Ep 29: Jay Rayner

James, huge news from the world of off-menu and indeed the world of the world.

Yes.

Ever heard of the Royal Albert Hall?

I have.

We've done live shows there.

And guess what?

We're doing more live shows there next year.

Sure, a lot of them are sold out already.

But we thought, hey, throw these guys a bone.

Let's put on one final Royal Albert Hall show in that run.

The show will be on Monday, the 16th of March.

It's going to be a tasting menu, a returning guest coming back, receiving the menu of another previous guest.

Those shows have been a lot of fun.

We cannot wait to do them live.

Who will we pull out of our little magic bag?

You'll have to come along on the 16th of March to find out.

If I'm correct in thinking, presale tickets go on pre-sale on the 10th of September.

Pre-sale tickets are 10th of September at 10 a.m.

And then the general sale is 12th of September at 10 a.m.

So if you miss out on the pre-sale, don't forget general sale is only two days later.

The day in between is for reflecting.

Get your tickets from royalalberthall.com or offmenupodcast.co.uk.

There's nothing like sinking into luxury.

At washable sofas.com, you'll find the Anibay sofa, which combines ultimate comfort and design at an affordable price.

And get this: it's the only sofa that's fully machine washable from top to bottom, starting at only $699.

The stain-resistant performance fabric slip covers and cloud-like frame duvet can go straight into your wash.

Perfect for anyone with kids, pets, or anyone who loves an easy-to-clean, spotless sofa.

With a modular design and changeable slip covers, you can customize your sofa to fit any space and style.

Whether you need a single chair, love seat, or a luxuriously large sectional, Anabay has you covered.

Visit washablesofas.com to upgrade your home.

Right now, you can shop up to 60% off store-wide with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

Shop now at washablesofas.com.

Add a little

to your life.

Offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply.

Excuse me, could you bring me another spoon?

This one's a little bit dirty.

Welcome to the Off Menu Podcast.

Hello, Ed.

Hello, did you like that one?

I did like that one a lot.

Yeah, I thought it was very good.

I'll be honest, I'm kind of running out of them.

I don't think you can tell.

We're not that many podcasts in, really.

You cannot tell, Ed.

Because this is, I don't know if people know we're doing a thousand episodes of this.

That's the aim, isn't it?

1,000 episodes.

Benito's giving us a thumbs up.

Yeah, but like, I mean, you just got to start, every time you go out for meals and stuff, you've got to start remembering everything you hear.

Yeah, okay.

Write them all down.

Yeah.

And you've got to have them ready to go.

Well, anyway, welcome to the Off-Menu podcast.

This is broadly what I'm trying to say.

Yeah.

Oh, I'm Ed Gamble, and that is James A.

Castle.

That's it.

Ed is wearing a t-shirt that says ham on it.

I am.

You know why?

Do you love food?

I love ham.

I love food.

And I love this t-shirt.

It's a pink t-shirt with dark pink letters.

It says ham.

It says ham.

Very good.

James, do you want to just remind everyone what the off-menu podcast is?

I don't think we now need to do it.

But just in case there are any new listeners who are here off the fact our brilliant guest, Jay Raynor, is on this week.

Maybe we've brought some new listeners.

So maybe you want to give people a quick idea of what we're going to be doing, mate.

We'll be asking Jay what his favourite ever, starter, main course, dessert, side, and drink is.

It's a dream meal in a dream restaurant.

And I am a genie.

Yeah, James is a genie.

Jay Raynor, of course, is the food critic for The Observer.

You may have seen him on shows like MasterChef.

He's often one of those critics who goes in towards the end of the competition.

The final table?

And goes like, ooh, gravy, and all of that.

That's one of his catchphrases.

I hope he doesn't mind me saying that.

He's a brilliant guest.

He did the final table.

He did the final table, yeah, which is a Netflix cooking competition show that we both enjoy.

Yeah, really over-the-top.

Yeah.

Big gladiators music and stuff like that.

And they've all got every episode is a different country.

And they have to make cuisine from that country.

And they're all in pairs, all the chefs are.

Yeah.

And it's so ridiculous.

I love it.

If they ever did a comedian's final table, would you go on there with me?

Yes, I would.

We would both go on it.

But, you know, I hope you'll be okay with me adding ice cream to everything.

Trying to sneak it in every single time.

James, you absolutely would do that.

Unless, of course, it was the secret ingredient that they said we weren't allowed to use.

Oh, yes.

Because that's something we do on this podcast, where if a guest mentions a certain ingredient in their dream meal, then they get kicked out of the restaurant.

No ifs, no butts, no coconuts.

Bye-bye.

And it doesn't have to be coconuts.

It's not been coconuts yet.

No, no, it's not been coconuts.

Which is interesting, actually, actually because a lot of people don't like coconuts.

Well, one week we should have no ifs, no butts, no coconuts.

Yeah, one week it'll be coconuts.

But it's not this week.

This week, the secret ingredient is hairy crackling.

I like crackling.

Yep.

I do not like it when it's got those little hairs on it.

No.

The stubble.

or even the big

curly hairs.

No, I like a clean, shaven crackling.

Yep.

Also, I don't like pork scratchings when they're soggy.

When they're soggy?

You know, when you get a soggy one.

Yeah, horrible.

And occasionally, it's like Russian roulette sometimes with pork scratchings.

You're just popping them in and then occasionally a little soggy one.

And then you're reminded about what it is and you're just eating skin.

Yeah, really not nice.

It really takes you out of the moment.

Takes you out of the moment.

But crackling, which I guess is

the same as pork scratchings, isn't it?

Yeah.

Just little bits of crackling.

But like, yeah.

hairy crackling.

Hairy crackling.

I mean, it feels unlikely.

If he says crackling, we have to push him him on.

Yeah, do you want hair on that?

Yeah.

How do you feel about Harry Crackling?

And if he's not,

if he goes, yeah, I love it.

Well, maybe you'll love the door.

Oh, and you should note that we're recording at Jay's publishers because we're talking about his new book, and it is a big, big old, echoey room.

So that's why perhaps the sound quality isn't quite what we're used to.

Oh,

that?

It's our big pile of free stuff that we have here.

That's James

rubbing his legs together.

It's your legs, you little cricket boy.

We often get sent little free samples of things from various food and drink companies.

And

it's a beery week this week.

Oh, man, a big old beery week.

Wild Beer Co.

What?

What?

Which is perfect for us, I think, because we love a beer and we're kind of wild.

We are kind of wild, actually.

Wild Beer Co.

have sent us some really interesting sounding beers for things like raspberries and pink peppercorns.

Pineapples.

Pineapples, smoky, spicy beers.

Wild yeasts.

Wild yeasts.

That was my nickname at university.

So we're excited to try those as well.

But

those aren't the only beer people who've been in California.

Have you been to Chiltern?

I've never been to the Chilterns.

No?

Wow.

There's a brewery there called the Chiltern Brewery.

And they've sent us some beers, haven't they?

Yep, they have sent us some beers.

We're going to be so pissed.

He's the only brewery brewery in the chilterns well i don't know i've heard i wouldn't like to cast aspersions but it's as far as i know they are in the chilterns they are in the chilterns that's all i know and they've sent us some free stuff so as far as i'm concerned they are the only brewery in the chilterns yes if you are a rival brewery in the chilterns and you want to get mentioned on this podcast send us some beer thank you very much thank you very much but we don't want to be pissed all week do we so luckily the real kombucha company have sent us some kombucha i like kombucha me too we've talked about it on the podcast before i believe but i i do like it.

Look, we've all spent time in LA.

We're cool, sort of laid-back cafe gratitude kombucha drinking hippies.

Exactly.

Fermented mushroom drink.

Yeah.

Is that what it is?

Fermented mushroom.

Yeah, it's like a sort of mushroom.

It's like a fungus type thing, right?

I do like it.

Panitas pulling the face, but I like it.

There's one I have

in America, which has got like chia seeds in the bottom of it, and the chia seeds are all puffed up and slimy like tadpoles.

Yes.

So you get the fermented thing and then like the slimy bit at the end.

And it's really good, actually.

Well, you know what?

What?

That's That's the worst job I've heard of someone describing something and trying to make it sound nice.

But

still,

I'll give it a go ahead.

Yeah, thank you.

So, thank you to the Real Kombucha Company.

Thank you to those two breweries.

We look forward to tasting those.

If you want to send us some stuff, send us some ice cream, goddammit, some chocolate.

Yeah,

how many hints do I have to drop?

We've had a lot of booze, but we, you know, we would like something to balance it out.

I like crisps, I like nuts, I like cheese.

If you are a cheese company, if you are a dairy and you want to send me a wheel of cheese imagine the publicity of me taking delivery of a huge wheel of cheese my girlfriend has become obsessed this week with uh getting uh i think it's like carbonara that's cooked in the actual wheel in the actual wheel of cheese she keeps sending me instagram pictures of it yeah photos of it videos

right

Do that.

Send me a wheel of parmesan and then I'll cook James's girlfriend some Carbonara within it.

That's fair enough.

Yeah.

But here is the off menu of Jay Rayner.

We're here with Jay Raynor.

Hello Jay.

Hello Ed.

Thank you so much for coming.

Here he is.

Welcome Jay Raynor.

Well, that was a better welcome.

I mean yours was a bit underway.

You know, it's like you hadn't thought anything through and he'd actually come up with a sound effect.

I know, but he's a genie and I can't make those sound effects.

Can you not?

No.

I could try and make them with my mouth.

Well, yes.

We're other than the bodily parts that James used

for that process.

Yes, 10 years in genie school, you better do those sounds, Ed.

10 years isn't it?

Yeah, yeah.

Three, ten years, yeah.

Do you move through a kind of apprenticeship scheme?

Yes, you do, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So for a while, I had to ghost another genie and watch what they did and stuff.

You had to ghost another genie, yeah, which is quite hard because I had to go to ghost school for that.

So I had to go to ghost school for like 10 years.

Then gaslight a genie.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I makes them feel really bad about this in a really subtle manner.

Do you mean shadow?

I think you probably did, yeah.

Because ghosting is ignoring someone, so it is.

You can't ignore a genie to become a genie.

Oh, you're right.

I had to shadow a genie.

You had to go to your shadow school.

I had to go to shadow school and become a gladiator.

Well, it's paid off.

All the effort has paid off because that sound you made.

You liked the sound?

I liked the sound.

And that went very well, and I made the sound earlier.

We thought someone was coming in now.

Someone will come in.

They'll come in with coffee.

Oh, yes, of course, because we ordered hot drinks, didn't we?

We did.

Or we accepted the offer of them.

In fact, I can see them through the door.

What hot drink have you ordered, Jeff?

I've ordered coffee with milk.

Ah.

And here it comes.

Did you specify what milk you wanted?

No, because there is basically milk.

Is that your view of things?

The world in general?

Thank you so much.

Well, I mean, I suppose there are.

I leave a pause and say, would you like me to hold on for the footsteps to recede?

And we like the footsteps.

Those are Lauren's footsteps.

Lauren is brilliant.

She's handing the press on my new book.

But we're going to go.

Lauren and footsteps.

Make sure you put the credit in the thing beneath it.

If you're asking, are there types of milk?

Well, there are grades.

I mean, there's skimmed, semi-skimmed, whole.

And if you had to only have one of them for the rest of your life,

whole, whole, whole, milk.

Yeah, oh, yeah.

Is that what's in the coffee now, then?

Well, I didn't milk the cow, so I can't really judge.

I just received the coffee.

But should we go with that?

Because

it's whole milk.

I think if you say milk, I think people are going to to put semi-skimmed in there but that just might i think they're going to put whatever was in the fridge right and came to their hands so if it was i mean this is quite a you know quite a posh publisher so yeah i've probably got a range of milk yeah but if you were then referring to other things

that result from torturing various nuts and grains yes

they're not milk no no you don't do not class them as milk not at all do i not class them as milk i'm just talking lexicographically yes they're not milk.

You cannot milk an oat.

No.

However hard you squeeze it.

That's true.

You're just going to get something.

You're going to get some oat paste.

You'll get a discharge, but a discharge is not the same as milk.

And you can't put that milk.

You can't.

Yeah.

Oat discharge.

Oat past.

Yeah, try that.

Try that and see how your marketing works.

When you say that whole milk is your favourite of the milks, is that because you...

So for me, I'm a semi-skimmed guy, but that's because...

I can see that, Jack.

Yes, thank you.

But I was raised on semi-skimmed, always in the fridge.

So I've never changed my mind.

But have you made your own decisions?

I've gone through the semi-skimmed years.

Look, if I'm really honest, there are both in my fridge.

Right.

So semi-skimmed for tea.

Yes.

But I drink almost entirely coffee.

And that has to be whole milk.

Right.

So it's different.

different milks for different

needs.

We have revised our opinion on the health or otherwise of dairy fats.

And they are no longer the great killer that we once thought they were.

Oh, really?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's That's fine.

Eat all the butter you like.

I love ice cream.

Because look at how thin I am.

Yeah.

No one can see.

No one can see what any of us look like.

You see, I'll try the subtle radio joke and

he just kills it.

I think we can all be.

I'm in a

subtlety school.

Subtlety school is a lot harder to say, than you think.

Subtlety school.

Oh, well done.

It's hard.

God damn it really.

Could you take it as a subsidiary alongside Genie Major?

A subsidiary.

A subsidiary subtlety school.

Jesus.

Subsidiary subtlety school.

Yeah, yeah.

I could do actually.

I think we can all agree that anyone who drinks skimmed milk is an absolute maniac, though, right?

Yep.

Well, I mean, it's kind of, yeah.

It's water.

Just water.

It's slightly opaque water.

Yeah, white water.

I think it's an insult to the cow.

I think it is as well.

You know, the cow has been put through this process.

Some people think the process is abusive.

I'm not entirely convinced that it's always abusive.

But then they go through all that effort.

They are milked.

Their teats are pulled.

And then someone goes, no, it's not good enough.

We're going to have to water it.

We'll just have to take all the interesting stuff out of it and leave you with something which pretends to be milk.

Poor old cow.

What do you think the highest compliment to the cow is that we do with milk?

The best thing we do with milk.

The best thing we do with milk.

I mean, actually, to be mildly serious for a moment,

cheese is,

like bread and like beer, is a way of using surplus that you cannot use instantly.

So milk sours very quickly.

So, what do you do with all your milk production?

You come up with cheese.

So, a really good old cheese, which goes on for years,

has to be the greatest tribute to the milked cow there is.

Yeah.

I think cheese is my favourite hobby.

Is it?

Yeah.

Are you big on cheese?

Sitting down with a bit of cheese.

He does love cheese.

He also likes winding me up.

I'm fine with cheese in general.

I just don't like it as a dessert.

It really winds me up when people get cheese in business.

It's not dessert, it's shopping.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mary Matt.

I never reviewed the cheese board in a restaurant.

If there is a reason, I mean, there was one restaurant where I went in to review it.

I think it's gone now.

But they placed the cheese trolley right next to the door so that when you pushed open the door, you smelt the cheese trolley.

Well, actually, what you smelt was arse because really good cheese.

And I don't think they really got this, but you smell arse as you went in.

But my view is that cheese, a good cheese trolley, is just the victory of shopping.

So I'm delighted they went shopping.

I'm delighted they have a cupboard for the keeping of the cheese, but

I'm not really that interested.

Oh, but a a trolley, but a wheel of a cheese trolley.

You get to pick what you want.

It's so exciting.

Well, that may sound like a good day out.

I mean, is it reasonable to question whether, as a diabetic, you're not necessarily going to hit the dessert list with the same enthusiasm?

So, yes,

sometimes.

So, for you, cheese is a way through

being discriminated against as a man with a pathology.

But

I could eat dessert if I inject insulin for it, but sometimes you can't be bothered with that sort of thing.

So, sometimes cheese is a good thing.

You don't want to jack up before a meringue.

Yeah, exactly.

So you can just have a lovely bit of cheese.

Well,

that's fair enough.

You can do what you like.

I mean, I just thought I'm reviewing restaurants.

Even if I wasn't diabetic, I still think I'd lean towards the cheese board.

Yeah, but the type one you always have things you have no idea.

Yeah, true.

And I was diagnosed when I was 13.

Really?

You were a fucking nightmare for the first 12 years.

I'd like to put it.

Be honest.

I mean, I want you to know that I'm not obviously taking the picture out of diabetes.

I would like Jay to review your childhood, please.

Very exciting.

You're a second critic on the podcast.

Second, if you count, the first.

No, Grace is a very dear friend of mine and a colleague.

We share many things,

including an audience.

So, you know, we divide and rule.

We don't review the same restaurants ever.

I really do.

We have a system.

It's of

I'm direct, but I have to go through her editor because she's obviously quite a bit grander than I am.

So her editor and I exchange lists of restaurants.

He says, can I take X?

And I say, yes, if I can take Y.

So that you never have the chance of either clicking on or picking up the Guardian, the Reserver over a weekend and finding Grace Dent and me holding forth on the same restaurant over the same weekend.

Or in fact, any weekend.

That's good.

And so

when it comes to what restaurants you review, do you personally choose that?

I choose them.

Oh, and how do you make your mind up?

I look at the size of the brown envelopes that have been placed on my desk and I work out which it's um it's a writing job, it's not an eating job.

Uh, so I have to nobody, I'm paid for how I write, so it has to have a story to it, it has to be compelling.

Um, and that's what I'm always looking for because there are any number of you know, let's say gastro pubs in the UK and they all have the same menu.

I can describe that menu to you if you like.

What the other the British Gastro pub menu is now: a risotto, a beetroot and goat's cheese salad, and a tureen to start.

It's a sea bass dish, a pork belly dish, and a ribeye steak for the main, and it's a lemon tart, a creme brulee and a chocolate fondant for dessert.

That is now the default British menu.

And there are any number of Gastro pubs that do that really, really well.

But if I

went into one of them, I wouldn't have anything to say for 1,100 words.

So I'm looking for somewhere that I can write 1,100 words about.

And then I'm looking for a change in location, in price point, in sale, just trying to keep it you know, mixed up.

I never think about that kind of stuff.

Yeah.

It makes perfect sense when you say it, but like, yeah.

Well, you know, quite my job, so I want to keep it.

Do you ever think like

you just for a laugh just go like review McDonald's or something?

I have reviewed McDonald's.

What?

When did you do this?

What's brilliant is when you feel you've sat down to do a podcast with people who've done their research.

Oh, no, we don't do any of that.

Do you not do any research?

No, no, no, no.

So I'm going to have to plug my book.

Oh, no,

we can see the book on the table, so

we'll definitely help you find out.

All right, goddamn books.

All right, so what happened was there was an Italian critic,

restaurant critic, who

gave McDonald's a bad review.

Right.

And McDonald's sued him for criminal libel.

Right.

So as an act of solidarity, I went and reviewed McDonald's.

Essentially what I said was, look, we know it's basically shit.

Yeah.

And it's okay if you eat it every now and then.

But let's not pretend, you know, the chips are awful, even though actually, weirdly in this book about my last supper, I do include McDonald's chips as one of my top five all-time chip experiences, but it's number five, and I can come back to that.

We have a regular argument about Burger King chips versus McDonald's chips.

Well, it's Burger King every time.

Whoever's saying McDonald's is wrong.

Correct, Jay.

Lovely Burger King chips followed by a cheese trolley.

That's it.

That's dinner sorted.

So anyway, my review was sort of solidarity.

No, it's crap.

It's fine every now and then if you want that crap.

And it finished with the line to McDonald's lawyers, come and have a go if you think you're hard enough.

Lovely.

And did they?

No.

No, no.

They dropped their case against the poor Italian man.

Yeah, of course.

Yeah.

I think the stupidest documentary ever is that one when he eats all the McDonald's every single day.

It's samey.

What point did you

say?

At what point?

He's just making a point we all knew before he even went into it.

I did the high-end version of that for another book.

Oh, yeah?

So if they, so Supercise Me, which was the Morgan Spurlock

film where he went and ate McDonald's every day for a month, wasn't it?

And if they said, would you like to supercise that?

He hadn't, and then he was medically checked.

So the high-end version was to eat in a Michelin three-star every day for a week.

And if they said, would you like to take the tasting menu?

And I did that in Paris.

And the pairing?

Did you always take the pairing as well?

Well, no, actually, I didn't because that would have just made it ridiculously expensive.

I mean, it was ridiculously expensive, and it was because I was paying for all of them.

It was finding companions was the real issue.

I had to get people to come out to Paris to join me.

And that was hard to get people to come to Paris and have three Michelin star meals.

Yeah, it was slightly different slightly tricky.

Nailing them all was quite difficult as well.

And I have to say, it was grinding.

There is a point when you get to, you know, a silver-leafed

seawater foe on a stick, which

I'm losing the will to live.

So we start the meal with, we always start this way,

still or sparkling water for you.

Oh, sparkling.

Always sparkling.

Always sparkling, yeah, absolutely.

I mean, mean, what's the point?

You know, still water is an opportunity to drink sparkling water that's been wasted.

Right.

Simple as that.

Again, there is a chapter on that in this.

I went to a sparkling water sommelier.

Oh, wow.

And I taste.

Yeah, there is one.

I mean, I'm not sure if it's an official title or one.

No, I'm sure it's an official title.

He said he got it from an institution in Germany.

Which kind of makes sense, doesn't it?

That you have to go to Germany to get a title.

Didn't he set it up, though?

I think that was next to my genie school.

But we did a sparkling water tasting and we finally found that the optimum sparkling water was a thing called Chateaudon, which was Louis XIV's favourite water.

Naturally effervescent.

And it was gorgeous.

Is Badois naturally effervescent?

Yes, it is, I think.

That's the only one I really like.

And really salty.

Yeah.

High in mineral.

So your book's called My Last Supper.

Right.

It's a concept based on our podcast, of course.

Of course it is.

Although mildly commissioned two years before your podcast was ever launched.

Oh, sure, but our podcast was commissioned in our brains three years ago.

I think you're fine, Jay.

We came up with the idea of having a favourite food.

I think you probably did, and

I think I acknowledge your supremacy

in favourite foodness.

Yes.

The problem is, as a food critic, you have so many different meals that you never get to decide what your favourite is.

Well, finally, I have it.

Finally, you're here.

So, listen, the point is,

so

when I do my one-man shows, I do question and answer at the end.

And the question I've been asked most regularly is, do you imagine you're on death row?

What's your last meal?

And I'm always touched by the fact that they want to see me put to death.

And

my shock response has been, I think I would have lost my appetite.

Right, yeah, of course.

And I've got to think about all the people who are eligible for last meals, and they are the condemned, the suicidal, the terminally ill.

It's always dark.

It's always dark.

There's one other category

which is the suicide bomber, but I can't even bring myself to get into that.

And also, you'd be so nervous.

Wouldn't you?

You'd be so butterflies in the sun before it was flung.

You just need some rennies.

That would be my last meal before.

So I was saying, none of these people are really suitable to eat one.

And anyway, that's not the question they're asking.

When you ask someone, what would your last meal be?

What you're really saying is, if no one was looking,

if you could just express who you are through a bunch of dishes, and there were no consequences, you weren't going worry about how you felt the next day what would you have so the book is my journey to find those ingredients explain the stories behind them psychoanalyze myself

talk a bit about music and food and all of that and then at the end have a big fuck-off party and find out whether it was worth it or not and then move on with my life Did you actually have a big party?

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I had my last supper in a room above a pub in West London.

Amazing.

40 of us.

We got a piano in.

I had most of the band that I play with because I have this sideline as a jazz musician.

And got a really good chef to work on the dishes and the various things.

Some of the things I you asked for my menu and I...

Yes.

A couple of them are actually from The Last Supper.

Excellent.

A couple of them aren't.

Did Dent get an invite to The Last Supper?

We are colleagues.

We're not.

I admire La Dent

very deeply and very profoundly, and I'm a big fan of all her work.

Yes.

But no.

Absolutely.

So we've got some sparkling water.

The end result, because there is a bit of a toll environmentally, not on the CO2, because the CO2 used in sparkling water where it's been injected into it is a byproduct from the fertilizer industry.

So

that's, you know, you know, when, was it last summer, summer of 2018, in case you're now listening to this in 2042 as a legacy podcast?

Summer of 2018, there was suddenly a CO2 shortage and beer companies were telling pubs to stop selling beer and all that.

There was a lot of panic.

So the reason was because the fertilizer companies tend to close down some of their factories in the summer to clean them down.

And CO2 is byproduct of the fertilizer industry.

And they all closed down at once by accident.

And there was a shortage of CO2, which is why there weren't any fizzy drinks.

It's why they couldn't power certain things.

I do remember that now.

I've forgotten about that, but I did an episode of The Mock the Week.

I think I did that one as well.

And that was one of the news stories.

And one of the news stories

didn't really make the edit very long.

Anyway, so there's the packaging thing and all of that.

So I now have a home

carbonation machine.

Soda stream.

Soda stream.

Other ones are.

I'm not even sure they are.

I have a soda stream and I like it, which means I can calibrate.

My level of effervescence.

Pop it onto your bread, Jay.

Pop it onto bread.

Well, it depends where you are, James.

You're here in the dream restaurant, Jay.

No one's going to be able to do it.

Well, Jesus, if you're not.

Actually, if there's a big pile of poppadoms, I'm face down in them.

Yes.

I think I am.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because they're lentil-based.

So

I'm not a keto dieter, but given A, my physical, I have a metabolism basically engineered.

for the Russian steppes when the Cossacks are kind of

there's a there's a particular Jewish Ashkenazi trait to be big shouldered and have big thighs and big ass because it's cold in Russia and you need to survive when there's a pogrom.

So I'm basically engineered for a pogrom.

And that means a slow metabolism, not good at running, terrible at DIY.

And because of all those things,

I try to avoid carbs.

Although I had toast for breakfast, so I don't avoid it very much.

But, you know, bread doesn't happen very much in my life.

But popadons.

Yes.

I think they're lentil-based, aren't they?

I'm not sure.

I've actually never...

Joe, what?

You've been asking this question quite a lot, haven't you?

And you've never checked?

I've never checked.

And most things, I guess most things out of your life, I don't even know what

just

its own type of food.

Its own type of food.

Well, you thought it came in the ground.

The poppadum trees.

They grind down the ingredients.

The poppadum trees.

I'd never thought about it.

Yeah, they're lentil-based.

I mean, there's lentils.

Can you remember where you've had the best poppadums you've ever had?

Oh, the best poppadums you'll ever have are after Deliveroo have dropped or other

food delivery companies have dropped the

curry house finest

onto your own living room coffee table

while you're watching probably you two and a replay on Dave.

Much obliged.

As long as they're freshly out of, you know, reasonably freshly out of the deep hat fryer.

Do you have a favourite local curry house that you require?

I keep sort of circulating through varieties of them thinking the perfect one is out there when it isn't.

Yeah.

Do you find that?

Because I guess a lot of people would have like just standard places they go to all the time.

Obviously your job is to go to loads of different places, but then in your free time as well, are you also no?

I see.

The truth is, in my free time, I tend to go to similar places.

You know, I've got a particular Chinese on Gerrard Street

where I go to by myself

and sit there with my back to the door so no one can see my shame.

And that does really good roast Cantonese duck.

And are you not naming it so people can't come?

It's called the the Four Seasons on Gerard Street.

Lovely.

Number 12.

Because if you go there and you stand looking north on Gerard Street, right in the middle, you'll see that number 12 is the Four Seasons.

But number 14 is also the Four Seasons.

They are clearly, you look at the face shot, clearly part of the same company.

Nobody knows why there are two of them.

There is no archway linking those dining rooms.

There are just two doorways.

I don't know anybody who's ever gone into number 14, but number 12.

It's bizarre.

It's one of the great mysteries of London Australia.

The way you told that was so great.

It felt like the beginning of a new Harry Potter book.

To two doors with the same thing.

There's two doors.

And then one day I went into the other one.

And that's when the adventure began.

It's run by the twin of the guy who runs the other one.

They hate each other and they haven't talked in 40 years.

But they get their ducks from the same place.

One's got a scar on his left cheek and one's got a scar on his right cheek.

Sometimes people can't remember which one is which.

Yeah.

I love it.

I want to read it.

But anyway, the Cantonese roast duck there is,

you know, I think the Chinese do the best things with ducks of all the cooking.

Hang them in the window a lot of the time.

Well, you know, they've got to be somewhere.

Show off the goods.

Ever wonder why you have insurance for your car or home, but not your digital life?

Meet Webroot Total Protection, your digital bodyguard that is built for real life.

Webroot takes the guessing game out of cybersecurity so you can confidently browse, bank, and be yourself online without the worry of hackers lurking around the corner.

With WebRoot Total Protection, you get antivirus that scans six times faster and takes up 33 times less space than the other guys.

Identity protection with up to $1 million in fraud expense reimbursement and 24-7 US-based customer support.

VPN protection that hides your IP address, personal data, and location from hackers.

And cloud backup with unlimited storage that works automatically in the background.

With plans for individuals and families, Webroot makes it easy to live a better digital life.

Go to webroot.com forward slash promo and get 50% off today.

That's webroot.com slash promo to get 50% off today.

Live a better digital life with Webroot because peace of mind shouldn't be optional.

If you thought goldenly breaded McDonald's chicken couldn't get more golden, think colder because new sweet and smoky special edition gold sauce is here.

Made for your chicken favorites.

I participate in McDonald's for a limited time.

So we come to your starter.

Yep.

So into the big leagues now, into the proper courses.

Is it from a specific place, this starter?

I suppose in the memory it is, because this is actually one of the things that's part of my last supper.

And I reference a meal with my late mother

at a restaurant called Rules.

Now Rules is Maiden Lane in Covent Garden.

It's been there since 1798.

Oh, recently?

Did you?

Yeah, for the first time.

Was it good?

It was very nice.

I had,

so Ed's been making fun of me for this, but I had a black velvet.

I never drank a black velvet.

Guinness and champagne.

Guinness and champagne, yeah.

I loved it.

I've been making fun of you because then

you went to a pub in Brixton.

And I for a black velvet, black velvet, and they had no idea what you're doing.

Which champagne would you like in that night give up?

But I told Nish to get it.

Yeah.

And Nish refused to say black velvet to them, but basically, and he came back with a pint of Guinness.

What on questions of diversity in Brixton

I live in Brixton yes but uh just to make it clear that I can make those jokes maybe I can't

we'll find out we'll find out we'll find out Reynolds are racist but uh he got a pint of so he came back with a pint of Guinness and a Prosecco

and then I just poured the Prosecco in the Guinness and I did not feel good the next day so but you had probably had to drink some of the Guinness first and then chip it up also had to have it in the Guinness glass which when I got it at rules they give it to you in a chilled like tankered kind of way way.

Was that a pewter?

I guess so.

It's like metal.

That's a metal.

Yes.

Did they have pewter in kettering?

No, absolutely not.

Pewter never reached Kettering.

If you had a pewter in Kettering, you're getting beaten up, mate.

Really?

Yeah, yeah.

With the pewter.

Yeah, with the puttering.

Banged around the head.

I mean,

it's a very classic British restaurant.

And one of the classic things is you can only cook really good British food if you first be to France a lot.

So it's that kind of British restaurant.

And they do steak and kidney puddings really well.

And they do lots of game.

They have their own game reserve reserve where they kill things.

But anyway, so my mother, my late mother, was a journalist, an agony aunt.

She was really famous.

You two are too young to remember that.

I do, remember, you remember, Claire?

Yeah, all right.

So she had this thing that once a year, there were three siblings, me, my brother, and sister.

She would take us out on her rounds of national newspaper offices, magazines, whatever.

which she always did on a Tuesday, and we'd have this day out with mum, which would stop with a perfect journalist lunch in rules.

And so I would have been 10.

I usually do the, you know, the old Rita Rudner joke.

It was mine was a standard middle-class upbringing.

We were Jewish upbringing, we were exceptionally wealthy.

And I just had this memory of this first time when I was about 10, and the waiter comes and says, Will you be starting with oysters?

And my mother says, looks at me, and it's clear that I'm meant to be starting with oysters.

And then all the accessories that come with oysters, and the spindle frame is delivered.

And then there's a plate with a muslin-wrapped lemon.

And then there's Tabasco, and there's some shallot vinegar.

And then the oysters turn.

I mean, anything, any foodstuff that has this many accessories

is worth the effort.

Frankly, you can just watch the show and not even eat them.

And it's sort of a...

I came to associate...

oysters with being a grown-up because I was quite keen on, I didn't mind being a child, but I wasn't very good at it.

I was very similar.

We've discussed this briefly before.

I think

from a very early age, I always rejected the kids' menu out of hand immediately.

You sophisticate.

I'm not going near it.

So I would have definitely had an oyster.

You'd have had an oyster.

Yeah, for sure.

I couldn't climb trees.

I couldn't skim stones.

And I was just, you know, never picked for football, all that sort of stuff.

But if you put me at the table, I would leapfrog my peers.

Yeah.

So where the other 10-year-olds were going, ah, mummy.

I was going, gimme, gimme, gimme,

gimme the oysters.

And they became so.

Not me.

Ice cream oysters, yes.

Ice cream oyster.

What the ones in the

shell.

It is in the shell.

Oh, I love them.

So, there's some.

How have you got this onto ice cream already?

No, no, we're just going to let him take it on the diversion.

I'm going to bring it straight to the bottom.

It's a wafer shell.

It's a wafer shell.

And the base of it is dipped in chocolate with some coconut on it.

And then you have some marshmallow in the base of the shell, and then it's filled with the Mr.

Whippy ice cream.

And then you get...

Look, it's a fabulous, fabulous thing.

That was my oysters when I was 10.

That was my oysters

and you have to and you have to buy it out of a van that's actually pumping carbon monoxide up your nose while you're purchasing it.

Absolutely but hey it came pre-shucked.

It was great.

Have you ever done a non-ice cream oyster?

Yes.

And I love them now.

Oh you do?

Yeah.

I think I got into them in my 20s though, so I was like a decade after you guys.

What about you?

I love an oyster.

All right, good.

Absolutely, yeah.

The ritual is part of it.

Yeah, the ritual is absolutely part of it.

And also that flavour.

I once wrote a piece for The Observer in which I said

it was advice to women, never take a lover who does not like oysters because,

you know, the sex isn't going to be up to it.

And I got a lot of correspondents agreeing with me, particularly from lesbians.

Particularly from gay women, who said, you're absolutely right.

You know, I...

It was great.

I just felt that we were having a proper conversation.

Yeah.

What's your theory behind that, though?

What's the argument behind

it?

What's the argument behind the argument that women shouldn't take a lover who doesn't like oysters?

Because they taste brilliantly of female parts.

Oh, okay.

Sorry.

That was me being very naive.

There is a very simple, straightforward.

It's not just looks, it's a simple...

Sorry,

I've never been more naive in my life, Jay.

Where do you think that was going to be going?

Where do you think this was going?

It was basically a reference to kind of lingus, Jay.

Because we were talking about how sophisticated we all were if we eat oysters.

I was like, yeah, because proper grown-ups eat oysters and you want to sleep with someone.

And I just went straight into it.

And then it was my little naive little mind.

Yeah.

Have you never seen Jay eat an oyster?

He licks it for 25 minutes before he swallows it.

I'm nothing if not polite.

you've made the great bonito blush

the great bonito of course is a vegetarian so yeah that that's why he's gutted about this yeah otherwise you say gutted

where do you stand on cooked oysters they they have their place i don't mind uh you know a baked oyster with i just reviewed a restaurant um prior to recording this uh in guernsey where they did a lovely sort of champagne savoyant with spinach and a bit of mature cheddar a fantastic thing and and uh oyster beignet when you or tempura oysters when you deep fry them uh they could be fantastic but the raw the raw is the raw i'll tell you what sort of beignets i like oh here we go do they include ice cream

just had some nice ones in new orleans once nice beignets with sugar powdered sugar on the top i had it with a hot chocolate yeah i mean actually an oyster beignet is a deep fried oyster the beignet you're describing is just a posh word for a doughnut yep

Nothing wrong with that.

Nothing wrong with that.

Something's taken a trip through the Deep Fat Fryer.

Yeah.

Good.

Good.

That's a good.

That's a base from.

Are your oysters from Rules?

Is that what you would like as part of your dream meal?

Part of your dream meal now?

Funny enough, no.

In the last supper, I actually had to go all the way to Northern Ireland to find the right ones.

Wow.

I got them imported.

My oysters came flying in

from

Castleford Loch, I think it was.

And is that when you'd been been before i i specifically went hunting them i well you know i'm i'm at heart i'm a reporter i'm a researcher that's why so when i i set out on this it was like where am i going to find killer oysters yeah well not killer oysters which sounds like a really bad james herbert book

free willy oyster yeah

but fine oysters of a particular quality not natives rocks people going about natives i'm not convinced um

so yeah no i got the i got the oysters i i found this variety this firm down in just the south of Northern Ireland, which makes amazing, grows amazing rock oysters.

What's their names?

Rooney Fish.

Rooney Fish.

Rooney Fish.

So you come to your main course now.

Spare ribs.

Just spare ribs.

And we have not had this on the podcast yet.

Nobody said spare ribs.

No one said spare ribs.

God.

Who are these people you keep talking to?

i think spare they're not jay rayner spare ribs uh are yet to go through that you know that how the whole burger thing kicked off again a few years ago i don't think spare ribs have gone through their sort of fashionable phase they have sort of because you've had the big us barbecue thing and they are a function of u.s barbecue um but i'm i'm quite a slut when it comes to spare ribs.

I'm promiscuous.

Yeah.

So it's not just they must be low and slow American barbecue like this.

I think bowdeans, some people are down on bowdeans, but I think they do a really solid job and I quite like those.

The Big Easy, again, there's one on Mainland.

They're great.

But also,

you know, those, do you want to know those Cantonese sparrows, which would always be sort of day-glow orange?

Yes.

And they'd kind of be

coming, giving off their own, like they only had their own stage lighting.

I found some of those in a restaurant in Blackpool.

It was amazing.

Just done a show in Blackpool and we went to this place called the Walk Inn on the front.

And it was really good, but the thing that was amazing was these spare ribs, which were, for many of us in the panel who are a throwback, you know, in our 50s, it was a throwback to the 70s, actually.

Fantastic.

And then there's other ways with spare ribs.

Like you can get

the ones with salt and pepper.

I love salt and pepper.

Salt and pepper ribs.

They're really good.

They're really good.

So it's just the...

the spare rib itself that you're into?

I am.

So I think eating with your hands is a thing.

Okay.

I think it's a really important thing.

When you eat with your, with cutlery, you're using sight, smell, taste.

When you're using your hands touch is involved and it just becomes a really tactile thing yeah and i think

do you remember in 2015 on the campaign trail david cameron remember him

he was he was uh trying to get elected yeah and he was photographed eating a hot dog with a knife and fork yeah

and while there are myriad reasons to look at a picture of david cameron and go you wanker

that one that was the one that finally nailed it for me you are eating a hot dog with a knife and fork Why?

Why would you do this?

The reason is because he thinks he needs to be sort of a feet because he wants to get elected.

And who wants a man with greasy fingers with a finger on the nuclear button?

Right, sure.

So he's.

That's the direct reason, you think, people are worried his button's going to, he's going to slip off the button.

It's all, what do they call it?

The optics.

How it looks, how it plays, how it plays for Middle England.

And he didn't reckon.

I mean, mind you, it has to be said there was also during that election that pick for political balance,

that picture of Ed Miliband with his bedroom face on eating a bacon sandwich, and he was using his hands.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Maybe he just really likes a bacon sandwich, but so it was more the face was the issue.

It wasn't the bacon sandwich, yeah.

No, it's more

like that.

Which had that kind of,

you know, that slight whimper.

Yeah, it had the edge of a whimper on.

Miliband's face.

Yeah, yeah.

So there's no, is there a specific plate of spare ribs that you would like to select?

Well, if I if I really could, I would go back, I would go back again to being a child.

There was a chippy, I think it was called Louis,

somewhere in North Holt or South Harrow, near where I grew up in I grew up in Harrow in northwest London.

And it was a basic chippy, but they did these racks of ribs in a really weird, I would love to know what was on them because some of it's probably, you know, if you put a Geiger counter in your port

and they would be they'd be cooked in the most subtle way, which is they'd be deep fried.

Yeah.

And then they'd come out, but they were fantastic Yeah bright orange or sort of rust coloured and slightly sweaty and you know when you get the you start unwrapping the paper like it's past the parcel and the grease stains are really starting to

anyway.

So I think those I've not seen them.

I did go through a period of

those really really

What's the word for them?

Sort of deep red ones that you get out i think kfc used to do them yeah those ones were really almost almost like school dinner sauce, really, isn't it?

It's just like really offensive flavours.

Or just,

you know, makeup that you put on your cheeks to indicate that you are now a savage.

In long lines.

That's what you should do before you eat them.

You know, get your fingers in your hand.

Yeah, all over your cheeks.

But, you know, I've always been hands-on.

I like the tactile thing.

And sorry, it's a tactile.

So I'd go back, I think, to Louis's South Harrow, circa 1978.

Oh, there's a theme.

It's all from when I'm about 10.

Have you seen Ratatouille?

I have seen Ratatouille, fabulous film.

In fact, it's the only film that

if you talk to chefs about the representation of restaurants on film,

they might, if they're trying to be posh, talk about Tampopo or Big Night, which is a great film as well, Sanitucci's film.

But the one that they all go, oh, yeah, is Ratatouille.

It's an animated film, but it's the one that gets restaurant kitchens better than any other.

And why do you think that is?

Because actually they did their research.

They had some very serious people involved.

Thomas, a big American chef called Thomas Keller was a consultant on it.

And I think Guy Savoie was involved in some way.

And they got these other, when they translated it into other languages, they had other big name chefs doing the voicing of one particular part.

So they've done their research.

And how do you think, so they nailed the kitchens, but how do you, well, do you think they nailed the critics?

Anton Ego.

What I'm thinking, the reason why I'm reminded of it is because both of your dishes so far have been childhood memories.

And that that moment when Anton Ego eats the ratatouille and he is just simply transported back to being a 10-year-old child or a little child.

And it's brilliant.

And I quoted, so I do a live show about my worst restaurant experience.

It's called My Dining Hell.

And

it's based on a book, which is a collection of my most negative reviews.

Still a main.

And

in the introduction to that, where I talk about the culture of the negative review and why we like them, I quote that Anton Ego

statement of the front you know taken in the main what we do does not amount to a whole hill of beans compared to the creativity of chefs yeah it's a brilliant speech utterly brilliant speech so do you feel like that as well that you're looking for do you look to get transported back to being a little boy not on a regular basis

but you know having spent what 18 months writing about my last supper and and all the memoir elements that are in there then that has become an inevitable thing.

Because part of it is, you know, I'm in my 50s, so there's less time to go than there has been, and therefore mortality hangs around.

Both my parents are dead, so I've shifted up the bench in the waiting room, as someone once said.

And so you tend to look back and try and cling to those particular things.

And that's how food works.

Food is brilliant at that.

It really is, as being a time machine.

That was a really good question, James.

I thought you were about to say you like ice cream ribs.

That's where I thought you were

with it.

Well, actually, it was either that or I was going to say, have you seen the ribs and the flintstones that they put on the car?

They look really great.

Yeah, but the thing is, I'd watch that and think, when I was a kid, thinking,

wouldn't mind?

Yeah,

I'll give it a crack.

It does look pretty delicious.

They topple this car over.

Yeah.

They're so big.

They're so big the car goes over.

Yeah, I think we'd all like to that's important.

How should a rib be cooked?

Because I used to think, I think with meat, you get told if it's like low and slow and it falls off the bone, it's good.

But then, me and James are both a big fan of Barbecue pit masters which is a competition barbecue cooking show um and they say that the best way to cook a rib is it should be on the bone and you should have to bite and break yes yeah i mean for the american stuff yeah american barbecue yes it should still have some bite to it

um and so but it's still kind of a low and slow thing yeah it's just how long is it going to be and how much direct heat are you going to give it um the quickest ones are lamb ribs and they have to be eaten the moment they come out and you can do those in about an hour just roast those very quickly in a hot oven.

Yeah.

And they're a real kind of aggressor.

I think I prefer lamb ribs.

I think, I think, yeah.

Chinese way is generally to braise first in a braising liquor of soy and star anise and a bit of sugar.

And

so they're simmered in that for an hour or two.

Yeah.

And then they're quick.

Either they're quick fried or they're quick roasted.

I really want some ribs now.

You really want ribs?

Yeah, I want ribs.

You have to put ribs out?

Also, you've kind of convinced me, because a lot of the time, there's a bit of an ongoing argument with me and Ed about, like, I don't like chicken wings or stuff like that, because I have to eat with my hands, right?

So I don't like, I don't like it.

James doesn't like eating with his hands, and he doesn't like taking things off the bone.

Does he not?

So I don't like all of that.

Well, this is probably the only time where we're ever going to be able to do that.

This is the first time when I've felt like I've been kind of like

hearing what you said about it has to be tactile and all your senses involved makes me feel like I actually want to get into that.

Does it?

Does it really?

I feel like I want to get into it.

Have you been turned?

Have you been turned?

I feel like I've been Have you been turned?

I feel like I have been turned.

Have you?

But like, were you?

I don't believe you.

I feel like I'm tired.

I mean, I'm slightly concerned now.

I hear that you've got all these issues, the thatchy thing.

Do you move with a pack of wet wipes?

No, no, I don't.

I'm not.

Do you like to keep an eye out for a shot where you might be able to purchase a wet wipe?

Should the eventuality arise?

No, but I think if

I was having ribs or chicken wood stuff, I would want

too much, too many wet wipes on hand so that I felt completely like this is okay.

After I've done eaten this, I can clean up completely.

You want an exclusion zone around you as well so you're not splattering other people.

Yeah.

Well, no, that's fine.

I don't care.

Other people's fine.

I feel like afterwards, I never feel like I've completely got it off my hands.

I just feel completely unclean.

I feel unclean.

I want to be straight into a chicken.

I live to be unclean, James.

Like I want to be able to be straight into a shower that is like the biggest pressure shower.

After you eat chicken wings, you feel like Macbeth, essentially, right?

You know, like when people go out of prison and they get and they all have to go in the shower,

hosed down, that's like a 1970s prison guy.

Yeah,

I want them to chuck

that horrible powder over me that burns and then spray me with the hose and then throw me in prison if they like, if that's what it takes

after I've had those ribs.

Maybe just to avoid ribs.

Maybe, but like I have had a ribbon.

Have you thought of committing crimes just to get through that experience?

But I'd have to commit a crime and and then, because obviously it's just because I want the ribs stuff off me, so I'd have to either commit a crime and then victory eat some ribs while the cops are coming,

or I'd have to

eat the ribs and then call the cops, quickly commit the crime, smearing your victims

in barbecue sauce.

Or it's literally

your last supper if you do it like you're on death row.

That's fair.

Order your last supper ribs, and then it doesn't matter if you're dirty because you'd be dead.

Yeah, sure.

It's okay being dirty if you're dead.

Yeah.

That's our catchphrase.

Little catchphrase on the show.

It's okay being dirty if you're dead.

Try and work into every show.

That's good.

It's okay being dirty.

Ever wonder why you have insurance for your car or home, but not your digital life?

Meet Webroot Total Protection, your digital bodyguard that is built for real life.

Webroot takes the guessing game out of cybersecurity so you can confidently browse, bank, and be yourself online without the worry of hackers lurking around the corner.

With Webroot Total Protection, you get antivirus that scans six times faster and takes up 33 times less space than the other guys.

Identity protection with up to $1 million in fraud expense reimbursement and 24-7 US-based customer support.

VPN protection that hides your IP address, personal data, and location from hackers.

And cloud backup with unlimited storage that works automatically in the background.

With plans for individuals and families, Webroot makes it easy to live a better digital life.

Go to webroot.com forward slash promo and get 50% off today.

That's webroot.com slash promo to get 50% off today.

Live a better digital life with Webroot because peace of mind shouldn't be optional.

So, come to your side dish now.

So, my side dish emerged out of, there's a whole chapter in the book about bread and butter, because there has to be, and butter's a big thing.

And I go looking for butter.

And I came up with a vehicle for butter involving cabbage.

And what's brilliant about this is it, you know, I do eat salad, I want people to know, and I do go to the gym, but I go buttered cabbage.

Yeah.

And it's a way of doing buttered cabbage which makes cabbage really filthy.

Nice.

In a good way.

Actually, I don't like those words about dirty and clean.

Food's not dirty and clean, but it makes it delicious.

I mean, cabbage can be delicious, but this is that white cabbage, and you fry it off very slowly in a bit of olive oil and then some butter, quite a lump of butter, and then you add a glug of 150 mil of chicken stock, and then you let it cook down until almost all of it has gone.

And then you add some more chicken stock and some more butter, and you let it cook down again.

And what you end up with is caramelized cabbage, which is deeply savoury and deeply buttered.

You can do it with vegetable stock as well if you want to keep it, you know, non-animal, but with the chicken stock.

Is this your own?

I believe it is my own.

Yeah.

It's my own recipe.

It's my own ticket.

It's like cabbage.

Jay's dirty.

Well,

buttery cabbage.

I'm withdrawing the dirty.

That's fine.

No one has to die here.

No one else.

Spare him.

I mean, you know, we're talking about a meal at the end of the world, aren't we?

We're talking about there's no tomorrow and there are no consequences.

So if anybody's listening going, listen to him.

That unhealthy, dirty.

Oh, I've seen him on MasterChef with those dark rings under his eyes.

It's a Jewish Ashkenazi trait, okay?

Oh, we must have liver issues because of eating all that butter.

No.

I say that.

Do you get a lot of that?

Oh,

I've had

nutritionists, I'm doing inverted commas in front of the microphone, claiming that they could diagnose everything that was wrong with me.

Where would you stop?

Is what I wanted to say.

Are people in a food shop?

Yeah, people are staggeringly rude.

But you guys know that they must

how often do you get told you're not funny, oh, yeah, all the time, yeah, which is slightly, you know, given what you do for a living.

I've never experienced it, you've never experienced it, but you've always been funny, yet to happen, which is, I think, being told you're not funny is probably more offensive than no one's telling you you're missing your mouth, like they are.

You're doing your job, I suppose, but they're not saying you don't know about food, I guess they're just saying they're just trying to find flaws and go, you should stop eating all that food, or you're going to die.

Yeah, well, eventually, sometime, but I'll look after myself.

Anyway, so this button cabbage is a very luscious thing.

That sounds phenomenal.

And it is pretty damn good.

That sounds like a good addition to Christmas dinner to make vegetables more exciting.

Yeah, I mean, it's, you know, the nutritional value might have fallen slightly in the process, but it has other things going for it.

Do you cook a lot?

Yeah, yeah, I do, because I can't eat out in restaurants all the time and I'm greedy.

Plus, I like the process.

I like the Zen process.

If you go into, if you're feeling like you're not in control of the world, you can go into the kitchen, bend ingredients to your will, make a mess, tidy the mess up, feed people.

Something has happened.

You've taken back control through food.

Yeah.

And did you

like,

so when you started cooking, was it because you were a big fan of like going out and you were thinking, from an early age, you were thinking about food more than you were?

Yeah,

I think I just thought it was a necessary skill for a grown-up.

Yeah, that's a good point.

I just think it's something, you know, that if you can't, you're missing part of the arsenal of grown-upness.

Plus, if you want to eat the good stuff and you can't eat out, then you're going to have to do it for yourself.

Yeah.

And I found I liked the process.

Yeah.

I didn't really get into it until university.

Okay.

I had to cook some terrible things when I was a kid for my parents, poor people.

Do you remember some?

Oh, I did a really terrible thing involving mints and green peppers.

Oh.

Just the thought of it.

And then

I made banana bread once,

and it was very nice, the banana bread and i suspect my parents thought that there there was a life of baked goods in front of them except all i ever did was fucking banana bread and you know and that very nice darling very nice oh jesus he's baking again we can't stop him he's still smells of bananas

the bananas are out

and uh so banana bread is not going to be your dessert no no no but we've got the drink

but like uh it would be great if banana bread wasn't oh does your cabbage dish have a name did my cabbage dish have a name Uh, buttered cabbage, buttered cabbage, buttered cabbage.

Do you not want to put your name into it?

Because it's your

Jay's buttered cabbage, Jay's buttered cabbage.

That sounds more appealing straight away, actually.

We can be snobbish about it, but that sounds nice.

Jay's buttered cabbage.

Well, you can try and be snobbish about it, but I'll just roll my eyes at you with such enthusiasm.

You'll actually hear my eyeballs roll.

Your beverage, my beverage, bodkin lime.

Vodka and lime sawdust.

That's surprised me.

I thought you were going to go with a specific wine or something.

No?

No, I mean, there are various things I could have gone for to try and sound grand.

There are some things I like.

But one of the things that happened in the 90s was the rise of the alcohol.

Yes.

And what the alcohol did was

make it too easy to drink.

So back when I was a kid,

in the 70s, late 70s, early 80s, alcohol was something you had to push on through.

You tasted beer for the first time, it was horrible.

Really horrible, but everybody was doing it.

So you go, well, I've got to kind of try and must get there.

I'll get there.

You try wishing, you think, well, it's horrible.

I'll keep trying.

But one of my ways through this was

to discover vodka and lime, which is basically my own alcohol pop.

Yes.

And then...

When I became a journalist, I managed to get myself to New York, sent to New York for the first time, and I was in a bar in the Algonquin Hotel.

It's a weird story.

I started very quickly.

I got sent to New York by the Observer when I was like 22.

And I booked into the Algonquin because it was the only hotel I'd ever heard of.

It's the great literary hotel that Dorothy Parker had the New York Around Table at James Thurber.

And so I thought I was very grand.

And there was a bar there, it was a very literary bar.

Even, you know, it was rumored that even the barman, head barman, had published two novels.

And

I sat down at this bar, very jet-lagged and a long way from home, and very alone, and a bit scared because I had to file a national newspaper column at the end of the week from a standing start, didn't know anyone in town.

And he said, what would you have to drink?

And I said, vodka and lime.

And he said, do you mean a vodka gimlet?

I said, so what?

Sorry?

And he said, vodka gimlet, vodka lime cordial.

I said, Are you telling me

that this thing that I've been drinking has a name?

Because if it has a name, it's sophisticated.

It's no longer

Jay's vodka and lime, it's no longer Jay's vodka and lime, it's a thing, a vodka gimlet.

You can have a gin gimlet, apparently.

Um, and he went, it's a vodka gimlet,

great choice.

And then he said, What's your favorite vodka?

I don't know,

and I just pointed at one, and I pointed at Stolly without Stolly Inca without really knowing what it was.

And apparently, that was a really good tasteful choice.

So, I had gone

from a childhood vodka lime alcohol creation to a man with his own taste in vodka who was having a gimnet.

And

even though there are other things, actually, I'm quite keen on a daiquiri, which is rum and a lot of sours and a whiskey sour and a vodka sour.

They're all the same thing.

It's basically a big hit of white alcohol, not the whiskey sour, obviously.

Big hit of alcohol and big hit of citrus.

And I just, it's a great drink.

Because it's vodka and lime cordial.

Yeah.

And that's it.

What do you want, mate?

What else do you want in there?

And is it always that brand of do you always still go for the same vodka that you're doing?

No, no, no, no.

My view is that once you're pouring lime cordial into it, it doesn't really matter.

I mean, I'd probably lay off the full impact of the lime cordial, but I think as you asked me, you know, for this very significant meal, what I would drink, it would have to be that because it would just take me back to that transference from childhood to adulthood, becoming a sophisticated man and realizing that childish things could have real names.

Yes.

Yeah.

And so it's still very significant.

There's something about New York specifically that makes people feel like that.

I think I think the first time I went and I was by myself after working there for a bit and sitting at a bar of a restaurant and drinking a cocktail and thinking I'm pretty cool.

I'm the ball.

I'm pretty cool right now.

Everyone's looking at me going pretty cool right now.

I'm in Mad Men.

Yeah, exactly.

So we arrive at the dessert.

Obviously.

James's favourite?

My favourite.

Your favourite?

It's a chocolate eclair.

Has to be a chocolate eclair.

Why?

Look, first of all, you know, we get consistency here.

Yes.

If you ever see somebody eating a chocolate eclair with a knife and fork, fuck off.

Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.

If David Cameron comes round and you serve him a chocolate clair and he gets out the knife and fork, you say, David, no.

No, David.

No.

I mean, I'm going to let you explain the chocolate eclair and you can talk about the chocolate eclair, but just know that I disagree with your choice wholly and we can have that argument in a few minutes.

Okay.

There is a childhood element.

Yes, okay.

Okay, so

desserts and sweet things were not a big thing in our house because my mother was fully aware that we all had our size issues,

but they would be outbreaks of indulgence.

So rather than there being a kind of, so I had this thin friend and their family had a chocolate drawer.

in the kitchen and there was a drawer just full of chocolate.

And I would see him, he would go in and he would open it and take one piece out and he'd eat it and then close the drawer.

And I didn't understand how that worked

because if that drawer had been in my house, it would just be emptied on a daily basis.

I had a thin friend who had that drawer.

If that drawer had been in my house, there would have been a padlock on it.

Absolutely, exactly.

So, oh, so anyway, so every now and then.

What thin people playing?

I know.

Guess what, guys?

I've got a chocolate drawn out.

Have you?

Have you really?

Yeah, but you don't, you don't restrain yourself.

You just don't put on weights.

That's true.

I'm a freak.

Is that true?

Can you eat literally anything?

At the moment.

I mean, we'll see how long that lasts.

Yeah, I'm coming back in 10 years to laugh and say.

Yeah,

James and his dad are absolute sweet freaks.

Are they?

Right, yeah, yeah.

It's very funny that it's my dad as well.

So

sometimes my father would appear with a box of pastries.

He'd gone to some place in Hampstead and there would be a box of pastries.

And we always told that we couldn't have the chocolate eclair because it was his.

And however often we said, get two?

Two chocolate declair, maybe three, it wouldn't happen because his need for an assortment.

He needed an assorted box.

So

I could never have the chocolate declaire.

But I bloody love a chocolate declair.

Chew pastry is a brilliant thing.

You know, profit around maper and shoe pastry.

It's a cooked out pastry, which is then baked.

It's very hard to make.

And then it's filled with cream.

And then it's got thick layers of chocolate on top.

And And it's tactile, isn't it?

And so, you know, it's basically me dealing with my father issues.

It is a finely calibrated piece of dessert work, pastry work.

You've got pastry, got cream, you've got chocolate on top.

What I can see in Ed's eyes is he's trying to muster his arguments to rebut me, but he's feeling on slightly fragile ground.

Well, I am now, because you obviously described it so well.

That's your trade, and you're convinced.

Listen, Ed, it's no shame in being turned by Rayner

who's been turned onto the rib happened to me earlier I know you I've got a present now

I I always I think I when I want a dessert I want something yeah dense and luxurious and unctuous and I feel like enough about your personality I've ever had yeah is I've bitten into it and it's gone like this

it's too much air in it too much air too much air in it so you don't like chocolate clares because you've only had shit once cream's boring cream's boring Cream's boring.

Airy cream.

Too much bubbles.

Your podcast, mate.

I'm the same with profiteroles.

I think shoe pastry is like weird and tasty.

What about a croc-on-bouche?

No,

that's just a sculpture.

A sculpture dribbled in caramel

with cream inside it.

It's that hard caramel.

Any email was lipidoping you.

He was letting you talk for a while.

Now he's getting you.

Any dessert that needs to be made in a traffic cone

is clearly a fine thing no it's it's showing off a croquet

it's showing off says a stand-up community

yeah but i'm not i'm not a croqu-on-bouche standing on a stage in front of a thousand people

it's showing off there's various kinds of showing off i just uh yeah i i mean i'm willing to be if you've got a tip on where I can get an amazing eclair, I will go and eat.

I will go and eat one.

Also, tell them my cream's good.

My cream's good?

You're the worst type of bully.

Huh?

You're the worst type of bully.

Because I don't know,

you know, like, hit him again.

There is a bully going to be like in prison.

There's a place on Old Compton Street, at the corner on Old Compton Street, called Maison Chou.

Okay.

And they do only chocolate.

Well, Eclairs have many flavours.

Right.

Ed.

I mean, you are.

you know it is your prerogative to choose a different flavour of what sort of flavours well they've got salted carrot and they've got raspberry and they've got peanut button they almost certainly have a peanut button i'll get that one should we go after this yeah are we going to basically do an oyster spare rib and yes a claire we're going to go and have your full meal are we and you're going for the classic yeah yeah yeah you're not you're not you're not having all the flavours you list well i kind of like i i do like what they do at maison shoe yeah and you know i can walk into there and go fuck you dad i'm having whatever i like i loved him very dearly um but the whole chocolate de claire thing was slightly disturbing but it's funny that that's now your idea of the dream thing because it was held back from you for so long.

Oh, I'm just one big bundle of

things I've been reaching for for my entire life.

Yeah, well, I think that's why I'm a comedian because my dad never laughed at me.

Is that what it was?

Yeah.

He did.

He just didn't do it in your hearing.

Yeah.

It was worse.

He used to bring back a box of laughs, didn't he?

But you weren't allowed to laugh.

You weren't allowed any of the laughs.

No.

These are my laughs.

These are my laughs.

None of them are for you.

Right, Jay, I'm going to read your menu back to you now.

See if you're happy with it.

You would like sparkling water.

I would.

I'd start.

Well, not to start, but yeah.

You'd like some poppadoms.

Then you would like some oysters from Castleford Lock.

Can I point something out?

I mean, you did ask me the question of a choice between poppadoms and bread.

Yes.

And

I politely answered you.

But poppadums have no place in this meal.

You threw it in, James.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I mean, it's like you're the matrix of this restaurant who's forcing your will upon his guests.

Yeah, best kind of matrix.

Yeah.

It's just that when you go from, you know, sparkling water through oysters, pop a doms.

No, don't be ridiculous.

Yeah, your podcast, off you go.

10 years at Matri D school.

I know what I'm doing.

James is 90, by the way.

He looks good, isn't it?

Not years old.

Oysters, cast foodlock.

Spare ribs.

Yes.

You didn't specify where you wanted them from.

Oh, we did.

Was it?

Oh, no, I did.

I went to Louis's The Fish and Chip Place in South Harrow, circa 78.

Absolutely.

Side, Jay's buttered cabbage.

Yeah, it can come straight out of my own kitchen.

Absolutely.

Do you want to be the one making them, or do you want me to just conjure them up with genie powers so they're exactly as you would make them?

Your genie will be shit.

I'll make them.

Genie is genius all.

Vodka and lime.

Brackets vodka gimlet, but we call it vodka and lime tonight.

I think we call it vodka and lime.

And your dessert is a chocolate eclair.

That'll do me.

That is a very nice meal.

Thank you so much.

What do we normally say at the end?

That's what we say at the end.

We just say thank you very much.

We say thank you very much.

Make sure you buy My Last Supper by Jay Raynor.

Yes, do.

Thank you very much, Jay.

It's been a pleasure.

There it is, the off-menu of Jay Raynor.

Great episode, right?

Yeah, great episode, great choices.

I mean, you got your backup a little bit at one point.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, the whole Eclair situation.

I don't know whether I'm going to be convinced around to Eclairs I told Jay as he left I'd go and try one of the Eclairs but even the idea of it makes me feel ill but I know you will try it because you're a man of your word I'm a man of my word I will go and try one of those Eclairs if that's what has to be done yes and I think you should take a photo of yourself with it and you should tweet that photo and you should let the listeners know how you enjoyed the Eclair should I tweet it to Jay Raynor yep also tag in Jay Raynor okay but what if he doesn't answer me well that's what you get for being an Eclair snob right I'm not being a snob I just just don't like it.

I didn't say you were a snob.

Right.

Well, what Jay didn't say, even if he did pick Eclairs for his dessert, is he didn't say hairy crackling, which was.

Congratulations, Jay.

He was close.

We were saying the ribs, and I was like, oh, well,

we're in the territory of meat here.

Maybe he's going to put some crackling on his ribs.

But he didn't.

That's quite a good idea, actually.

Yeah.

Imagine some spare ribs with ground up crackling on the top.

Oh, I'd actually quite like that.

Yeah, minus hair.

But look, great episode.

Lovely to to have someone on who is so well versed in the world of food.

Yes, he knows his stuff, and

I liked the fact that he was a bit like Anton Ego and he does think about his past, his childhood when he's eating food.

I know I said it at the time, James, but that was a really great question.

Thank you, Ed.

I was really happy with that question.

It was a really good question, and he clearly loves Ratatouille so much.

Yeah,

new bits of the script.

I'll tell you how I came up with that question.

Yeah.

Is after we interviewed Grace Dent, I thought of it on the way home.

oh he really slammed grace dent in that episode didn't he oh shots fired shots fired i think we should get some more food critics on and then we can properly get some beef going get the critics critiquing the critics and the beef should be medium rare oh

yeah baby

good ed um so uh if you buy jay's book yeah i mean it's it comes out this week it's called my last supper uh it's as he discussed it's about his uh it's about his dream meal really it's it's sort it's you know we are suing well if you're a fan of the podcast you're gonna love this book i reckon love this book um so get that book he's also doing a live tour of it uh which you can find out more about on jreiner.co.uk

he's also got a podcast he has big business podcast these days yes it's called out to lunch you can get that from all of your normal podcast places james what are you up to Dah, not much.

Cool, me neither.

So thanks very much for listening to another episode of Off Menu.

We will be back soon with another one.

Subscribe, like it, give it a five-star review, tell your friends about it, all that jazz.

Let's bump it up the charts.

Bump it up the charts.

Bump it up to charts.

Pushing down the farts.

Bump it up to charts.

Pushing down the farts.

If no but no coconut.

Thank you very much for listening.

Goodbye.

Goodbye.

Your night in just got legendary.

Legends.com is the only free-to-play social casino and sports book where you can spin the reels, drop parlays, chase the spread, and hit up live blackjack without leaving your couch.

Slots, sports, original games.

Legends has it all.

Win real prizes and redeem instantly straight to your bank.

Legends is a free-to-play social casino.

Void prohibited.

Must be 80 plus pay responses.

Visit Legends.com for full details.

Get in the game now and score a 50% bonus on your first purchase only at legendswithaz.com.

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.