Ep 58: Susie Essman

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

Hello, it's James Acaster 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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Yeah, can I get my podcast toasted with a schmear of humor, please?

Of course you can, sir.

But we have a name for that here.

It's called the Off-Menu Podcast.

With Ed Gamble and James A.

Caster.

Yeah, I took you by surprise, didn't I, with that intro?

You played multiple characters.

Yeah.

Oh, it was very good, Edin.

You really delivered it with confidence.

Sometimes, you know, I can always detect in your voice, you really don't believe in that first bit, but that was really great.

Yeah, and that's what took you by surprise.

And that's why you were chuckling, looking at the Great Bonito.

You couldn't believe it.

I couldn't believe how good it was.

Excellent stuff.

Well, if you're a little bit confused as to what even the Great Bonito's Off-Menu podcast is.

Back to normal again.

Here we are.

Here he is.

Old friend.

I just thought I'd rename it the Great Bonito's Off Menu Podcast.

I'm happy to call it that, absolutely.

A podcast where we ask a guest their favourite ever.

Starter, main course, dessert, side dish, and drink.

All at the behest of the Great Bonito.

He makes us do it.

He makes us do it.

He's got a gun to our heads.

Who's our guest this week, Ed?

Susie Esman.

Susie Esman,

a very funny comedian, very funny actor.

You may recognize her from Curb Your Enthusiasm.

She plays Susie Green in Curb Your Enthusiasm.

One of my favourite sitcom characters ever, I'd say.

Absolutely amazing.

Shouting at people, calling people a fat fuck

I hope when she comes in yeah she doesn't call either of us a fat fuck James fingers crossed but do you know what I kind of will love it if she does because we've been in New York for a while now and we've very much been eating our way around the place yeah yeah so it'd be pretty great if she called us those names

it's what I what I'm hoping for in a way yeah I would like that actually I hope she calls us names

but I'm also very excited to hear her menu and James I hope she doesn't say a secret ingredient we have to try and kick her out the restaurant because I don't think it's going to go down well.

No, no, no.

Every single week, if someone mentions a secret ingredient that we don't like, then we kick them out.

Although this week, the secret ingredient, I love it.

Yeah.

But you don't like it.

So I'm letting it go in, you know, fine.

Secret ingredient is egg custard.

Egg custard, I love egg custard.

Yamma, yumma.

It can F the F off as far as I can.

I don't trust the texture.

It's like jelly but dairy.

Right, so that's you name two lovely things.

Well, not combined, mate.

No, thank you.

It's like greatness, but loveliness.

Old Vom.

Absolutely not old Vom.

Awful.

Egg custard tart.

New vom.

Egg custard tart, you're living in the past, mate.

Oh, no, I'm living in a dreamland.

If I'm eating an egg custard tart, absolutely delicious.

It's the sort of thing Tiny Tim would think is a treat.

Tiny Tim.

Tiny Tim.

Well, what do you know what?

He's a good cat.

He's a good, good-hearted character.

He appreciates things in life.

So maybe you could learn a thing or two from Tiny Tim.

You know what I'm saying?

Well, that's a good point, actually.

I could learn a thing or two.

That was a bad example.

Yes, I apologise to all the Tiny Tim fans out there and Tiny Tim himself, if he's listening.

He's always listening.

Never dies, Tiny Tim.

Probably a bigger Tim now, though, of course.

No, no,

Immortal.

Immortal Tim.

He's like Vasputin.

Yeah.

Tiny Tim.

Never dies.

Well, sorry if you enjoy egg custard.

It's not my sort of thing.

So if Susie Esmond says it, she's out on her ear and she will not be going without a fight.

Because I love it.

I'll probably have to leave the restaurant as well.

Yeah.

If Susie leaves, I'll leave.

Bye-bye.

Here's Susie Esmond.

Welcome, Susie, to the Dream Restaurant.

Thank you.

I have to tell you guys that like

when I was asked to do this, you know, I said yes because I sent the email to my manager.

He said it's a really great podcast to do it.

So I was like, okay, good.

You know, because I love all things.

I'm an Anglophile.

And I thought you were taking me to a restaurant.

And then I realized I have to do homework.

Yeah.

I hate homework.

It's a restaurant of the mind.

You have to do a lot of work.

I mean, yeah, you can imagine a restaurant, whatever your dream perfect restaurant is, that's what form will be.

Yeah, but I'm all, I picked one from column A, one from column B.

I'm not at one restaurant.

No.

I'm at a million fucking different restaurants here.

Because I couldn't, first of all, if I say, I hate my favorites.

You know what I mean?

It's like people say, what's your favorite color?

Am I that superficial that I only like one thing?

you know what I mean so I don't have a favorite restaurant and in New York if I say this restaurant and then another restaurant where they know me then they're insulted so no favorites

whenever you meet someone like an adult who has a favorite color do they go down in your estimation absolutely go down or what's your favorite recording artist or your favorite movie who has one favorite it depends on your mood or what you're in you know there's no such thing as a favorite very true I always I always end up doing end-of-year lists of my favorite things of the year and That's okay.

That's that year.

But is it all-time?

You know, the greatest of all time?

I hate that shit.

I've got my list of all-time favourite colours, of course.

Yes, and what would they be?

Red, orange, blue.

Well, I don't want to reveal.

Ed likes metal music, so I'm guessing it's all black.

Yeah, it's all black all the time.

You like what kind of music?

Heavy metal music.

Oh, do you really?

Not me.

No, no.

Not your favorite.

No, not my favorite.

But there's something in it I could like.

Yeah.

So, you know, you just discard, you wouldn't, I won't discard a whole genre, so to speak.

That's first.

Now, James made a noise at the beginning of the recording there.

James is a waiter genie in this.

And I must say, out of all the guests we've ever had, you are the one who most took the arrival of the genie in your stride.

Yeah, it was like you see genies burst into the room all the time.

All the time.

Yeah, yeah, hi.

Anyway, I don't have favourites.

It's a sound effect.

Did you guys ever work in restaurants?

I've worked in a pub, in a pub kitchen, yeah.

Uh-huh.

Yeah, I worked in a couple of kitchens for like six years.

I was a waitress for many, many, many years.

Many.

And when you work in a restaurant, you see the worst in people.

Absolutely the worst.

Food brings out the worst behavior in people ever.

What's some of the work?

Have you got some like that you still look back on and go, that was the worst customer ever?

There were so many.

You know, they were just complaining and ketching.

And, you know, it would start with they'd walk into the restaurant.

this seat is drafty I want to sit over here and then whatever they were just horrible people and I remember I waitressed for about seven years and five years I was not doing stand-up and then I started doing stand-up and the guy who owned the restaurant where I worked in he was a he was an old bar mitzvah band accordion player who wanted to be in show biz but wasn't so he was totally into me when I started doing stand-up he'd let me leave early you know and go do sets and he would let me like he'd let me quit and then go on unemployment and then pay me off the books you know he was like a big supporter and I remember after about two years I was doing it and one a woman really annoyed me and I brought the the check down and she was nasty and I threw the pen in her face and then I knew it was like after about two years of doing stand-up I was just like okay it's time for me to go

this is it I'm getting violent now it's time for me to go and then I never went back and then I started making a living as a comic well you're the customer in the dream restaurant today so you can treat the genie waiter like absolute shit to get your eyes on.

But I wouldn't, and by the way,

and to me, it's always a bone of contention how people treat waiters, having been a waitress for seven years.

And I tell my daughters, when you go out on a date with a guy, watch how they treat the wait staff or the cab driver or whoever.

Because if they're an asshole of them, they'll be an asshole of you eventually.

Do you apply the same when you're on set these days, how people treat like runners or like how people treat

you?

Yeah, you know, people will say to me, How was so-and-so as a guest star?

And I'll be like, like well they were really nice to me but they treated hair and makeup like shit yeah yeah yeah and then I don't like them that's my peeps baby yeah yeah other people that you actually exactly that's the crew you got to be good to the crew yeah of course yeah I was gonna ask if you're a food fan if you're a foodie you know you know I am and I'm not and I was thinking about this last night

prior to coming here doing my homework

I was thinking about there have been so many different incarnations in my food life you know I'm 64 years old.

Would you guys, what are you, 12, 13?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, you're kids.

Like, I was a vegetarian for 30 years.

Oh, wow.

Yeah, and I stopped doing that because about six years ago I stopped being a vegetarian because I bought my husband for birthday or Christmas or whatever.

I got him the Bacon of the Month Club.

Well, you know, you're with somebody a long time, you run out of gift ideas.

So I saw this, and it's like artisan bacons from around the world or the country and they send you a new bacon every month or something.

And so he's cooking up the bacon and I'm smelling the bacon.

I had not had, I ate fish but I had not had any meat, poultry, nothing in 30 years.

And I was strict, like no, you know, no chicken bullion, nothing, you know.

And I'm smelling the bacon and I was like, Why am I not eating this?

You know what bacon smells like.

It's like the most incredible smell.

They should make a perfume of bacon.

I'd wear it.

And then I was like, I had a bite of it, and it was the first time in 30 years.

And that was it.

And then I started eating meat, and I was in a much better mood since then.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

The smell is good when it's normal bacon, but this was the bacon of the month.

It was bacon of the month.

You had no chance.

And then I just, I had a piece, and then all of a sudden, I started eating, like, you know, like, I don't eat a lot, but like some steak.

Yeah.

You know, and it's like, nothing ever tasted so good to me in my life.

Yeah, which is incredible.

It was like steak of the week.

Steak of the week.

Oh, I'm sure they have that.

But anyway, so I was a vegetarian all those years, and I've been gluten-free for 20 years, like pre-fat.

So there's been all these different incarnations in my life of food, but I like food a lot.

Excellent.

That's what we like to hear.

Are there people who don't like food?

There are.

And we've had a couple of them on this podcast, would you believe?

People who really eat food for fuel.

That's all.

They're not interested in what I'm doing.

I'm not next to two people in a cafe recently, and they were having a chat, and they were saying, yeah, you know, I'll just just eat it it's just fuel it's just fuel really i don't really want to if i could not eat it or what if i could just take a pill and then that went and then that was it and i didn't have to eat food i'll do that they must save so much money oh i was so furious listening to them they need to just get tang you won't remember that but the astronauts used to drink tang yeah it was just this crap you put in or they should just get like a insure or something.

Fuel is the new thing that people see.

What is that?

It's like a meal replacement thing, which is just like a really thick shake, which has got all the nutrients in that you need for the day apparently.

I don't like shakes.

They make you bloated and gassy.

Yep.

Even nice milkshakes.

Even nice milkshakes.

Oh milkshakes is a whole different story.

What we have here in New York, I don't know if you've ever heard of, is an egg cream.

We only heard of it the other day.

Yes.

We were in a restaurant.

I saw it on the menu.

I asked what it was.

It doesn't have egg in it.

Yeah, so that was the one thing that was surprising.

Yeah.

But because the previous day we'd had breakfast and I'd had a milkshake with breakfast and really knocked myself out.

Yeah, why not?

So

when we were ordered in the next day and I asked what an egg cream was, these two were really laughing at me because I was clearly about to make it a little bit more.

He's going to make the same mistake again, just kill himself.

Did you have it?

No, because I was actually still quite confused as to what it was.

I don't know if you could help me.

Well, I'm not totally clear because I used to have them when I was a kid.

They don't serve them as much anymore.

But it's basically a milkshake with like seltzer in it.

Like a fizzy milkshake.

Yeah, yeah.

It's good.

Really?

Yeah.

It doesn't sound good.

Yeah,

what's not good that has ice cream in it?

Tell me something with ice cream in it that's not good.

Well,

a fezzy milkshake just feels delicious.

I just fuse my mouth.

You know what?

After you're done here, go down to like Katz's Delicatessen or something and order an egg cream.

All right, we will do that.

Now we have homework.

Yeah.

Yeah, we have to do it.

It's only fair that we do.

It's only fair that we do our homework.

We always start off with still or sparkling water, as do all restaurants.

We give you the choice.

Well, in New York, they also offer tap water, which is just, which is what we always get, because New York water is great.

We've heard there's people very, very sort of pro New York water.

It's great water.

It just is.

It's not true all over.

Don't order tap water in Flint, Michigan.

Yes.

For example.

And I don't remember the London water.

London water, I think, is okay.

I mean, I'll drink water out of the taps in London, no problem.

But apparently, New York tap water is the best of all.

It's really good.

So you just get tap.

I'm going to pay for a bottle of fucking water.

It's like, you know what really pisses me off when you go and go go get to a hotel yeah and there's a bottle of water for like $15.55

you know and it's a three-dollar bottle of water that so pisses me off yeah I will not go back to that hotel again you'll never even be in the hotel even though no even if the water should be complimentary even if the price of the room is astronomical well will you tell them when you're leaving why you're not coming back sometimes they should have free water and free wifi yeah yes very true yeah there's a certain bullshit

Certain things in hotels that are definitely, I'd say, yeah, free water, free Wi-Fi, and just a good shower.

A good shower, yeah, and a good bed.

But you know, when you're traveling and you, and you get, like, I go LA to New York a lot, and I get to LA and I'm dehydrated and exhausted, and I end up drinking the expensive water because I don't have time to, and it so pisses me off.

Yeah, with every glass.

It's not a matter, like I could even afford it at this point.

It's not a matter of that.

It's the principle.

Yeah, but that's not what you work hard for.

You don't work hard to afford

water.

Damn.

And you don't drink LA tap water because it's not a bad picture.

No, no, no.

LA tap water is disgusting.

Yeah.

And as a matter of fact, in LA, you can't get good,

well, people would argue with me about this, but from my point of view, you can't get good pizza, bagels, Italian bread, and it's because of the water, I believe.

Ah.

Because you need good water to make good bagels.

Exactly to make good dough.

Because obviously New York's very famous for good bagels, good pizza, but I didn't think it was because of the water.

I think it is.

I could be completely wrong about this, as I am about most things.

But I don't mind that you could be wrong about that.

I like the sound of that theory, and I'm going to tell a lot of people about that theory.

When you go to LA, mention it, and they'll smack you.

Because of the water.

Pop-doms or bread.

Pop-doms or bread, Susie.

Pop-a-doms or bread.

Papa, what?

What is he saying?

You guys have bastardized the English language beyond all recognition.

Papa Doms?

What's Papa Dobs?

Papa Doms.

Papa Doms.

What's that?

What are Papa Doms?

At a curry house.

Yeah.

Bring out the big, like, crispy snack things at the beginning, like sort of flat, big.

Oh, yeah, the flat, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Made of lentils, those things.

They can be made.

Yeah, they are made of lentils, aren't they?

Yeah, they're made of lentils.

Yeah, you know what?

Here's the thing.

They're gluten-free, so I eat them, but nothing's like a good piece of bread.

Yeah, with shitloads of butter.

We can specify that.

Warm, warm with butter.

Toast, what's better than toast?

Yeah.

We can get you.

Would you like toast for this?

No, because the problem with being gluten-free, and there's plenty of gluten-free breads and bagels and pizza, they suck.

Yeah.

They're just not as good.

You would have thought they'd found a way to make good gluten-free bread by now, right?

They haven't.

They haven't.

No, not.

I mean, there's some decent.

And there's some decent pizza crust, but not, you know, it's not as good.

So is that what you, would you like pop-a-doms or for this meal, are you gonna?

I want bread.

You want bread?

We'll get you bread.

Okay,

they may have good bread in the UK, delicious bread in the UK.

I think we've nailed bread in the UK.

Some good bread knocking around.

Yeah.

Depending on what water you're using, of course.

Yes.

It'll depend on the water.

You have to bring the New York water over to the UK, and then it's really good.

But it must be good water in the UK because I've had good bread there.

I think there's pretty good water in the UK.

I think there's quite hard water further north.

Where does the water come from in London?

Good question, isn't it?

That's a very good question.

Excellent question.

No idea.

In New York, it comes from upstate New York.

Okay.

Where it's clean and pristine.

That's nice.

The thing is, if you look at the Thames, you hope it's not coming from there.

Well, you don't want it to come from the Hudson either.

No, yeah, for sure.

All these rivers, you know, you don't want it to come from the Ganges if you live there.

Is there a specific bread you would like?

A certain bread that you've had that is like the best bread that you'd want?

I used to bake a lot of bread.

And I used to make this Russian black bread.

That was good with like shitloads of butter.

So what's in Russian black bread?

I've not heard of that.

I don't remember.

Black water.

It's just dark.

Yeah.

It's dark and it's like thick and just like you slice it and it's warm and you just bring it out of the oven.

It's unbelievable.

So you don't bake anymore?

No.

Those days are behind you?

Yeah.

Did that stop at the same time when you started eating bacon?

Was there all coming together?

The baking stopped a long time ago.

Because baking is like homework.

Baking, you know, when you cook, you could improvise, and I'm an improviser.

And when you bake, you have to be completely accurate with all your ingredients.

And that bores me.

Yeah, you can't riff.

You can't riff with baking.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Same thing every time.

This amount of baking soda, a pinch of salt.

And leave it.

You've got to leave.

I've only done a little bit of baking recently.

You've got to leave it until it's then twice the size and you're trying to work.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Let it rise, which is kind of fun, because then you get to beat it.

Yeah.

You get to beat the crap out of a thing of dough, which is fun.

Would you think about anything in particular while you were beating up the dough?

It depends.

You know, I get asked this question a lot about, you know, how I work up my anger for my character, for Susie Green on Curve.

And there's always, now my trigger's so easy, you know, because I have this asshole-in-chief here that I could just use him.

But, you know, there's always something.

I mean, I brought up teenagers.

There was always something.

Yeah.

Is it?

I was then thinking about who the asshole in chief was.

I was like, oh, yeah, it's Donald Trump.

But then I'm not going to be able to do We don't say his name.

For a while, I was like,

Larry seems like a nice name.

No, it's not Larry.

It's not Larry.

I love Larry.

What?

Larry's one of my best friends.

I love him.

Yeah.

So do you find that you find the character easier to access now?

She's always been easy to access for me because it's so much fun.

Yeah.

You know, you just scream and yell and tell everybody to go fuck themselves.

I show up to set, you know, they fly me to LA.

The other thing about when you're on set, they feed you all day.

Yeah.

You know, this craft service, you know what craft service is.

It's just like deliciousness all day long and choices and then catering.

We always have a great caterer.

And I love when you don't have to think about your food when it's just provided for you.

Because to me, every night it's like, all right, what are we going to do for dinner?

It's like the stress and the anxiety of it.

And when I had kids at home and the meal prep, and then, and now they're all in their late 20s and they all, you know, live on their own.

But they come home and it's, what are we doing for dinner?

What am I?

The meal preparer?

The rest of your life, I have to prepare your fucking meals.

You figure it out.

Here's money.

Go to the store.

But yes,

but on curb, they fly me out and then they put me up and then I show up to set and I scream and I yell and I tell everybody to go fuck themselves and then they give me money and then I go home.

And they love me for it.

It's like the greatest job in the whole world.

That's why you don't bake anymore because you can get your frustration out another way.

I can.

You don't need to beat the dough.

You could just go and go and be at a TV show.

Go and set with a pocket full of pens.

And I beat the shit out of Larry and Jeff.

It's so much fun.

Would you ever throw a pen in one of their faces?

Like

throwing a pen in their face?

No, because that could hit their eye.

Could hit their eye.

Well, Larry's got glasses up.

Yes, Larry has his glasses on.

Always.

He's protected.

There was actually a scene in this season where I'm beating the shit out of him, but it was cut.

It was cut just for time.

I don't know why, but

we always shoot so much and then it's cut.

But I remember I threw my shoulder out because I was beating him with a purse.

purse and I threw my shoulder out that's how into it I was

so we're coming to your starter yes the start of the proper meal is it from a particular place or it's from my kitchen oh wow

because my starter would be a caprese salad with with fresh burrata oh yeah okay so now the reason why it's from my kitchen is because in my house I have a place here but I also have a house

I grow tomatoes and basil and all of that and there's something about and I'm a city girl so this comes late in life to me but there's something about picking the ingredients and making this salad that is so thrilling to me, I can't even tell you.

It's like, you know, I feel like, of course, I'm not back on the land because that's the only thing I fucking make is, you know, a little basil and a tomato.

I'm not killing the cow.

No,

I don't have any livestock.

But there's something about it with a really fresh burata, and there's a cheese place near me that I get it.

And you just cut into it and it just runs.

And then I just put a little balsamic and really, really good olive oil.

And that to me is just heavenly in the summer when the tomatoes are just amazingly ripe.

Oh, that sounds delicious.

It's such theater with burata as well, like putting a slice in it and then it sort of unfolds.

Yeah.

And it's not the same as just regular mozzarella.

No, no.

No, you need the complete runny grossness of it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And then you take like a really good hunk of French bread or Italian bread, and then you wipe it all up.

Yeah.

And then the other thing, sometimes I like to put little jalapenos on it.

Oh, nice.

That I grow, that I also grow.

Game changer?

Yeah.

Little jalapenos in there.

I never would have thought to do that.

Well, you've learned something.

I have learned something immediately.

I think you're our first guest who's grown their own meal so far.

Is that true?

Yeah, I know.

You're an innovator.

You might be.

And by the way, tomatoes and basil and that kind of stuff, really easy to grow on a window box in the city or even just in your flat, you know.

See how I change apartment.

I appreciate that.

I mean, just you could just, it's something that anybody can grow.

Yeah.

So what, so you grow jalapenos,

basil tomatoes, what else?

Or is that the main fruit?

Yeah, olive oil, balsamic, and the burrata.

Yeah.

You know, that's basically sometimes, depending on what I find at the farmer's market, I'll put maybe a little avocado on.

Oh, yeah.

Very nice.

So wholesome.

So wholesome and delicious.

And the food that I don't like saucy.

I don't like fancy.

I like the flavors of food.

Like, you know, when you bite into like a tomato off the vine,

you could just eat it like an apple.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, it's just so delicious.

Do you think you could ever go back to mozzarella?

Yes, if it's fresh.

That stuff you buy in the packaging, it's rubbery and disgusting.

Yeah, that's not.

Yeah.

a problem.

We often talk about mozzarella must feel sad now that burata's come around.

Because there's like a better version of it.

It's the ugly step system, isn't it?

Yeah, it's really.

But it serves a purpose for other, you know, melting.

Right, yeah.

On a pizza, whatever.

And actually, the terrible mozzarella is the best for melting.

Is it?

The really rubbery stuff.

I didn't know.

I would imagine because it's not so runny.

Yeah, there's too much moisture in it.

So we don't have to feel sorry for polyo.

That's the brand we use here.

Polyo.

Would you ever punch a burrito like a bit of dough and watch it explode across the face?

No, because it would get all over my face.

It would be like punch it with.

It wouldn't be pretty.

It's not as fun to beat up your starter as it is the bread.

No.

Bread, you're supposed to beat the crap out of it.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know?

The starter's got to be treated very delicately.

Yeah, very delicate.

There's only two things you ought to beat the crap out of, bread and Larry David.

Yeah.

Only on camera.

Not in real life.

There have been scenes.

I remember one scene many seasons ago where I had to punch him in the chest.

Like he came, something happened.

He comes to my door.

He's always coming to my door and I'm kicking him out or something.

And I had to push him, punch him in the chest.

And he kept on saying to me, do it harder.

Do it harder.

He seemed so frail to me.

And like I was so afraid I was going to hurt him.

And finally I gave him a really good, that's it, that's it.

He loves to be screamed at and he loves to be beaten.

That's all I'm saying.

When you

eat the caprezi salad at home is there a particular place you like to go to with some like scenery or whatever looking at the windows yeah well we just sold this house right so you know um but it was on it was a beautiful old country estate on the hudson river with a beautiful view of the hudson and we had a sun porch that was you know really old it was built in 1922 really old brass hardware and you know the doors uh french doors that opened up and that was where i like to eat my meals in the summer if it's a porch you could probably just work out when the new owners are going to be out and just go onto the porch and eat a break.

They invited us.

Oh really?

Yes.

But that was before they moved in.

You never know when people move into a house and they find all the little things that you didn't tell them about.

Then they start hating you.

Yeah.

Not that there were a lot.

My husband's very handy.

He fixes things.

Oh yeah?

Yeah.

That's good.

I'd like to be able to do that kind of stuff a bit more.

But there's no purpose to a husband who's not handy.

What's the point if they're not handy?

Don't tell me that, Susie.

I'm getting married and I'm not handy at all.

But you're funny.

Yeah, sometimes, not at home.

Is there

anything you could do that's worthwhile?

No, I don't think so.

Really?

I can cook.

All right, well, that's good.

Okay, good.

I can do that.

All right.

Does your fiancé cook?

No, she doesn't cook.

She doesn't go off.

She's actually the handy one out of the two of us.

Then it works out.

Yeah.

There you're fine.

Okay, good.

Because, like, he is funny, but he hasn't made her laugh in years.

You know, it's.

She's fed up on my bullshit.

Here's the thing about funniness.

If you're funny, like, you can get away with so much shit.

You know, I knew this from the time I was six months old.

But, like, if there's like a nuclear holocaust, my husband could build a lean to and, you know, build a whole house or whatever he

could be out there foraging and helping us survive.

Where's Larry David with all his millions?

What the fuck is he going to do?

Nothing.

Money will mean nothing.

They come into your door, asking for help.

You'd be paying attention to that.

Exactly.

Exactly.

Get out of my bunker.

Is that hard enough for you, Larry?

When I was thinking of starters, another one was

a restaurant in London on Dean Street that's no longer there, Redfort, which was an Indian.

And they had this mushroom appetizer.

You don't call it appetizers, do you?

No.

Starters.

They had a mushroom starter that was like this mushroom and that cheese that they use that I still think about to this day.

I love memories of like places that have shut and you still think about them.

I still think about that

starter.

Yeah.

I still think about that.

And when they brought you the popadoms at Redfort, what did you say?

Poppadoff?

What the fuck?

I never heard that in my life.

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So we come to your main course now.

So, all right, my main course, and this is going to sound a little odd, but if I was thinking of this in terms of, you know, like they're about to execute me,

which might happen someday.

And what's my last meal request?

And it would have to be, I grew up in a place called Mount Vernon, New York, which is just, I don't know, 12 miles north of here.

It's right next to the Bronx.

And there was this pizza place there called Johnny's Pizzeria.

It's been open since I think the 40s or something.

And they had an old-fashioned brick oven, and they had that thin-crust pizza.

It's still there, Johnny's Pizza, but it's not in a different location.

So I don't think they have the brick oven anymore.

But they had this thin crust pizza that was like you've never had anything this good in your life.

I'm telling you.

Although there's a couple of places here that I would recommend in Manhattan while you're here.

But that would be my entree, would be an amazing pizza.

And they don't sell it by the slice there it's only you got to get the whole pie and I've never had pizza like this in my life and it's simple it's just tomato sauce and probably a little garlic and and the the rubbery mozzarella that melts amazing and has it got all the it's got all the like the big burnt bits on it yeah big burnt and it's really really thin crust and not everybody likes that but it's like and then there was this pizza place for years I lived on 73rd in Amsterdam was this pizza place Vinnie's pizza which many people thought was the best pizza in New York and I would go in there every single day and get a slice of pizza every day every single day to get a slice of pizza because it was amazing pizza and they would not give you extra cheese even if you asked for it because it was so cheesy to begin with

see pizza is something that like I overlook too often because I've had too many there's not loads of places in the UK no great there's not New York there is New York is great

and like I so I don't order pizza very often but if someone tells me I was saying this the other day, if someone tells me a place is good for pizza, like those pizzas are brilliant, then I have to have it.

But otherwise, I just skip past that part on the menu.

And New York is known for the thin crust or the coal oven pizza is really good too, which is old-fashioned coal, like Chicago, they got the deep dish pizza.

Fuck is that?

That's shit.

I think I would have used to have enjoyed that.

I think back in the day, I've eaten so many terrible pizzas, like the big chain pizzas, like Pizza Hut or Domino's or something.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I end up having deep pan and it's like eating a loaf of bread.

With just red sauce and

the sauce is so important.

People don't understand how important a good marinara is and making it.

And Johnny's pizza, oh my god, in Mount Vernon, New York, the greatest pizza you're ever going to eat.

And

it's basically just a cheese and tomato.

There's no other extra pizza.

Well you could get pepperoni and like

it's like bagels.

You know, like I'm a New Yorker.

We used to go to the bagel factory.

My father and I, every Sunday morning, we'd go to the bagel factory in the Bronx and where they boiled the bagels in the old-fashioned way.

And we would get like what they call a baker's dozen, which is 13 bays.

We'd get like three or four bags and then drive home.

And I would eat four of them on the ride home because they were like warm and just delicious.

But you don't get like...

cinnamon raisin or you know these kinds of flavored bagels you get sesame poppy or plain that's it i love the sesame ones so like a pineapple pizza and that michigas, that's bullshit.

Well this is the thing.

I was telling Ed about a pizza that I'd had the other day and it was a very busy pizza but it was I loved it but Ed really screwed his face about it.

What did it have on?

I was going to tell Susie and see what Susie had.

Was it in New York?

No, so it was in England in a place called The Bull's Head.

It was in Derbyshire.

It was in like a little.

So it sounds like a pub.

Yeah, so it's about a pub.

But you wouldn't expect to do great pizza.

And my sister was like, you know, she used to live around there.

We've got to go there for the pizza.

I got a very simple one and it was delicious my sister got one that was like it had uh like chicken on it like tandoori kind of chicken with like that is so it's so wrong

it's so wrong bits of mango chutney on there

stuff like that and then put that that could go on a papa dot whatever the hell that is

and i love indian food good indian food yeah but

I didn't think that pizza would work and I had a slice of her pizza and it was it was amazing because it was savory because it has all those delicious flavors but it's not pizza yeah okay I appreciate it's a it's a piece of bread with stuff on it

it's like a sandwich yeah I knew Susie would back me up on that yeah

am I right yeah yeah you are going in I knew that I wouldn't stand a chance but I thought it was good to bring it up

it's it I I'm upset about this now

it's wrong I mean they did very plain ones as well they did very simple ones as well and was it good yeah I had a very simple one

You know, we were talking before about the water.

The water is really important for pizza crust, but so is the oven.

It has to be a really, really hot oven.

And, you know, that's all the rage now.

Like, all the really rich people get pizza ovens in their house.

Deliver.

I need a pizza oven in my house.

Yeah, it's too hot.

It's crazy.

There's a place where I grew up, a little town called Ketterin in Northamptonshire.

It's very small.

And they don't really have loads of restaurants or whatever.

But there's a family-run place called Frank's Pizza, and they've got a proper pizza.

You know what?

I just had a

memory because I lived, I went to school in the UK in 1976 and there was this little Italian cafe on

Tottenham Court Road.

Did I say that right?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Good enough.

Say it for me.

Tottenham Court Road.

Tottenham.

Tottenham Court Road.

You probably said it better than us.

Yeah,

all the letters.

And it was a little Italian place, and I could picture the waitress.

This is what food does here.

I could picture her.

Lovely, older Italian woman with dark hair pulled back and a part in the middle.

She looks a little like Ana Magnani, you know, she was very elegant.

And they had amazing gelato.

I used to get the hazelnut gelato, and they had these mini pizzas that were amazing.

And I used to make a special trip, because I lived in Islington, I used to make a special trip there to get the pizza.

Wow.

It says it's not there anymore.

Oh, it's close.

I went back years later and it was like, it's gone.

Yeah, it's so sad when you go back and it's gone.

But then at least you,

that then, I'm really glad that when it was there,

I went there all the time.

All the time.

But I don't know if this is happening in London.

I think it is because I was there like two years ago and I noticed all the little mom and pops are leaving.

Yeah, especially that area, especially topics.

It's real estate prices.

And it's happening all over New York.

All the little

specialty places.

There used to be a pizza place.

I lived for years.

I lived on 78th and Broadway, right across from Comedy Club, which was great because I lived on the ground floor.

Stand-up New York was across the street.

And

when you're doing stand-up, I don't have to tell you, but for the audience, when the act is about, their time is up, they get a light, you know, to know that they have three minutes left or whatever.

So I lived so close, when it was my time up, they would call me when the act before me would get the light, so I could just run across the street and go there.

Yeah.

So there was a pizza place,

New Pizza Town on the corner.

And I knew the owner, Sal, and his wife, Shirley.

And

Shirley,

she was funny because she used to always say things to me like, you know, Sal wants me to be old-fashioned, but I want to be Majoran.

And I had no idea what she was talking about.

So,

so Majaran.

So,

so

my brother-in-law, he was not my brother-in-law at the time, but he was my good friend, and that's how I met my husband.

He was painting my apartment, and he went across to get pizza, and he got pizza with chicken on it.

And this is when I was a vegetarian.

And Sal said to him, Susie no like chicken.

Susie no like chicken.

So they knew me so well that he knew exactly the pizza that i would eat

but that was like a little mom and pop it's gone now now it's a cvs yeah that

yeah yeah it's very sad there's a there's a yeah little

uh little post near me i went in there and they said my order before i could sell yeah and when those places go it's horrible yeah that's all i that's all i want that's always been my dream to just walk into a place and they know you yeah and just make it straight away you know we all want to be treated special that's one of the perks of celebrity is that you go into a restaurant and they just send you stuff

One of my personal dreams as well in restaurants is to have a dish named after me.

Has that ever happened?

I haven't, but we had a whole episode about that.

I think that was season five or something, where it was the Larry Davids sandwich, where he gets a sandwich named after him.

I have not had that.

There's a place, there's a curry house again in my hometown called The Raj.

And when I go in there, I have a chat with the owner for a while and catch up with him.

And then he'll just ask me about what I'm in the mood for.

And then he won't make me that he'll make me something that's like that but better

and then they bring it out see that's delightful isn't it and then I noticed on the last time I was there he gave me the receipt at the end and I looked at it and instead of like what my meal was it just said the James A.

Caster special

really yeah that's I hope you saved that I did save it I took a photo of it meant a lot to me but also I noticed that he'd put it was uh he'd put that there were two two people eating which there absolutely wasn't it was just me but I guess he knew that I'd be showing the receipt to people and he knew what wanted me to be able to do it.

He didn't want you to feel pathetic because I wasn't lonely.

Exactly.

I had a friend.

Because there's actually nothing sadder than eating a dish named after you alone.

Alone.

And it's like, you know, if a tree falls in the woods and nobody, it's the same thing.

Who gives a shit if nobody's there to see it?

Yeah, it's there on my own eating myself.

I just remember when we were talking about chicken on pizza, I've just remembered something awful.

My fiancé's old flatmate ordered a chicken pizza once, and it arrived, and one of the bits of chicken was clearly raw, and he ate it anyway, and contracted one of the only cases of campylobacter in the UK that year.

What kind of idiot is he?

What kind of moron eats raw chicken?

I guess he just thought, oh, it'll be fine.

The government had to come round.

Oh my god, who are you marrying that lived with such a person?

Why are you getting married?

Why am I getting married to someone who would live with someone who ate raw children?

I'm just always curious why people get married.

Just because I like her.

I'm a fan of her work.

How long have you been together?

Ten years.

Oh, that's fine.

Never mind.

Ten years is.

Might as well, right?

Oh, but you're so young.

I'm 33.

All right, so since 23?

Yeah, yeah,

you know, I have a problem with that.

What's the problem?

The problem is, is that after a while, you know,

you get a little restless.

I married my husband at 53.

Wow.

So I had no wild oats to sow anymore.

I'm not a wild oats guy.

Really?

Yeah, I'm not a wild oats.

All right, so you like the stability?

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But she might feel differently.

Because women's sexuality changes at 35.

Well, we'll be, you know, did you know that?

Yeah.

Yeah.

In men, it's 18, right?

And then women.

In women, it's 35.

It's the great big,

fuck you, that we don't even know what it means.

Like, why, when we're losing our fertility, do we get so randy?

You know?

But it's true.

And not just for myself, I've asked all of my girlfriends, all of us when we turned 35, married, single, whatever.

I was single, so it was fun.

Yeah.

But, you know, everybody, all of a sudden, you just, your whole sexuality changes.

Do you think it's because,

like, in an evolutionary perspective, men die earlier, so they get all their fun earlier in life.

And then when the men are gone, the women, you know,

pick up a gear.

But evolutionarily, you would think that we want, we're sexual beings to procreate.

Sure, correct?

So why 35 for women?

Yeah.

I mean, I don't even have any eggs anymore.

Yeah.

You know, I mean, it's ridiculous.

There's no, there's no point

apart from just fun.

Well, fun, yeah.

And it's fun because, but I think that it's, it's supposed to be fun so that you want to do it so that you create offspring.

Sure.

But what maybe not.

I don't know.

Maybe we maybe we have this all wrong.

Yeah.

Maybe that whole Darwinian thing is a complete load of crap.

Not that the other idea, you know, that Adam and Eve,

maybe there's some other reason for the whole thing.

Yeah, maybe Darwin was sort of half right, but it's not survival of the fittest, it's survival of the randiest.

Maybe.

Or the horniest.

Survival of the horniest.

That's all it is.

He wasn't particularly attractive anyway.

So maybe he just made that up.

Yeah,

he was bitter.

Well, we've never seen him at 18, though.

Because I guess when he peaked at 18.

Yeah.

He peaked young.

Yeah.

He peaked young.

It was a problem for him.

He went into deep depression in his later life.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

Did he?

Yeah.

Because he knew stuff that...

This is your boy.

How come I know this shit and you don't?

Damn, it's not our boy.

He's not our boy.

Anyway, congratulations on your divorce, Ed.

Yes, yes, by the way.

We've got a few years.

I know.

That's very nice that you're getting married.

I'm very nice.

Do you live with her?

Yes.

Okay.

Yes, we live together.

Okay.

I think that would be a nightmare.

And what do you cook?

Oh, all sorts of things.

What's your speciality, Ed?

I already have a speciality.

If Susie came out, what would you make?

I did a lovely dish the other night, which was a turmeric salmon called like a crispy coconut topping.

See, that sounds delicious.

It It was really good.

That sounds yummy.

I got it off Bon Appetit.

Do you know Bon Appetit?

The magazine, yeah.

I got it from there.

It was fantastic.

And it comes like Swiss chard and ginger.

Oh, I love Swiss chard.

I love vegetables.

Well, you're very welcome to come over.

I will.

James, do you cook?

I haven't, I'm going to start now.

I've only just got a hob.

A what?

A hob.

What's that?

Like a cooker top, a stove top.

A stove top.

I've only just got that.

So you didn't, like, you mean a burner?

Yeah, yeah.

So for like two years, I was just touring constantly.

I wasn't at home.

Do you have a girlfriend?

Yeah.

So now I'm at home.

And who cooks, you or her?

We both don't cook the same amount, but I want to cook more this year.

Anyway, it's a sort of thing that I want to do.

Can I just say exciting news?

Because we just got a new house because we sold the old house with the garden.

We haven't moved in yet.

We're going to move in in a couple of weeks.

And for the first time in my life, and I'm old, I have a big kitchen.

Oh, God, nice.

And it's like, and a double oven.

Yeah.

And I can't wait to get in there.

Yeah.

That's the dream.

A big kitchen.

Have you got an island?

I have an island.

Yeah, the island's huge.

The island's the dream.

It's huge.

When we were looking at places, there was one place we were potentially going to get, and it had an island.

And I was like, we need to get this house because there's an island.

It has an island.

And I have two sinks, one on the island and one on the counter.

So you could separate the vegetables and the meat.

Yeah.

My fiancé made the point that the rest of the house was pretty shit.

But you have an island.

I was like, all we need is the island.

I will just stand by the island all day.

Live and sleep on the island.

Side dish.

This one was hard for me.

Are the sides hard for people generally?

I think it can be because, you know, you'd normally order multiple sides or something like that.

I love vegetables.

So, any vegetable side, it's simple, is you know, broccoli,

greens, any kind of greens, I absolutely love.

There was this restaurant, it's closed now, that used to make these amazing fried artichokes

that were so amazingly delicious.

However, if it was my last meal,

it would be french fries.

Yeah, I mean, that's a really crispy, really, you know, really delicious french fries.

And that's a total last meal thing to have.

If you want to make this your last meal, by the way, that's, you know, some people interpret it in a different way.

way yeah but if it's your last meal pizza and fries and french fries i mean i i would die very happy yeah yeah very very happy but if it was like a normal life that i know i'm gonna live longer then it would be some kind of a vegetable and probably the fried artichoke if i had to choose yes yeah fried artichoke with a little parmesan oh that sounds parmesan saves everything to me oh yeah yeah i love parmesan i've only just kind of like started saying yes to it really yeah for even on pasta for a while i just didn't want it i just i always said no on spaghetti and meatballs another favorite dish yeah yeah i i love it now but for ages i was like don't want it i just i just want i just want my meal i don't want that stuff i think because i'd had like you know bad like i'd had like also powdered

stuff yeah no no you and you don't want the the one that comes in the in the thing with the that that you want fresh you want to grate it on yeah no i don't grate it on because it's too much trouble but i always buy i buy i use a lot of it so i always get it fresh right that's good i always just take hunks off it though if i've got it in the fridge I'll just

hunk in the mouth.

We had an amazing meal at a restaurant called Beast in London and the starter, there's a set menu, the starter they just bring you a wheel of parmesan that they've dug the middle out of a bit and you just have like a chisel and you just

absolutely

what's your favorite cheese

you know I don't have a favorite cheese.

This is cheese that I bought.

Of course, I've just asked you for your favorite.

And we've just had

favourites.

I'm so sorry.

For different times, different.

But I like, I had a goat brie the other day, which was out of this world.

That sounds amazing.

What's better than cheese and crackers?

Well, James would argue with you massively there.

All desserts.

I'm a cheese boy.

Yeah.

And James is a sweet boy.

I love sweets.

Yeah, when you were saying about ice cream earlier, I was fully on board for that.

I do like cheese and crackers.

Definitely.

I do like it.

I don't want people to think I don't like cheese at all.

I do like it, but I would take ice cream and desserts and cakes over it any day.

I understand.

Yeah, that's what I would do.

There's nothing wrong with ice cream and desserts.

Yeah.

But cheese and crackers, especially like those really, you know, smelly cheeses.

Oh, yeah.

Yummy.

We do those well in Britain.

What's interesting?

Yeah, you do.

What's interesting, though, is like, you know, because I was thinking about this, as I said, I was thinking about the different incarnations in my life and how much your tastes change as you get older.

You know, like when I was a kid, I hated olives.

Now I could eat a whole container of them or certain like potent cheeses I hated.

And you just develop tastes for these.

Coffee is another one.

Yeah.

It's important that that happens as well.

I'd hate it if when I was a kid, I just discovered all the things I liked and it never changed for the rest of my life.

You would get so bored.

Yeah.

And like, because life is so like...

And so much of it is what you were brought up with.

Like, my mother was a horrible cook.

She used to make us spaghetti and ketchup.

Like, that was what she used to do.

And I thought she was a great cook.

She was my mom, you know, and I thought, oh, she makes the best, you know, whatever.

Until I got older and I went out into the world, I was like, oh my god, she's horrible.

And she was also really, really, because she was a little wacky.

She was very unsanitary.

So as we, my siblings and I, as we got older, we wouldn't eat her food, which was hugely insulting to her and it became a problem.

But she never, you know, she didn't believe in things like if you touch a raw chicken, then you wash your hands.

She didn't believe, she thought it was, oh, that's all nonsense.

They just made that stuff up.

She didn't believe in hygiene, you know.

So I was sick all the time when I was a kid.

And I think she was trying to kill me.

I look back now, and it was like Munchausen by proxy.

You know, she was trying to kill us.

Did she become a pizza chef in England?

Yeah.

But she seriously didn't believe that stuff.

She didn't believe.

So now I am like super, super clean.

Like I keep by my sink, I always have a little jar of diluted bleach.

Wow.

You know, like water and bleach.

So if you cook chicken or whatever, everything gets wiped down like a crazy woman.

You'd be a great murderer.

Oh, yeah.

I never thought of that.

It might be a new profession.

Have you ever had like the big wheel of cheese that's hollowed out and then the pasta's cooked in the cheese?

I've seen that.

That doesn't appeal to me.

Oh, I've had it.

It was good.

And there's one place, there's a stall in Camden Market Market that does it.

And they put a burratto on top of it.

And I'm quite tempted.

I'd like to try that one a lot.

But when I went there to get it, that one was sold out.

I had to have the bacon one instead.

The bacon one?

There was one chunk of bacon in it instead.

Oh, that's like a carbonara.

Yeah, that's a carbonara.

Which is, by the way, that is one of my favorite dishes.

A really good spaghetti carbonara.

Unfortunately, I have to have gluten-free spaghetti, which is never as good.

But the carbonera overrides the spaghetti.

So, yeah.

That's a great dish.

Yeah.

I made that one year for Thanksgiving.

Oh, really?

Oh,

that's a turkey.

You know, I used to have wild turkeys in my backyard, and I became friendly with them.

I had names for them.

So I didn't want to, you know, eat one of them, even though that's not what I got at the market.

But I made a spaghetti carbonero.

Why do I have to have turkey and stuffing?

You don't have it anyway.

You don't have Thanksgiving.

But we have to have turkeys on Christmas day.

You don't have goose?

No, no goose.

No.

Some people have goose.

I had goose last year.

Did you?

We had goose and ham, two two meats.

You know, Italian friends of mine, I used to have an Italian boyfriend.

I would go to his house for Thanksgiving.

They would have, they wouldn't have turkey, they would have lasagna, they would have lean, all of that stuff for me.

Which

sounds better.

So much better.

You have what you want to eat, right?

Yeah.

You should have what you want to eat, not what is exciting.

Have peanut butter and jelly.

I don't give a shit.

I wish somebody taught me how to regulate my emotions.

No one ever taught me that you're allowed to be sad.

Heartbreak hits hard, and yet managing romantic grief is so often left out of the conversation.

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your drink there's i imagine drinks quite hard as well like because like sided drinks there's so many that well it would be alcoholic

and it would you know here's another thing how it might say i was a huge red wine drinker you know i loved a really dry bordeaux yeah and now it's like now it's giving me headaches.

So now,

do you get the headaches straight away?

Yeah, yeah.

So, and then for Christmas, my husband got me this filter.

I haven't tried it yet, that takes away the sulfites.

Oh, okay.

It seems like a lot of work.

You can buy a lot of nice natural wine where there's no sulfites in, which is delicious and doesn't give you a headache.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, I switched to white.

Yeah, oh, this is a good one.

Now,

the problem with white, and I love white, my drink of choice would be like a really expensive,

very, very cold, because white has to be very, very cold Chardonnay.

Right.

But cheap white wine tastes like urine to me.

Not that I've ever tasted urine.

Yeah, yeah.

But, you know, it.

You imagine that's what you're doing.

Exactly.

Whereas you could get really good, inexpensive reds, not so much whites, I don't think.

Yeah, you need to spend for a good white, I think.

Right.

Yeah, yeah.

So Chardonnay, that's what I'm doing.

I used to be a Sauvignon Blanc, and now I'm a Chardonnay.

See, it always changes.

Always changing, yeah.

Yeah.

So that would be my drink.

Or if it was an after-dinner, dinner it would be a cognac right

we can give you an after dinner drink

yeah if it was

that's why i mean you maybe you need to get a little more specific in this list

when are you having the drink well we want to leave it open to the guests interpretation whenever you want to have the drink that's when you'll have it yeah um and if you do want to i mean we've had uh chefs on it in the past and chefs tend to order uh want a lot more drinks than our other guests do they need to they have a hard life yeah yeah and we let them do it.

So I don't know.

What drinks do people do people pick non-alcoholic drinks?

People have picked non-alcoholic drinks.

Like a Diet Coke?

No one's picked a Diet Coke.

I haven't picked a Diet Coke yet.

Although I like Diet Coke.

It tastes like normal Coke to me because back in, I think this was like 2013, I completely cut caffeine out of my diet and stopped having all caffeine.

And then five years later, I decided like, actually, I'm going to start having Diet Coke again.

So I hadn't had a Coke in like five years.

And then I had had the Diet Coke, and after five years of having no Coke, it tasted like normal Coke.

It didn't taste like chemicals?

No, it tasted like normal colours.

See, to me, it tastes chemically.

I like it.

It's good chemicals.

Right, yeah.

But it tastes chemically.

Right, yeah.

No, to me, it just tastes like a normal Coke now.

Really?

You're a very strange person.

James has told that anecdote, I'd say, on about six or seven episodes.

Can you cut that out, Ben?

It's not that interesting.

But by saying that, you have guaranteed guaranteed it's staying easy because saying that James is a very odd person

it's never been interesting I've done it I've done it six times on it's never been interesting you've made the cut every single time you keep trying I love your persistence

that's very much what his stand-up's like

persistent yeah yeah yeah

do you just do constant callbacks yeah that's all it is it's like half an hour

you beat them to death yeah I know you know the thing about wine because there'll be people who say like you know I buy the cheap wine.

It is such a load of shit.

If you have a really, and there have been times in my life when I've been somewhere where somebody's had a $500 bottle of wine, you could taste the difference.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course.

You might not be able to taste the difference between a $20 and a $40,

but like a really good bottle, you could taste the difference.

Yeah, absolutely.

And then it's quite hard, I think, with a lot of food and drink, once you've had the, like,

one that's so much better than anything you've had before, it's hard to go back.

It is, except it's alcohol.

Yeah, you still feel fun.

You get the buzz.

Still feels fun.

Yeah, you get the buzz.

Do you ever do drink before you go on stage?

No, even if I have one drink, it just dulls the senses.

I can't.

I never have.

Never have.

I did once in the early years just to see what it felt like.

And I got hostile.

Right, yeah.

I got hostile.

And then I once

smoked a little pot before I went on just to see what that was like.

And I had no idea.

I was all over the place.

And so in all my years of stand-up, which have been many, that was the only times I ever did.

But all these years, I know a lot of people that would be at the bar, knocking them back, and then go on stage.

I don't have to do that.

People can handle it.

I guess it depends on on-stage persona as well.

If you're super laid-back or like slurry, anyway, it sort of works.

But I always find I have to be quicker than the audience.

Right, exactly.

And I improvise so much and it's got to be, you know, yeah.

Hey?

Huh?

Budden?

The audience are quite slow.

The audience are quite slow.

Yours?

Yeah.

Right.

Not as You were saying then about smoking pot.

When you're high on pot, do you, is there something particular you like to eat?

Oh, yeah, I like crunchiness.

Uh-huh.

You know, so like potato chips.

Yeah.

What do you call them?

Crisps?

Crisp crisps.

I mean, but really good ones.

Yeah.

Those are like, oh my god, they're my downfall.

But then I also like to eat nuts,

like almonds, you know, roasted almonds.

And yeah, salty.

What do you think of these like crisps or chips now that are like made of other things like peas or dumb?

It's just dumb.

You know, if I want to eat a pea, I'll eat a pea.

Although I like the sweet potato chips, but that's still a potato.

Yeah, potato potatoes feel.

Yeah, I love the root vegetable ones.

And also, like, oh, I've got to get the brand name off my parents.

I went around my parents' house and they had these ones that were, I think, yeah, made of like peas and lentils and they were actually good.

I'm not saying they're not good.

They're not potato chips.

But it's like having that crap on your pizza.

It's wrong.

It's just wrong.

There's a lot of things that are good.

Yes, but they just shouldn't be.

They shouldn't be.

A lot of things that are good, but shouldn't be.

Well, we come to the dessert now.

So obviously I'm a bit...

scared because even though you said you love ice cream earlier, you did say cheese is the best thing in the world.

Well, I was thinking about dessert.

You know, know, I mean, there's so many things.

This, I mean, like a delicious chocolate layer cake and ice cream.

I love ice cream.

But I was thinking about if I had to go back in my memory when I used to eat my mother's food before I realized she was filthy and disgusting.

She used to, my mother used to make this Russian,

my mother was Russian, and she made this Russian

Orthodox Easter thing called pashka.

And here was a, she was also Jewish, so here was a really weird thing about it because it's a Russian Orthodox, you know, it's Christian.

Russian Orthodox is a Christian and very religious Christian.

And they make this thing called pashka, and it's, oh, it's so delicious, it's amazing.

It's cheese.

Okay.

And it's a white cheese.

There's different recipes.

Like you could use farmer's cheese or that curd cheese or you could use regatta or you could use whatever, but it's always a white cheese.

And apparently it's a white cheese and you make it in a triangle, this big thing in a triangle.

And it's a white cheese to indicate the purity of Christ.

So, what this Jewish lady was doing with this, you know, making the purity of Christ, I have no idea.

But it's cheese and butter and eggs and nuts and some dried fruit.

And what else?

I mean, it's so rich and fattening, and sugar, a lot of sugar.

And my mother used to make it, like, and it would be like this big.

And I'm like, I know this is, nobody can see what I'm doing, so what size is this?

That looks like a foot.

Besides your penis.

Yeah, a football.

Like a half a football.

A half a football.

Of an American football.

Yeah.

Not a football soccer of what you call football, which I don't know what that means.

And I would eat the whole thing.

Wow.

I would eat the whole thing.

And it was like so

filled with fat.

I love fat, you know?

Like the texture of,

I like more fat more than salty or savory or sweet.

Something about the texture of it, you know, like when my husband has a steak, he leaves all that delicious fat.

I eat it all.

It's disgusting.

So would it...

This sounds like...

Texturally, how is it?

Is it like cream cheese sort of texture?

Yeah, it's so creamy and delicious.

And like, I could eat a whole stick of butter.

Yeah.

It has butter.

It has like everything.

Every dairy product.

Every dairy product possible in it.

And it's sweet, but it has crunch because it has nuts in it.

And it has that little, like, candied little, you know, currants and things like that.

And maybe I'm not describing it correctly because my memory is dim at this point, but I remember this was the most delicious thing I'd ever had in my life.

Now,

forget about the cholesterol factor, which I don't really believe anyway.

Since my mother cooked it, it probably, you know, gave me salmonella or something.

They were raw eggs.

Exactly.

Probably.

It's a major puke.

Yeah.

But it was the most delicious.

Pashka.

Pashka.

If you're ever like in a Russian Orthodox bakery or something, it's for Russian Easter.

Also, it sounds like this is like we finally found.

Well, I was going to say, you must be in two minds right now.

No, I'm not.

Oh, you would both like it.

No, because James gets traditionally angry on this podcast if someone picks cheese for the dessert.

Yes.

But this is a session.

It's a dessert.

It's a dessert.

Well, how about cheesecake?

Well, no, cheesecake's great, obviously, but like, this sounds like the perfect middle ground.

This sounds like we finally found something that me and Ed could unite over.

I am so happy that I contributed to your coming together in a a way.

And Susie's mum would put a piece of raw chicken in the middle, and whoever found the piece of raw chicken got good luck with it.

What was that disease that he had?

Campulobacter.

I never heard of it.

Is that like salmonella?

Yeah, I think so, but it's much rarer, which is why the government had to come over.

Oh, my God.

To this idiot's house.

Oh, yeah, well, that sounds delicious.

I think we've finally found a dessert that we can bond over.

The problem is that you can't find it anywhere.

But I'm sure that there's recipes online.

Yeah.

Maybe you should make it.

It's unbelievable.

Sounds good.

Unbelievable.

But it's like a cheesecake, only it's much,

it's not as thick and dense as a cheesecake.

Okay.

And you wouldn't have anything else with it.

Yes, there's this other thing called coolich that you have with it, which is a breaded kind of a

product that's a sweet bread, you know, like a not a muffin.

Yeah.

There's this whole thing we have this season.

I don't know if you saw episode three or episode two where Larry is trying to find the perfect scone

as opposed to a muffin.

You know,

like a scone he believes should be hard and dry and crumbly, and all these kind of soft scones.

That's a muffin.

He has a whole riff on it that it's a muffin.

It's not a scone.

So I'm going to read your order back to you now.

Okay.

How you feel about it?

You know, I'm going to tell you right now, the combo on my order is disgusting.

Tapwater from New York.

Yeah.

You would like Russian black bread with shitloads of butter.

Yeah.

Made by yourself.

Starter, crazy salad with fresh burrito, also made by yourself.

Main course, Johnny's thin crust pizza.

Side dish, french fries.

Drink, a very expensive, very cold Chardonnay and dessert.

Pashka with culich.

Kulich, yes.

Sound good?

That sounds good.

It sounds amazing.

It does sound amazing.

But it's not

something that you would have to come to my house to have.

Because it's not something that any particular restaurant would have all that combo.

I think eating a nice meal at someone's house, very special.

But when you come to my house, you have to bring the expensive wine.

Yes, fine, yeah, of course.

Yeah, yeah, we'll bring the wine.

We'll all club together.

Bring the wine together.

Thank you so much for coming on.

Thank you.

This is so fun.

Thank you very much, Susie.

There we have it.

Whoa.

Susie Essman, that was a great episode.

What a lovely person and absolutely hilarious.

It was everything I imagined it would be that interview.

A dream come true.

I absolutely loved it and so grateful she didn't say egg custard as well.

Although, you know, that dessert for a while sounded like it might be kind of similar.

It's had a similar vibe.

I wasn't really sure,

but like, you know, I mean, maybe she was saved by our ignorance there.

Yeah.

As many people often are.

Yeah, saved by our ignorance.

Yeah, yeah.

So, but I want to try that dessert.

It sounds very nice.

It does sound nice, actually.

And I don't even like egg custard.

Yeah, yeah.

I'd tuck into that.

What's Susie up to?

Oh, well, Cobra Enthusiasm, if you're in the UK, is on Sky Comedy.

I'm sure you can find it on our TV.

What a show.

Just watch it all, mate.

Watch it all.

You'll have a good time.

You'll enjoy yourself.

She called James a strange person.

That's one of my highlights.

Yeah, absolutely.

I really loved it.

It's a privilege and a pleasure.

Thank you very much for listening to the Off Menu Podcast.

If you want to hit us up on the internet, it's offmenupodcast.co.uk or on social media at off menu official on instagram and twitter go on to that website i previously mentioned as well and there is a tab on that website for the restaurant recommendations all the restaurants we've mentioned so far on the podcast ever restaurants in the uk restaurants in new york from our trip from all over the world where guests have mentioned them at no point will benito answer you if you tweet him asking what's the name of that restaurant it's all on the website but listen guys just because it's all on the website doesn't mean you can't tweet Bonito and Ed asking them about recommendations.

They put themselves out there on social media.

They deserve everything they get.

Oh, no, you can.

You can do it.

I do appreciate it.

He loves it.

I like that people consider my opinion worth asking for.

He likes it.

I just want you to know.

I probably won't get rid of all that.

He just doesn't want to disappoint you.

He wants you to know that he appreciates it, but he can't get around to replying to all of them.

So best thing to do is ask repeatedly until he does reply.

Thank you very much for listening to the podcast.

We will see you again next week for another off-menu menu of a mystery secret game.

Hello, I'm your dad's friend Lou Sanders, and I've launched a new podcast called called Cuddle Club.

Hmm, it's better than it sounds actually.

I talked to special guests about cuddling.

Hmm, there's not another podcast on cuddling, I thought to myself.

Guests include Catherine Ryan, Richard Osman and Alan Davies.

It's a perfect gift to yourself or to loved ones because it's actually free to download.

I'd love you to listen, but you're going to be the loser if you don't.

It's worth reminding you that there's no other podcast about cuddling.

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Of course, it is.

ACast, yes.

Spotify.

Wherever you get your podcast, subscribe now, please.

Don't be an absolute dick piece.

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 is coming to London.

True on Saturday, the 13th of September.

At the London Podcast Festival.

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At King's Place.

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