, Jesus.

But yeah, absolutely, I eat it.

And there used to be a big thing in my family of like, we used to fight about who gets to go and buy bread that day because we wanted the head of the baguette.

I guess we like to behead things a lot in France.

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Your dream starter, then, which we know is gonna involve some more bread.

Also, for the listener, Selia showed us, we don't know what's on there, but from a distance, Celia showed us us that the notes on her phone

for this episode, and it is the most amount of notes anyone's ever made

for the podcast.

This is the last amount of time.

No, no, no, no, no, need it.

I just want the listener to know what we're dealing with here.

Okay.

This is a novel.

So what you're dealing with is, I had an idea.

I went for a meal once with Ivo and Tim Key in Edinburgh and we had this idea.

And by we, I mean, I think Tim had this idea.

And then I jumped on it for a restaurant that's called Sips.

Just to flag up before we move on,

full transparency.

I've been told about Sips before.

I'm hearing about Sips for the first time.

I've never heard about Sips.

I've heard about Sips.

Sips is a restaurant where you can go there and have just a sip of something.

And next door to it is another chain called Byte, and I'll let you guess.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Someone bites you.

Well, that is someone bites you.

Yeah, yeah.

With baby teeth.

There's a lot of like sips and bites content about to happen because I'm very indecisive and I love a lot of food.

Okay.

So, I mean, right there.

Bites is just tapas, though, right?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Don't you dare.

It's a bite.

So like you'll have a little plate with an actual bite.

No one chewed it for you, but like it's like bite size of one thing.

Right, okay.

Yeah.

Canopace.

Not canopace.

No.

No, that's not a French word.

It means sofa.

So sips and bites are next door to each other.

It seems unnecessary that they're in two separate places.

It should be called sips and bites.

Sometimes you just want sips though.

Yeah.

Sometimes I'm walking around London and I'm like, oh, God.

I'm dying for a sip.

Yeah.

And then I have to buy a whole drink and that's too many sips.

So is this going to be...

Too many sips on the dance floor.

Is your starter going to be loads of floor?

Fight the Concorde's fans out there.

Song too many dicks on the dance floor.

Is this starter going to be loads of bites?

Is it Ed?

Yes, it is.

Loads of bites.

So I used to work in a pub in Birmingham called the Red Lion and they had the best Sunday roast I've ever had in my life.

Now one of the starters that I would like is okay when we worked in a pub we weren't allowed to eat during our shifts but we would get really hungry so what we would do is we God I shouldn't have said the name of the pub

I'm sure they don't do it anymore.

What we used to do is eat like the rest of people's roasts.

Yeah, yeah.

So like we like pick up and we call it scraps and there'd be a WhatsApp group would be like there's good scraps in the kitchen.

And our manager would get really mad at us, but it was really good scraps.

Please tell me the WhatsApp group was called What Scraps.

No, it's not.

That's very good, actually.

Might rejoin?

What Scraps?

2016 coming back.

Come on.

Come on.

That is gutting that it wasn't called that.

I know.

That has got to be absolutely gutting that it wasn't called WhatsCrap.

What scraps?

What scraps?

Fuck yeah.

They used to do a lamb bap, which was like lamb roast dinner covered in gravy with mint sauce.

What bap?

And a little bap

and

what just ignore it okay

I think you want that one Edward

so I want like a bite of that of the lamb bap

I want a bite of the lamb bap

can I just check with the bite with bites as a concept

do you get the whole thing you take a bite and then leave it or do you get a bite-sized bit of that both are excellent ideas So it's hard to...

One involves a lot more waste.

One involves a lot more waste and self-restraint, I would say.

What if

it was a whole thing?

You take a bite and immediately you have to give it to someone else.

Yeah.

Pass it down the line.

And then, yeah, I think that's nice.

I like sharing food with people like that because it's a you go, you have it and then you go, you can't have it ever again.

It's very romantic, actually.

I like sharing food with people.

I don't, actually, that's a lie.

But yeah, so don't lie.

I definitely wouldn't like sharing food with people if the concept was it was a bap, I took a bite and then they took a bite.

Especially if you're the second person.

Yeah, if you're the second person or the last person, it's still a human-centipede questioning in, isn't it?

Yeah, it's you.

Not quite.

When would you be in line for the bap?

When are you taking the bite?

Yeah.

Yeah,

you don't want to be right at the end of the line.

No.

Bites fucked up.

No, so bite is like a bite size.

Let's say hygiene.

I mean, each person's bite is different size, though.

So you've got to make.

Oh, they know you.

They know you.

Well, this is interesting because I once came up with an idea for a restaurant that I might have said on off-menu before.

Me and my friend Leo came up with it called Steak Face, where you go in and they measure your face, and then you get a steak the size of your own face.

That's amazing.

Pretty good, right?

But is it like the size of not the circumference?

Not the head.

Not the head.

So it's just the face.

Are you sure it's the first time I've heard about Leo as well?

Leo.

Yeah, you and Leo.

You've got a steak face together.

Do they draw your face on it?

No, I don't.

Oh, yeah, good idea.

Good.

Yeah, that's not hard.

I'd love to eat my own face.

Yeah, yeah.

If I like.

But I think that's good.

Well, steak face?

Yeah.

No?

No.

Shit.

I like it.

Yeah.

I like it.

Well, so, because if there's a little baby or something.

If there's a little baby or something, they're not going to want a big steak, so it works perfectly proportionally.

I've never seen a baby eat a steak.

I mean, yeah, yeah.

Well, you've not used it.

Rare please.

He's luring us in there.

He knows babies don't eat steaks.

He's trying to get us in.

Find a little kid.

Little kids.

Even a little kid.

Oh, my God.

If I see a kid eat a steak, I'm bullying him.

Yeah.

That kid will bully you.

No, no, I'm stealing his lunch money.

I can't get his lunch, actually.

That kid eating the steak.

I reckon that kid could beat up anyone.

Yeah.

Oh, my God.

Yeah.

I'm reckoning.

Good luck bullying that kid.

You try and bully a kid who's eating a steak.

Steak baby.

You ain't bullying that steak baby.

You're right.

Yeah, he'd win in a fight, wouldn't he?

Yeah, yeah.

Steak baby.

Anyway, I'm sorry to distract from the bites concept.

You've got the lamb bap.

Bite-sized lambap.

Then, I want, there's a restaurant in Paris that I go to a lot.

So it's right by one of the bridges.

I'll find out the name of it later.

It feels like a tourist trap, but the food is actually really good.

And what I want from it is the bottom of a thing of mussels, just a sauce, and I can soak a bit of bread in it and eat that.

I'm not bothered about the mussels.

They're nice, but I don't like food that has tech.

So

it's too much.

just get rid of all the mussels and then i'll just like to dip a bit of bread in it so far it's a lot of bread yeah yeah It's got some more bread here.

But that sauce was delicious.

So you want to dip it in.

You don't want like a cube of bread that's had that sauce soaked up into it and then you...

No, I want to dip it in.

I want to feel strong.

I want to dip it in.

And there's two more, which are not bread.

I want a sip of a vegetable soup that I had in a pub

in Brotherhood.

Soup's an interesting one.

Would that be in sips or bites?

That's sips.

It's got to be in sips.

But then you have to get, if you want the bread, you have to go to bytes.

Yeah, so it's tricky.

Yeah.

See, that's why you should maybe adopt Ed's idea of having sips and bites.

No, what if there was a conveyor belt telling the two?

A secret tunnel.

Secret tunnel?

A secret tunnel between the two.

Yeah.

The Yosushi and Ed's diner in the centre of London, when there was an Ed's diner there, used to share a toilet.

Is that true?

Yeah, you'd go in, you'd go into the toilet, and you'd be like in the toilet, and then someone from Yosushi would be like trying to get into the toilet.

That's amazing.

I bet they had tales to tell each other.

Yeah.

Toilet tales?

Yeah.

What's it like in your sushi?

So

that could be a way of getting around sips and bites.

Yeah.

Just in the toilet.

Share the toilet.

I think I'd like to

sip the toilet.

Oh, dip the bread in the toilet.

I want a sip of the vegetable soup from a...

It was a pub in Rotherhai, which I forgot the name of, but it's lovely.

Yeah.

And then my mom, so I'm, for the listeners, I'm Algerian as well as French.

Plop twists.

Plop twist.

But But we haven't made fun of that.

No, Ed does 20 minutes with an Algerian accent.

Pretty wrong, actually, Ed.

We shouldn't open with it either, should we?

No, we shouldn't.

Also, the outfits, BitMan.

So there's an Algerian type soup called

Shorpa.

which my mom makes.

I don't know if you've ever had it.

No.

No.

It's lovely.

It's quite mild, but it's very satisfying.

And you have it around Ramadan a lot.

I did Ramadan once in my life and then I fainted, so I don't do it anymore.

Fair enough.

But I used to, I always had the meal at the end of the day, which was amazing.

Everyone would have.

So you would eat throughout the day.

Yeah, and then at the end.

I was seven stone heavy as a teenager, yes.

How did you faint?

Yeah,

you fainted when you actually did Ramadan.

Yeah, it was in a shopping center and the guy called an ambulance and the man said, what haven't you eaten?

And I said, it's Ramadan.

And he said, don't do that anymore.

And then I'm not Muslim anymore.

So I guess that man had a big impact on me.

There you go.

He converted someone.

But also, isn't that...

His name was Jesus.

But isn't that folded?

folded into?

I don't do that anymore.

Isn't that folded into Islam, though, that if you can't do it for medical reasons, that's fine.

Cause then everyone else doing it is taking on the fact that you can't do it.

Yeah, I think,

I mean, I was very young, and I think I just thought I'm just going to leave Islam instead because that's a bit quicker than

putting my guilt on everyone else's.

Tell everyone else to burn and the tank is burning off.

I'll just leave the room, actually.

Don't worry about me, guys.

I'm off off to sips and bites.

But I want a sip of shorba.

Actually, two sips of shorba.

Two sips.

Two sips of shauba.

Is it allowed in sips?

It's allowed.

You get two different containers.

Wow, that's pretty mad that you can go in sips and order two sips of something.

Yeah.

That's a gulp.

And then on Fridays, they'll have two sips Fridays.

Yeah, yeah.

When you get deals for it.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

And so that's my starter.

I want a sip of shorba.

A sip of the vegetable soup from that pub in Rotherhight, which was the best vegetable soup I've had in my life.

And I usually hate vegetable soup.

The bread at the bottom of the mussels from the French restaurant.

yeah which is kind of i mean this is like so that's a sip and a bite as well yeah yeah that is a sip and a bite of sip and a bite yeah yeah oh my god bite and a sip there normally we get a bit weird about people ordering multiple what's clearly multiple things on one course but these are so you've so specified that it's sips and bites yeah that it's absolutely fine it's it's it's global to pass it's global to pass but like on a smaller scale yeah and um i think if we're talking two bites three sips here by my my calculations

that's basically a start.

Yeah, I think so.

I think you'd find.

And I'm going to say the word because I know everyone's thinking it.

It's quite sophisticated.

Yes, you're right, actually.

Yes.

I'll tell you what makes it not sophisticated in my head is that I've imagined sips and bytes are spelt with a Z.

Yeah.

And it's in Comic Sans on the sign.

No, sips and bytes is all in lowercase, somewhere in East London.

With a full stop after it.

Yeah, yeah.

Sips, but it's all in lowercase.

Wood,

a lot of wood.

And the people working there are all wearing little hats

and glasses.

It's very hipstery sips and bites, that's how I imagine it.

Your dream main course.

Oh, okay.

I really thought about this.

Yes.

You thought about this stuff?

And I thought I would know by now, but I don't know if I want a main course.

I think I just want sides.

Oh, my God.

Interesting.

This is going to be another sips and bites situation, isn't it?

We thought we'd left sips and bites.

We're back in there.

So, sides.

First side I want, as my main.

Is this the first time someone's skipped main?

I'm not sure.

Maybe.

Yeah, it might be.

We've definitely had starter skippers and dessert skippers.

Yes, we have.

We've never had a main skipper.

Yeah, just skipping starters.

Yeah, that's fair enough.

No, that's mad.

That's the only reason I go to restaurants is for the starters.

It is mad, but as someone is about to skip main.

I just think a main is too much, innit, when you you think about it.

After you've had a few sips and bites.

Yeah, it's not too much at all.

But you've had that.

That's why you should never fucking bag of crisps before you arrive at the restaurant.

I like a bag of crisps.

Actually, no.

I know I'd like to skip my main course.

It's too big.

Oh my god, I've just remembered on the way here, I've settled on a main, so I've got a main.

Okay.

Are we ready for the...

Oh my god.

Okay, main is.

I really like Studio Ghibli films.

Is it Ghibli or Ghibli?

Ghibli.

Ghibli.

It is Ghibli.

What?

Ghibli?

It is Ghibli, yeah.

I said Ghibli the other day to someone to their face.

Oh, no.

and they texted me they said what did you

meet i've said ghibli for a long time actually no then they sent me a gift i think i said ghibli i think ghibli is acceptable but i think it is ghibly i think someone else said ghibli to me the other day and i've now thought that that's how it's said yeah it's a ghibli benito you've got to cut that out the podcast

have people thinking that i go around saying the wrong one so studio ghibli I really like the food in it.

I think that's quite a common thing.

There's a page I follow on Twitter that's just Studio Ghibli Food or Studio Ghibli Food.

So my main course is i want a bowl of ramen with pork at the top of it and i want the broth to be rich and spicy yes and the noodles to be uh on the thicker side i don't like little noodles size queen

i've never said that in my life

i haven't been able to say that on the podcast but no one said no we haven't heard the the term size queen said on the podcast

i don't even agree with it

but when i walk into a a noodle place,

the size queen.

The size queen's arrived.

She's nicely ood on.

You better have that ood on.

No rice noodle.

Waste of time.

I don't want to.

With no rice noodle, motherfucker.

Matomoni guy.

Fucking Cardi B lyric.

Oh, it's funny.

So I don't want it to be quite udon.

Yeah.

But like on the Oudon scale, I would say.

And I would like to tea-stained egg because one is not enough.

Every time I have one, I think that was amazing.

I'd like to.

Always order an extra egg.

Always.

Emina.

Amiena.

Yeah.

And also, it makes you think, because where's the other half of the egg going?

That's true.

Yeah, that's true.

Well, but sometimes they...

It's certainly not in enough avatar that they're serving in the egg.

Yeah.

Where's that egg going?

They must be putting half an egg in and then throwing the rest of the egg in the air.

It's so cute.

That could happen where

you find the other half of your egg in someone else's around them.

You both put them together.

You both, and then, oh my god, that's so sweet, isn't it?

Yeah, I'm disgusting.

But yeah.

How different do you think eggs are that if you put the two halves together that they wouldn't match any other egg?

They're quite different, aren't they?

They're quite different, I'd say.

Oh, I had an idea for a game where unrelated.

Okay,

let's fuck that up.

I think you'll like this.

It's kind of related.

So imagine if there was a game where it's a packet of crisps and then you have to put back the potato from the packet of crisps like a puzzle.

Oh, yeah.

What, put it back into potato shape?

Yeah.

Do you think it's so much fun?

Do you think maybe the slices change shape when they're fried?

No, I think it'd be really fun.

Yeah, but it's impossible.

Because, as I think you know,

when you fry the potato slices, they change shape.

It's like getting a jigsaw, fucking it into a blender, and then saying, let's try and put that back together again.

That sounds fun, Ed.

I'm trying to get away from my phone, so please give me a crisp puzzle.

But eggs, I think, would...

I'm sure you've done that as well.

I like the idea, though, of the potato jigsaw.

Yeah.

I think about that.

puzzle a lot.

Yeah.

And I think that

and I know that they change shapes and stuff.

But I think that, you know, life is, they'll have a bit of magic what you

you know who knows they change shape but maybe those shapes the new shapes will fit into one another and you'll create a big fried potato yeah i'm not convinced guys i'll be honest it could happen we're not the one fucking jigsaws into a blend or whatever

you spend your time doing

so that's my main are we happy with that you want uh the ramen from

spirited away from spirited away yeah i do what's the one

No, there's one where the ramen is specifically ramen is really good in it.

Is it ponyo?

I think it's a non-ony.

It's where it's like they spend a whole scene making ramen.

Yes.

With like the pork and the, I think it might be Ponyo.

Ponyo.

He says, I've forgotten the guy's name now, the main guy behind the studio.

He says that like in every film there should be a moment where they

have a meal.

Yeah.

And spend that time.

And it does look delicious.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Even in Spirited Away, that scene where they eat all the foods, like and they're turned into pigs.

I mean, there's a part of me that's like, oh, make me a little piggy.

Yeah,

turn me into a pig.

I just, yeah, those dumplings.

I think they had the best day out of everybody, I think.

Yeah.

The pigs.

The pigs, the parents.

They sat down, had the meal, turned into pigs, and then turned back into humans.

I don't remember the end, to be honest.

Yeah, I don't know what happened at the end.

So your dream side dish.

So you were going to choose loads of sides for your main.

Yes.

You decided not to.

Are the sides now just the things that you were going to have for your main?

Yeah, there's quite a lot.

Okay, the first one is, the first side I want is something that I think you'll be familiar with.

I want the chicken wings from Shak Fuyu.

Yes, the Korean chicken wings.

Yes.

But I want them to be magical because I want them to like, you know, they're very sticky.

Yeah.

So I want to eat them, enjoy the flavor, but magically my fingers aren't sticky afterwards.

Yeah, okay.

If anything, they're cleaner.

Yeah, that'd be nice.

Good, because they are delicious, but I would say they're in my top three foods of feeling disgusting after you've finished eating them.

Yeah.

And they they only make me think of Nish Kumar.

Yeah, yeah.

Because he is a man because he makes me feel disgusting too.

Yep.

Always gets them.

Always gets them and does not care if he's got dirty hands.

Oh, no.

Same goes for my dad, who ate them and looked like the Joker afterwards.

And we told him that and he didn't care.

You look like the Joker, didn't you?

We said, Dad, it's literally on your nose.

And you're like, so what?

I've just really fucked it out.

So what?

I don't care.

Which joke, Heath Ledger.

Heath Ledger's joke.

Yeah, yeah.

Not Jared Leto.

He didn't have like fucking haha written on his face.

If he did, he wouldn't care.

Yeah.

He looked like Jared Leto afterwards.

It was amazing.

Now, with the starter, we let you get away with multiple things because it was all sips and bites.

Those wings are massive.

Yeah.

To the extent I have never seen a chicken the size of those wings.

Yeah, I don't know what they're actually.

Ostrich wings.

Bodybuilders.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They got

the gym.

I think.

Yeah, I'm bodybuilding chickens.

Yeah.

And there's about, what, three wings to a portion?

Yeah.

Which is disconcerting.

Always disconcerting to get three wings in a portion.

It's weird, isn't it?

Yeah.

You think about it.

Like, what do they do with the other wing?

With the other egg.

The other half egg.

Oh, my God.

Then you have to find...

Yeah, you have to find who has it.

Who has the other wing?

Yeah, and then you fly away together.

What if, this could have happened to you and you don't even know it.

What if in the same day you had some chicken wings and you had some mama with the tea-stained egg and the egg came from the same chicken?

I think about that stuff constantly.

Honestly, I think like if I have if I have a meal, I think I wonder if this chicken that I'm having, for example, if I've like had it before like that.

Yeah.

Yeah, or yeah, or had one of its eggs.

Yeah.

Yeah.

One of its mates.

Well, I've got

one of the shack food.

The chickens that make the shack food your wings, you'd know if you have one of their eggs.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

Because you wouldn't be able to use them for ramen because there'd be no space for broth.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So, do you want a whole serving of these chicken wings?

Um, I'd be lying if I said I didn't.

Yeah, I do.

I want to because I can't be full in that meal, so I want a full serving.

You really have to sell these other bites then because, like, this that sounds like a side that's a big side, isn't it?

In and of itself, but let's hear the rest of them.

Um, I want a square, like a little post-it note square of lasagna,

specifically,

specifically I used to live with a guy who was a tech at a comedy club in Birmingham and he also was trained as a chef and he would make the best lasagna I've had in my entire life and he would spend all day doing it and it like I don't know what he would do to it but he would like soak the tomatoes and it's it was the best thing I've ever had in my life and what he would do is he'd make a big batch and then he'd have a square of it and he'd go oh you can have the rest for tonight and for work it's the best thing I've I've ever had in terms of lasagna.

It's my favorite, my favorite dish is lasagna, but this is the best lasagna I've ever had.

Oh my gosh.

We don't live together anymore and it'd be weird to like pop around for a lasagna

seeing as I don't know.

If it was that good.

It was incredible.

Yeah.

And God, I love lasagna.

Yeah.

It's just, it's like a book, isn't it?

It's like a book.

It's like a book.

Yeah.

I used to have a joke that never worked.

Do you want to hear it?

Yes.

About lasagna.

I have a lasagna joke that never worked as well.

So you go in, you go ahead.

So, hey, your special was good.

Yeah, the whole thing didn't work.

So confident with it, it was the title of the show.

Yeah.

Had to drop the bit.

Yep.

So, yeah,

the joke was: hey,

starts with hey.

All the best jokes start with hey.

Drop it in halfway through a set.

Hey.

Which was

as if you don't have their attention already.

Hey, listen to this.

Hey.

It's sad because I actually do that.

The joke was, do you use a bookmark or fold a corner

of your lasagna when you're done when you want to pick it up later?

That presumes

that everyone

looks at lasagna and goes, that's like a book.

Whereas you're the first person I've ever heard say that.

Yeah.

And we get it because you gave us the context earlier saying you think lasagna is like a book because of all the...

And also, you don't eat lasagna by peeling the layers back like pages.

I do.

You do.

And I go, that's enough of that.

Going to bed now.

Writing the joke.

Shall I establish

that lasagna is like a book?

No, I just say hay.

Everything I need is in that hay.

Honestly, the sad bit is that for ages I was like, I think that's one of the best jokes I've ever written.

And

people are just on getting it, but one day it would click.

never did no I love the sound of this lasagna the square of yeah the square of lasagna I love the sound of it yeah are there other things you're about to tell us about Celia so I think we're gonna have to make you make a choice at some point yeah maybe we will also have to have an opinion on it so far if I was to limit you to one side as much as I love shack fu you don't like the wings you never get the wings I never get the wings just because but it's because of the messiness yes yes one of the things actually oh one more wing story a Shack Fu Yu wing story uh going there with Camaro Ngiani who's been a guest on the podcast before he got the wings, didn't want to get messy.

So he used, well, I'm going to say cut the V, but it was two chopsticks.

Your lovely girlfriend told me this story, and

it's.

I've still, I'm trying to work out how he did it.

It was quite expertly.

It's like he'd done it before.

Yeah.

He managed to.

He'd met that chicken in the gym.

He met that chicken in the gym

by preparing for a role.

When that chicken dropped the Instagram transformation.

So fun.

Everyone couldn't believe it.

Chicken man.

You're making all the rest of us chicken look bad.

And you marveled, but this really was a chicken.

He held the chopsticks at the very end, the fat end, and kind of like sliced and died.

They just like pinned it with one chopstick and with the other one just shredded

along the chicken.

Did it work?

Yeah.

It all came off the bone.

Just did it all like that.

That feels wrong, though, doesn't it?

Oh, it felt wrong.

Because when you eat chicken wings, you have to be okay with the fact that you're going to hate yourself a bit.

It's like a milkshake.

When you have a milkshake, it's like, it's the fastest you can go from, ooh, little treat to, I hate myself.

I might have to be very restrained at the minute.

I got given as a present for Christmas, but I thought they were like mixers.

And I've just realized yesterday that they're not.

These like massive wine-sized bottles of basically chocolate liqueur from Hotel Chocolat.

That's just velvetized chocolate milk.

different flavors with vodka in it.

And I thought, oh, you've got to mix that with other stuff.

And I looked at it the other day and go, oh, no, it's just, you just have it on it.

So So I thought, now this is a it's going to be a daily battle.

Yeah.

I've not just pouring myself a big old milkshake, a boozy milkshake that's like chocolate and mince pie flavor.

One of them is.

Oh my god, that sounds amazing.

Yeah, like it's really like, how, how the hell do I not?

I can't drink a whole milkshake.

If I get halfway through, I have to fold the corner over to remind me where I am.

Can I suggest something?

Yeah.

There's a place where you can have just have a bit of a milkshake.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

Suddenly I'm on board with sips.

there is one more two more sides yeah they're quick ones yeah yeah and i'm realizing now that i mean i could just go to a normal restaurant and they will have that uh pork bow buns i love them uh bow buns in general i think are just a brilliant invention yes i think what a concept it's like uh food on a cloud it's yeah

that must have been how they came up with the idea

food on a cloud food on a cloud like to eat food on a cloud i bet that makes like if you had a giant barrel that'd make a good pillow yeah it would yeah oh easily if i'm gonna choose something from the food world to have as a pillow it'd be a bowel bun that's one of my questions actually yeah

probably is that's one of my questions duvet

it's a bit more difficult isn't it duvet a sheet of lasagna easy it's too too crispy no but it couldn't the one in the middle sheets oh no too soggy all right goldilocks

sorry i'm i'm sleeping in something made of food sorry if this is very goldilocks on me

so you got your pork bowels

and i would love some shredded sweet seaweed from bow in Barrow.

They've got shredded seaweed and it's crispy and they've put like sugar on it.

And

it's delicious.

Now, how do we feel?

What are we going to do here?

I'll say it.

I don't think we can

allow all four.

No, I don't think we.

Normally, if you were to say that as your main, fine.

Here's what I would allow.

All four of them as a main and a

side-sized ramen as your side.

A cup of ramen.

Yes, let's do that.

Yeah?

Let's do that.

I want a cup of ramen with one egg because it's otherwise there's no more ramen left.

Yeah.

Oh my god, it could just do one long noodle and then I just

do it whatever.

One long noodle in a cup.

Yeah.

With half an egg.

Yeah.

I think that's in a little mug.

That's great.

That's a great idea.

Oh my God.

For sips, you could have a sip of ramen.

Yeah.

Yeah, let's do that.

Is that okay?

Can you have that?

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

You can have your little ramen.

Switch them around.

Problem solved.

The old flipperoo.

I'm stamming me so happy, actually.

Yeah, so now you've got everything.

Yep.

I've got everything, except one last thing.

Can I have an extra sip?

There we go.

The chili beef noodles from Noodles and Dumpling in Edinburgh.

It's not an extra bite.

You've just picked some more noodles.

Yeah, but like.

Are you fucking kidding me?

We've just managed to find a way.

Okay.

So your sides could be a mug of ramen noodles and you're going, oh, one more extra thing, an entire other portion of noodles.

You know what I think?

I think if you had completely skipped sides and said, I just want all this for my main and skip sides, sides.

I think

I was like, Yep, yeah, fine.

Okay.

Lots of noodles and dumplings in Edinburgh.

Yeah, I think it's one of the best restaurants in Edinburgh.

It's absolutely incredible.

It's amazing.

And I think that, do you know what?

I'm going to skip the chili noodle beef, but what's, I've just remembered that on the way, I was like, do you know what?

I haven't really picked pasta, but noodles is pasta.

I was thinking to myself, I don't really eat pasta.

Yeah, and you've got lasagna.

And I've gone, yes.

So let's say bye to the chili noodles.

You got a square of lasagna as well.

Yes.

I don't know if you remember declaring yourself a size queen earlier, but

it was about pasta.

Yes, a lot of pasta.

Yeah, I'll let go of the chili noodles.

Although, if I may, just hop on the shout-out.

Hop on the shout-out.

Just hop on the shout-out.

Oh, I'm on the shout-out.

Noodles and dumplings.

Those noodles have got me through a lot of Edinburgh fringes, and I love them so much.

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so your dream drink is this one sip or multiple sips of different drinks that you like okay my dream drink is a cocktail that i this you're gonna hate this you're gonna because you're gonna hate it you're not gonna be able to find it and because i had a cocktail once and i'm not a cocktail person generally i like just wine or sparkling water or the two of them combined it was the best thing i've ever had it was peachy and i like it and cocktails when there's a layer of sugar around the glass, it had that.

I don't remember where it was from.

I don't remember who I had it with, but I just know that it was incredible.

I had three of them, and they were quite expensive, but it was so delicious that I kept.

Do you know what was in them?

It was like peachy, orangey.

It has.

Do you know what the booze was?

Do you know what the booze base was?

I have no idea.

But like, that's a dream restaurant, right?

You can find it.

You can remember.

Do you remember what city you were in?

No.

You must be able to remember what city you were in.

In my mind, I think think I'm.

Oh, God.

It was a party night, but I can't remember if it was a tour thing.

It was party night?

It was like a night on tour or after a gig where everyone goes, let's have a drink after.

You know?

It was party night.

You've been away from the circuit.

And we'd take off our shoes and have a dance.

When we go to the circuit.

When it was party night, we'd all go get cocktails.

So far we know that sugar's all around the glass.

I personally can't do that with a cocktail anymore because I did some gigs in Tenerife and we all went out afterwards the comedian's party night

and loads of massive sugar crystals around the middle of the glass.

Which you must have loved.

Yeah, at the time I was in heaven.

But the hangover was so disgusting the next day.

Because I ruined it for myself.

We went to a water park.

I couldn't go on any of the rides, so I took hungover.

Yeah.

Had to just lay on a sunbed.

I got my legs sunburned.

I'm going to say that that wasn't the fault of the sugar.

I think it's the

sugar that makes me feel sick thinking back on it.

Right.

like the daiquiris yeah and like all the i just remember the feeling of the sugar on the rim of the glass and as that as the night went on that getting more and more just like making me feel ill and i was puked up in a bush it was a bad night yeah really bad i think i just remember where i had that cocktail

oh my god yes tenerife no no no no birmingham very similar in birmingham where i used to live remember i

i worked in a photography studio for a bit and my friends, Maru and Vlad, were both fashion photographers, and they invited me to this little runway thing.

And it was my first runway I've ever been to.

It was very low-key, like, but they had cocktails there.

This is incredible that even when you move to Birmingham, you can't help but live a French life

on the runway.

It was so weird, but also, like, I come from, I'm, I come from trash in France.

Like, I'm like, like, La Poubert.

What a surprise.

That's my favourite French restaurant.

La Poubelle.

No, I come from like basically what Latin is, is where I come from.

But I moved to England and something got lost in translation and everyone thinks I'm posh.

And I've started living like...

But like, it felt quite nice.

I had a cocktail from that thing and it was very fancy.

They didn't have the prices of the cocktails and I thought they were free.

They weren't free.

But that was one of those cocktails.

He was there.

It was incredible.

So you had the peachy, orangey cocktail at a fashion show in Birmingham.

So we can't Google that.

No.

We can't Google their menu because it was a one-off thing, but it isn't going to happen anymore.

It was in Digboff.

Does that help?

It was in Digbeth in Birmingham.

Digbuff.

Yeah.

And you don't know what the booth was?

No idea.

I just remember it was delicious and I had three.

And then I think they were very expensive.

It was 17 quid a cocktail or something.

I think because so few people came, they had to offset the they started charging for the free drinks.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And they had to offset the drinks.

She's on her third peachy Digbuff.

I have another drink.

Huh?

You have another drink?

Come on, post-drink.

Let's have it.

Come on.

A cup of tea.

A cup of lovely licorice and chamomile tea.

Ingratate yourself to the English

with licorice and chamomile tea.

That's what I'll say.

Robert Sellier says all right, Governor.

Governor?

What kind of tea did you say?

Licorice tea?

I want, like, I really love tea.

So I want, there's a licorice one that I really like that you can buy.

I think it's one of those.

Is it puka?

Those things?

It's licorice, but I can't remember what the other flavour is, but it is delicious.

It's really sweet by itself.

Okay.

Well, yeah.

Is that at the end of the meal?

yeah yeah come on now that's fine

yeah that was my stomach hello stomach i didn't have time to eat this morning so my stomach's going things make set his stomach off licorice tea this time

i've got to get back home yeah yeah i've only got five pages left my lasagna peppermint and licorice peppermint and licorice is the best after bonito read out from the website also three cinnamon is really nice flavours with licorice you hate hot drinks don't you I don't hate hot drinks.

No, no, no.

You just don't really have them very often these days.

I went through, you know, I used to have cups of tea all the time.

Then I stopped having caffeine for about five years, I think.

And during those five years, just was on to herbal teas.

And then got bored of them, stopped having them.

So now I really only have hot chocolate from the velvetizer.

Like a grown-up.

My dessert.

Do you know the one we're going to have?

Yes, actually.

Okay.

How many things?

Yeah, it's four.

Oh, fucking.

Four bites of desserts.

I'm going to run through this because I can tell by.

I'm going going to order a deliveroo while you're talking.

You're ordering a deliveroo?

Yep.

During the chat?

Yep.

This is rude.

I apologise for you.

Yeah.

I can't believe it.

First of all, he does an impression of you and his show.

I know.

Ten minutes.

Then

he dresses an Algerian man for the recording.

Yeah.

Which

I'm going to do.

I'm going to mention, but now, due to this.

He's in a jalaba.

Yeah.

You're not in a jalaba.

Nothing from Ed.

What?

He's lost his deliveroo.

Yeah.

Dessert.

Sorry, I won't do that.

That's rude.

Desserts Desserts is, I went to a fancy restaurant in London once.

I was meeting my other time partner's mum.

She took us to this really fancy restaurant.

The dessert was a deconstructed tiramisu.

I didn't like the fact that it was deconstructed.

So I want it reconstructed, but with the same elements.

Yeah, correct.

So you want all of those elements, but for someone to put them back together as a tiramisu.

Put them back together.

Like the packet of crisp and the potato.

So like I want them all back together.

Exactly the same.

Individually, exactly the same.

Nothing different between the two of them.

I think that all the elements of it were incredible, but I didn't like how snobby it was to deconstruct it.

Like, don't play with the form.

Yeah, yeah, I completely agree with you.

Stick to it.

Because all you're doing with deconstructed stuff is you're putting it all in your mouth and then it tastes the same.

So it's just more effort.

It's annoying.

It feels like then your mouth is like an IKEA furniture.

Yeah.

And your mouth puts them all together.

Yeah.

Well, are you supposed to eat the elements individually?

When it's deconstructed, are you supposed to just go around and have a slide fingers?

I just think it looks unfinished, doesn't it?

Who wants that?

Who wants this?

Just a dry sponge finger and then some creamy.

But maybe if each element is that luxurious, that's what they want you to do, is experience how good this element is.

It all goes in your stomach.

And how good this element is.

It comes as like a crap out your ass.

But then it's all the same.

No point in deconstructing it.

It's all going to be a crap out your ass.

But if we start saying that, then a whole podcast is pointless.

It all just comes out your butt as a crap out your ass.

And it's like, then people are just going to come on and go, who cares what I want in my dream menu?

Yeah.

It all comes out like a crap out my ass.

I enjoyed that.

When you're hungry, Ed, you turn into an existentialist.

Yeah.

What does it matter?

So I want that to remiss you.

But also I would like a, it's a type of pastry that you can get in France.

I don't think you can get good ones here.

They're called Paris Brest.

And have you had them before?

Don't do it.

I was going to go on about a thing about how me relates to my childhood.

She said, no.

They don't like knockers.

I think I'm actually thinking of a different thing anyway.

I think you are.

Yes, Perry breasts.

Peri breasts.

So they're like shoe pastry bits cut in half and then there's like praline cream in it, crushed almonds and some sugar.

Like not normal sugar.

What's that?

Special sugar.

Do you know the white, white icing sugar?

Icing sugar.

That one.

Special sugar.

Yeah, special sugar.

So

I would like a bite of that.

And then an hour after the meal.

And this is the last thing I'll say.

And I have edited down as I went along because I'm feeling a bit of impatience from the both of you actually

I'm loving it it's a dessert course dessert course Kipfell is a lovely uh bakery in um London and Islington they have a Viennese uh thing called a sakutote which is like a really it's a really dry chocolate and apricot cake that you have with cream on the side it's delicious so i want a bit of that but an hour after the meal i want a happy hippo

from kinder by no happy hippo i want a happy hippo i love

I kind of do respect the hour before crisps, hour after happy hippo.

Yeah.

So what for you makes the happy hippo the superior kinder product?

Because there's a lot of kinder.

You have a kinder bueno, kinda surprise.

White kinder bueno.

White kind of kinda bueno.

Those fingers that they do now.

I got some kinder cards when I moved into my house.

Did you like them?

No, they were too sweet for even me.

I bit into them.

I was like, I'm giving these to my nephews when they come over because I can't stand that.

I was like, this is too much.

Turn my face inside out.

Yeah.

I like them.

Oh my mad.

So I don't usually eat sweet stuff because it could ruin my life.

So this is what I love about the happy hippos.

First of all, fun name.

I love the name of it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You want what you eat.

I like that it's like a cannoli but accessible.

Do you know what I mean?

Yeah, it is, but it has cannoli vibes.

I feel like, but you've only just been learning about cannolis recently.

No.

Cannolis is a thing that Selia's only recently learned about.

We just started watching the Sopranos.

You tell the story, James.

I mean, I don't know how it really started, but my girlfriend and Selia decided that they were going to watch The Godfather film.

Right, okay.

So I wasn't that far off.

Yeah, it was so crazy.

And I was like, I'll watch the first one.

And when you get onto the second one, I will watch that.

Although, I don't think you are going to get onto that because the other day you were meant to watch Goodfellas and you

used my Amazon account to rent it.

And then I went downstairs and

they were watching Channel 4's The Dog House

and watching dogs get adopted and crying together.

You know, they watched the Scarface the other day and absolutely appalled by this by the lead character, appalled by his behavior.

Yeah.

People like this guy?

No.

No.

It's a film about an alpha.

And yeah, Sally learnt about cannolis, watching The Godfather, leave the gun, take the cannolis.

Yeah.

And Sally was like, what is that?

What are they talking about?

I'll tell you what I'm going to get.

A happy hippo.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, and but the cannolis from that place are incredible.

Yeah, there's a place called Grains and Greens.

Which does hazelnut.

It tastes like Nutella.

Yeah.

But it's like a little...

It tastes like what?

Nutella?

Am I saying it wrong?

Nutella.

I've never heard of it.

It doesn't exist.

Here we go.

Trying to help you out here, Sally.

What's the cannolis, Sally?

I mean,

I had met cannolis, but I had not met.

I had seen cannolis before.

Yes.

But I just forgot about them a bit.

And then

what a comeback.

2023, cannoli year.

Yeah, you're going good on the cannolis now.

Yeah, so I can see how a happy hippo is kind of like a cannoli the wafer the crispiness and the chocolatiness.

Yeah, the filling the lovely filling.

Yeah, how happy it makes you.

Yeah, and it's a hippo.

Yeah, fair enough.

And it's a good size as well for a little just a little sweet treat.

Exactly.

If I had a bad gig, I have a happy hippo.

So there's a map to it.

There's some shops that don't carry them.

So I keep track in my mind of who has happy.

If you have a bad gig, you have a happy hippo yeah if you have a good gig do you have a sad hippo oh yeah if i have a good gig i have a cannoti

so not every shop carries them in lockdown i threatened um

my ex-partner to order 50 happy hippos on amazon threatened them yeah because he was like that's gonna ruin your life but i was like it's like seven pounds fifty at a time and you could get 50 happy hippos and uh like I almost did it so many times.

I'm going to do it.

I'm going to do it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Like Scarface in a way.

Here we go.

I'm gonna read your menu back to you now, see how you feel.

There's so many pages of this menu, so it's like looking at a picnic zany.

One hour before, you want some ready-salted walker's crisps dipped in soy sauce.

Fucking hell.

20-minute walk to the restaurant, then you want a pint of really sparkling water, more bubbles than water, with ice.

And then throughout the meal, you would like still water, tap water indeed, filled up throughout.

Pop-ums or bread.

You want pop-un-ums and dips from Milan in Birmingham next to the station.

And then you want some bread from Dapan et de IDs.

IDs.

It's where you can only buy the bread if you've got ID.

Yeah.

Even if you're in pain.

With salted and unsalted butter so you can experiment.

Starters, bites and sips.

Lamb bap from the red line in Birmingham.

Bread and mussel sauce with a little bit of cubic bread.

Vegetable soup from Roberhive.

Shauba?

Yeah.

This is always the most vulnerable I ever see you in this bit.

Well, I've got to pronounce words.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think it's very sweet and you're doing a great job.

You've not done a great job.

It is sweet though.

I enjoyed the I've never thought I would see you say anything in French in my life.

What do you said IDs?

You still haven't, so it's good.

I'm back in the service station again.

Panicking.

Mains and sides mixed together here.

Yeah.

Chicken wings from Shatfu Yu, square of lasagna, made by your housemate.

Pork bow buns, shredded seaweed from Bow, a little cup of pork ramen from the film Pono.

drink, peachy cocktail from the Birmingham Fashion Show,

dessert, reconstructed tirimasu, reconstructed, Paris breast,

fair enough, sack of torte from Kip Firl, yeah, and then a peppermint and licorice tea, then 20-minute walk home, then a happy hippo an hour later.

Yep, and doesn't that sound amazing?

It sounds insane.

I think it could be an amazing menu if you'd focused it down, maybe.

I mean, I will show you the.

I'll show you the first draft of this menu.

Yeah, it's fair with the fair.

Want to have a guess what your secret ingredient was before we go?

Is it snails or something?

No, it's snails.

It's pana chocolate.

Panachola.

Fucking, that was close.

Was it?

It almost made it in there.

Yeah, but you didn't want to give me the satisfaction, I'd imagine, of ordering a panachocola.

I think, oh my God, I even said panachocola.

It was so close.

It's like, do you know those films where you look back and everything was so close to happening yeah it's exactly like where imagine good fellas yeah we can imagine that

however that's going to end yeah thank you very much for coming to the dream restaurant celia thank you for having me thank you

there we are james i mean listen loopholes galore loopholes galore we do respect people who order a lot We've had a lot of people order a lot.

The spalls.

Loosehanders with a global tapaz.

Yes.

And there was a lot of nice stuff in there.

Yeah.

But sometimes when people order a wide-ranging amount like that, it's very difficult to discuss things specifically.

We ended up having to glaze over a lot of delicious stuff that I was happy to see in there.

Was there stuff that you were going to...

I wanted more Parry Breast chat.

Uh-huh.

Yeah.

Sure, that sounded really nice.

I think I was thinking of a different dessert

when I said what it looked like.

There is something that's based on...

Marie Antoinette's breast.

Do you know what?

I think it might be a glass.

There is.

It is the glass.

It's the glasses, the wine glasses.

The champagne bowls.

Okay.

But also, I think there is another...

There's a cake like that as well.

Are you nothing as just letting them eat cake?

Oh, maybe.

Anyway, that's what I was thinking of.

I'm not grubby.

Oh, yeah.

Look, he's not grubby.

I'm not wow.

Although, if people listen to this podcast enough, they know that you are.

Yeah, I'm grubby.

I'm a little grub-grub.

Yeah, if anything, you're the grubby one.

Well, what should you grub?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But Celia also didn't say Pana Shockala.

We discussed the incident

at the top of the show, so maybe some listeners might thought that's unfair.

You're putting the dish in her head.

Yeah.

Maybe Celia will pick it later on and then you kick her out for that.

But she probably didn't want to pick anything that would make me do my French accent.

Yes.

I mean, and

a bit of a minefield.

Well done for not doing it.

Nerci.

Lovely to hear some behind-the-scenes info on your fridge as well, James.

A little peek, a peek behind the door of the fridge.

I think more condiments than people were expecting, you know.

I think the people would expect the sweets, people would expect

the Diet Coke.

People wouldn't expect the condiments.

Not the condoms.

Thank you very much to Celia for coming on the show.

Go and see Celia gig.

She's gigging all the time.

She's absolutely brilliant.

If you're at the Edinburgh Festival, and I think she's doing a show this year, go and see that.

And check her out on social media, AB Celia on social media.

Fantastic.

Also, congratulations, Ed, on the Fox and the Mole.

And the horse.

We just had a hamper delivered that was congratulating the makers of the Fox and the Mole, the Horse and the Boy, whatever it's called, on all their success from the Apple Originals team.

We did not make that thing and we thought, well, they must have clearly meant to send us one and they put the wrong note on it.

So we'd started looking in it, working out what we were going to take away from this fantastic hamper from Dalesford Organic.

If anyone from Dalesford Organic is listening, we'd love one of our own hampers

before we were told that it wasn't for us and it was for the neighbors.

So we've put everything back in the hamper.

I considered taking something, yeah, yeah, yeah, but I didn't.

So, you can do a full inventory check.

But if you're listening from Apple Originals or Dale's Food Organic, we'd love to have our own hamper.

And include the Florentines in there, please.

Include all of that.

Oh, God.

And cannolis, there were cannolis in there.

After that cannolis chat with Celia, there were cannolis in the hamper.

There was a fridge bag with cheese and

tappanard.

I'd chuck that in the Thames.

Thanks so much to Celia.

We will see you next week.

Goodbye.

Bye.

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Hello, I'm Carrie Add.

I'm Sarah.

And we are the Weirdos Book Club Podcast.

We are doing a very special live show as part of the London Podcast Festival.

The date is Thursday, 11th of September.

The time is 7pm.

And our special guest is the brilliant Alan Davies.

Tickets from kingsplace.co.uk.

Single ladies is coming to London.

True on Saturday, the 13th of September.

At the London Podcast Festival.

The rumours are true, Saturday, the 13th of September at King's Place.

Oh, that sounds like a date to me, Harriet.