Off Menu with Ed Gamble and James Acaster - Ep 105: Big Zuu

Episode Date: May 26, 2021

Grime artist and chef Big Zuu takes a trip around the globe to pick his dream menu. Is he having a nice time, or is that his fake laugh again?The new series of ‘Big Zuu’s Big Eats’ is on Dave starting Mon 7 Jun.The ‘Big Zuu’s Big Eats’ cookbook is published 3 Jun.Recorded and edited by Ben Williams for Plosive.Artwork by Paul Gilbey (photography and design) and Amy Browne (illustrations).Follow Off Menu on Twitter and Instagram: @offmenuofficial.And go to our website www.offmenupodcast.co.uk for a list of restaurants recommended on the show.Watch Ed and James's YouTube series 'Just Puddings'. Watch here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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

which are exclusively available from Waterstones. But go and pre-order your copy of Glutton, the multi-course life of a very greedy boy, now. Please? Hello, Ed Gamble here now. I'm sure you're all jonesing to listen to another episode of Off Menu, but before you do, you have to listen to this. For me, it's a very exciting announcement. I am going on a national tour in 2022. The show is called Electric. I can't wait to show it to you. I'm very, very excited. And you, as Off Menu listeners, will get an exclusive pre-sale. The tour is going on sale generally to the normal general public on Friday at 10 AM. But it's Wednesday if you're listening to this when it comes out. And if

you go and sign up to my mailing list on my website, edgamble.co.uk, you will then receive an email tomorrow with an exclusive pre-sale link. There are limited pre-sale tickets, so get in there quickly. Tomorrow you will get that email, but go now and sign up on edgamble.co.uk for exclusive pre-sale tickets to my brand new national 2022 tour, Electric. For now, enjoy Off Menu. Please come to my tour. I love you. Bye. Welcome to the Off Menu podcast where we chop in half the fruit of chat and take out the seeds of bad times. Hello, James. Hello, Ed. Ed Gamble there with his intro. My name is James Acaster. I'm a genie. Yes, you are a genie, aren't you? It doesn't come up very

often. You tend to sort of get rid of it at the beginning where you burst out your lump and then that sort of it. Well, you know, as a genie, you don't want to go on about it too much. You know, I'm magicing up their meal, getting it from wherever they want, whatever time, whatever restaurant. It's up to them if they want to talk about me being a genie. I don't like to go on about it, you know. No, you hide your genie light under a bushel sometimes and I respect you for it. Well, James is the genie who can get a dream meal for our guest in the dream restaurant and we will be asking them, James, a series of questions. What will we be asking them? The favourite ever. Starter, main course, side

dish, drink, dessert. I did it in the right order. Well done, you. And the special guest in the dream restaurant this week is Big Zoo. Big Zoo. Big Zoo. He is a MC. He's a DJ. He is a TV host of the brilliant Big Zoo's Big Eats, which we've both been on. Yes, it was the joy and a privilege and a pleasure. Big Zoo talks to you about food memories, all your favourite foods and then concocts like a new dish from the things that you've told him and it's a surprise. It's like it's a new dish, but it takes you down memory lane when you're eating it. So it feels familiar. I had a great time on there. Ed's been on it a record number of times, right? Three times, Ed. Am I wrong? Well, I did the non-broadcast pilot

and I did series one and then I did the Christmas special. So yeah, I've worked with Zoo a lot and I'm very excited to have him on the podcast. This guy knows his shit. He does. And author. He's got a cookbook coming out. He's got a cookbook coming out in June called Big Zoo's Big Eats. And the new series of Big Zoo's Big Eats is out in June as well, which is the one you're on. So we'll all be tuning in for that one. Anytime I do any of the Adminy stuff, Benito has a little look in his face. It's really surprising. I said he's got a cookbook coming out and Benito looked right at the camera like, oh, look who's here. Look at this guy. He was expecting you to say the cookbook. Yeah. I mean, I gave all the details about it, I suppose. Oh yeah. I said he's got a

cookbook coming out. So I wouldn't have to say the details because I don't know them. You don't know them. Exactly. But I tee it up. I think that counts as my me chipping in. But he knows what he's talking about is the point. So I think this is going to be a good episode, James. So I hope for the love of God that we don't have to kick him out of the restaurant because he says a secret ingredient that we are going to say now. Yes. Every single week there's a secret ingredient that we say that we don't like. And if the guest says it, they get kicked out of the restaurant with no dinner. And this week the secret ingredient is chicory, chicory, bitter lettuce. Very bitter. I'm not sure I've had this. So I'm going along with it. But I have had bitter lettuce

in the past and loved it. So I might be being a massive hypocrite here. I don't know. I look, I've cooked with chicory before. You'll love this, James. This sums me up. Many years ago, when I was sharing a flat with Nish, I think Nish was out, I got into the habit of for lunch. Cooking chicken breast and a pan-roasted chicory. Oh yeah. Oh, delicious. I did that a lot. Of course you did with your napkin-tide valentine. Yeah. Didn't have a lot else going on. So I just thought, hey, I'm going to just cook more chicken, sorry, cook more pigeon breast. Pigeon breast and chicory. Yeah. It's nice actually. Love it. So I don't know why it's a secret ingredient, but yeah, chicory. I think someone suggested it on Twitter. Would you another kick out fairly soon, I think.

Sometime in the next couple of series, it would be good to really get Turf someone out because it was a long time coming with Jade and now I've got the taste of blood. I really want to get someone out those doors. Also, daddy needs some new pants. Have we mentioned the pants on the pod yet? No, we should probably give context for what I've just said. We should mention the pants on the pod. Daddy needs some new pants. When we recorded with Jade, she had pants delivered during the episode. We kicked her out for hundreds and thousands. So her friend who made the pants to centre her made us bespoke hundreds and thousands pants. And they're very comfortable. They're very comfortable. I popped them on a sit straight out of the envelope. I would highly recommend

Curious Moon Pants. Well, without further ado, this is the off menu menu of Big Zoo. Big Zoo. Welcome Big Zoo to the Dream Restaurant. Inside. Welcome Big Zoo to the Dream Restaurant. We've been expecting you for some time. Like you're having me. Alakazam. So polite.

You know, I just, I like to be cute sometimes. This is what I do. Can you turn it on and off like a tap? Do you know specifically when you need to be cute in situations and then when you don't need to be cute? Yeah, you gotta play with it. Do you know what I've been practicing a lot? Yeah, it's my fake laugh because I just had to get really good at that. And it's just like controlling that is really bad because then you laugh at your friends and they're like, are you even laughing? Because I could do the problem. Hmm. I think you did that when I came on your TV show. I think I saw it on my face.

No, there it is again. Just hearing you say you've been working on your fake laugh because you've had to work on it recently. It was just like, oh yeah, pretty sure we've both done your TV show recently. Yeah. And you thought, you thought I was hilarious on the day. This is the problem now. People think that my laugh is real because it sounds exactly the same. Well, that's a good fake laugh, then, I suppose. Neither have you mentioned Manu catchphrase at the start. What's your new catchphrase? I said Alakazam. Give us your catchphrase. I'm a genie. I'll start with the same magical words at the beginning.

What other magical words do you have? Well, there's loads of different magical words I could choose from. Alakazam, I went with this week. There's stuff like Hocus Pocus or Abacadabra or Shazam. What are your favourite ones, Big Zoo? For magicians and wizards to say. Magicians. I'm looking back at all my magical role models that I was growing up watching. I don't know, man. What does David Blaine say? Probably nothing. He just looks in the camera. He flipped it. That's what the genius of him was. He came along and just went, I'm not saying Alakazam or none of that stuff. He didn't say nothing. He didn't say, is he wizzy? Let's get busy. Imagine if David Blaine said, is he wizzy?

Let's get busy. We need a roadman magician that does the magic. When it's done, he's like, yeah, don't know. Or like, bad man. What? He does the trick. He looks in the camera and goes, what? I love that. What's my favourite out of that, I think, as a magical word for what? Well, he doesn't even look at the camera. He just street magic, goes up to people, does the magic for them and then sizes up to them and goes, what? That's it. I just thought it was really mystifying, please. I thought it was a good trick. You love food, Big Zoo. We know that we're in good hands this week because we've got, I mean, food's your life, right? And music. Yeah, I've definitely cooked for both

of you. How many people in common have cooked for both of you? Absolutely brilliant point. Very few, I'd say. Like Tom Carragher's restaurant we went, but he wasn't cooking. Yeah, and that was after we, you know, we'd interviewed him as well. Lou Sanders has cooked for both of us. Oh, yes. She cooked me an absolutely terrible vegan pizza. Yes. She also cooked me, again, a vegan pizza. Absolutely awful. And so bad it made me laugh. And not a fake laugh like you do. Like, real laugh. I was really laughing at how bad it was. So, yes. So you're definitely the only person who's cooked us nice food, Zoo. Yes. That's a better thing to hold, anyway. Obviously, we work with the producers and we

work with the people that come on the show to kind of like gear things towards what people like eating. And a lot of the recipes are kind of like a combination of what you guys love with my stupidness of cooking. Out of all of the guests you've had on your show, do you have a favorite dish that you've cooked, one of them where you've thought this is also something that I'm really into? Great question. Okay. It's from season two. I'm probably not allowed to give too much away, but because you are absolute geez, I don't care. Forget the rules. We're cooking for a lovely comedian chef, Demo comedian, to give you a hint. I think that's enough. We made a laxar, yeah? A Malaysian laxar, which I've never had before, where I'm from,

where we grew up. We just used to like our greasy Chinese takeaways, you know what I mean? We never explored like Vietnamese dishes and things from Thailand and things from Malaysia and these kind of things, you know, we never was really exposed to it. So when we made a laxar, it was the first time I ever made it and it had fish balls and fried tofu and chicken and we put two types of noodles in it. We put the egg noodles and the flat noodles. Oh, it was crazy. Like just everything, the way we made it is, I genuinely made it in the van. I tasted it and I couldn't believe how good it was. I went home the next day and I have to order a laxar. Order the laxar then the next day we filmed again. So I ate a laxar again. Then after that, I took the bag home of the seasoning,

like you have to make a paste to make the like soup and I just took that home and just kept eating laxar. And now you hate laxar, right? I mean, I'm a bit bored of it now. Too much laxar. We always start the podcast with still or sparkling water, Big Zoo. I've definitely still, I definitely used to hate sparkling, but now I can appreciate the goodness behind it. But nah, still the way, you know what I like? I like the Turkish water in the Bossman shop. You know the one in the shop that's looking like, it's not one of the big boys, it's not Volvic, it's not Evyan, no them lot. And there you go. You just know the pH level is just there. So is that based on taste, you know, the random water from the Turkish shop? Is that based on

taste or is that like, because you know, you're drinking like underground water. You're not drinking the same water as everyone else. You're not drinking that. You're not drinking from the mainstream. I'm basically a hipster, ain't it? A hipster of water. Nah, it's more time. I can't like, I do love a Volvic, yeah? But more time for the people then, for the, it's just the pH. I don't know what it is. It just tastes cleaner. I don't know what it is. I think the big boys, they just got like, people tell me Evyan has like the best pH balance, whatever, all that stuff. The Turkish Bossman water, if you don't know what I'm talking about, trust. Oh, Nestle. Nestle got a big boy water. That's what I got right here, but I took off the tank. But this one,

see the bottle is shaped like this. It's very flimsy. Yeah, that's the gold water. You would like Turkish Bossman water though. Yeah, that's what you would like. I like that you went from sort of like an obscure Turkish Bossman water, the one where you don't really know what the name is, either that or Nestle. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, but you know what? They're not really that known for water, ain't they? Let's be real. They're not picking the water game. So like, that's why I kind of, still, I kind of respect them more than, you know what I'm saying, Volvic, Evyan, XYZ, like all of that. It's like saying, you don't like Keanu Reeves' films. You just like his grunge band.

Yeah. The thing is with Nestle water, I've seen Nestle water on the shelves before, and I've just thought, no, I can't even imagine it, because I look at it and go, this seems like it would be creamy. You're looking at it and going, that's not going to be proper water. That's going to taste the Kit Kat. Yeah, weird, creamy, like, I don't want that. I would much rather have Turkish Bossman water than Nestle water. Listen, yeah, after Turkish Bossman water is definitely the Nestle water, then we go Volvic, yeah? Nestle water over Volvic every day, trust me. Trust me. How did you get into Nestle water? How did you cross that barrier in your mind of thinking this is going to taste like a Yorkie?

Ah, boom. So my friend loves water. Doesn't drink other things. He only drinks like a Sprite once in a while. Is that Tubsy? No, not Tubsy. Hide on him. Say my friend, but you know them. You know them. I don't know what's going on. Any of our listeners haven't seen Big Z's Big Eats before. Yes. Big Z is joined by his friend Tubsy and Hyder. Yes, that I went secondary school with my little mates. Hyder is a big complainer and his family installed a tap. That's a purified tap. So you know, some people just have tap water. Some people put the tap water in the fridge. Some people have like a Brita filter, you know, with the jug. This guy installed a tap just for filtered water, like in the house. I don't know how much it costs, but it's like

a fountain of heaven. You go to the house and I swear down, I go to the house with empty bottles just to get their water because it's like the perfect pH. Well, obviously the guy that sold it to them spun their brain, gave them like a lot of pH testers for like show them how the water is basically shit. Yeah. So he would like make us go to the house, drink his water, test the pH, then drink like a Volvic, Evian, then a Nestle and be like, see, see, we'll see, we'll see, I'm just talking about that. He was basically trying to get us all to install these water things. I felt like he's getting a commission or something because he's all he was talking about for like a year. He's just telling us how his life's changing. Didn't the first time you went round Hyder's house

when you were younger, he answered the door and pretended to be his own twin brother and told you to get lost. That wasn't to me. That was one of the bad things. I think that was the argument. I think you did that to Tomsie. This is why we're talking about that. We're talking about stupid things we did in school. Like, I told my whole year from year seven to year 11 that I was allergic to Tipex. So that's it. Because one day someone was using it. I was so annoyed. I'm like, you made a mistake. Like, get over it. Like, please. I can actually scribble it out. They move on. I'm saying people put Tipex. One day I was like, oh, you know, I'm allergic. I started doing all of that, yeah. And then every class I was in for like five years,

you can't use Tipex. You're not allowed to use Tipex. No one was allowed to use Tipex because you were in the room. Nah. So it took a while to push. But by like year nine, it was like a known thing. Like, unless you was a new pupil in my lesson, people would tell you, Jesus is allergic. And in the year 11, year 11, I just said, you know what, I guys cast out a bag, hey, I don't even love this Tipex. I need to prove it. I used it to prove it. Paint yourself with it. There you go. When you think about it, I've never really thought about it before. But like, it's amazing that Tipex does done as well as it has commercially because

rubbish. Yeah, really rubbish. It's not like you use it and then it looks like a new sheet of paper and no one could know that you've done anything. It's a big white splodge that then creates this uneven terrain that you have to write on so that that word that you write over it just looks rubbish compared to everything else. You might as well just scribble it, put a neat line through what you've done and then rewrite ridiculous. I've got to say though, shout out to the Tipex mouse. I was a huge, do you remember the Tipex mouse? Satisfying. No, you won't know this, do you? Because you probably missed this because they won't allow any Tipex. So you missed the invention of the Tipex mouse. Yeah, that's the

one that I know it took a while because I used to get extra angry. That's like the ultimate one. Yeah, you put the mouse's nose on the word and then you drag it along and it's like a little bit of white tape. Way smoother. I like the Tipex mouse. Smoother, more satisfying to use. Cuter because it was a little mouse. You didn't have to get the brush out and paint your coursework or whatever you were doing. Yeah, much preferred the mouse. How do we get on to Tipex? Pop it up with your bread. Pop it up with your bread, Big Zoo. Pop it up with your bread. It's a bread thing, man. I never appreciated the Papa Dom because I only like mango chutney. When all the sauces come out, I'm sorry, man. I just feel like it's not

the time. And I've had the Papa Dom with the sauce arrange but many a time. I just want Tandoori lamb chops and the meat. My mom's West African so growing up with her, we just eat a lot of assorted meat. That's why, and it's funny because Asian culture is very synonymous with African culture because a lot of my family grew up watching Bollywood and stuff because that's what they had access to, like Bollywood DVD. So they could speak a little bit upon job and it's crazy. It's a weird connection. And the cooking is very similar. It's about stewing and cooking onions. So the food's synonymous. I couldn't believe it when I unlocked that there's vegetarian Indian restaurants and stuff. I didn't understand that. I was like,

why would you do that? Why would you take away the essence? But now I'm starting to appreciate life and stuff. I appreciate things that Papa Dom's but I'm sorry, Brett is too amazing, man. Have you gone to France? Yes. You've gone to France? Yes. You had a baguette in France. Yes. Ed has talked about this on the podcast, how much he loves. He used to visit his now fiance, then girlfriend in Paris. Yes. And he would go down and go to the bakery around the corner and then on the way back to the flat, eat at the top of the baguette out the back. That's why they leave it hanging out the end of the bag, right? So you've got to nibble the top. If they wanted you to not nibble the top, they'd put it in a bag that covered the end. I've never thought of that

before. My mind is spun. My mind is spun. I'm going to start saying that to people like I haven't read that. I said, and it's funny, it's because my ex, who was my gal for a long time, was French as well. She's half French. So I kind of got to see that side to their culture. I remember telling me, eat some bread. Don't put no butter though. I'm like, what are you talking about? No butter. You want me to just eat the bread? There's not even hummus. There's not even hummus or satin, just to give an olive oil. I remember just biting. I was like, why is it so just amazing that it was just, yeah. And then like, like even just going on to Iran and Iraq and obviously Middle East and as well, like pita bread. I'm sorry, Papa Dom. You can't talk to a good pita bread, man.

It just wraps up the wraps. Like I was thinking over the day, you know, like shawarma, like all them Lebanese restaurants, how much pita bread do you reckon they've used in their time? That is a lot of pita bread, if you think about it. Yeah, they're going through a lot. They're going through a lot of wraps. At what point do you think they stopped counting? How much they've used? You know, I'm sure that is definitely a meetup. Like the company that sold that bread, they know they turned over trillions, trillions of kebabs been created in their name in it. You know what I'm saying? And that's a good feeling. I might start making bread. I've got my photo on the wall of a kebab shop. How? Big Zoo's face there was sort of a mixture of

shock, confusion, and then ultimately jealousy. Yes. Yes. Yes. As a kebab shop in Edinburgh, I've actually forgotten the name of it, Ed. Well, then the photo should come down and it should be replaced with a photo of me because I've always been livid that you're on the wall of that. And you've forgotten the name of it. I can't believe I've forgotten the name of it. I know the name of it. Do you want to have a guess? Well, I mean, every time that I'd go to Edinburgh, we'd immediately say it as soon as we got in the flat. Do you want to go down to? I can't believe I've forgotten it. Oh, no. He's had a breakdown. I know it's not mystics. No, it's not mystics, mate. But it feels like it's something similar. I can't believe this

Big Zoo. I'm so sorry this has happened during your episode because I know that, you know, there's loads of other stuff we could be talking about and not just me here, not being able to remember the name of this. I thought he was a witty man. I've had that heckle many times before. He'll be on stage. I thought you were witty. I was informed you were witty. This is awful. I paid to see a witty man. Not someone stood on stage trying to remember the name of a kebab shop. Yeah. If there's anyone listening in from Palmyra, do pop that photo down. I don't want to see that photo. Please don't take it down. I go with a large mix kebab personally because if you're offered chicken or lamb,

but there's an option where you can get both mixed, why aren't you taking the both option? I've never understood that. I mean, it depends. I'm Lebanese, you know. I like to always say where I'm from before I confirm food. Yeah. Just so I can add that extra insight. Look, you've got the authority when it comes to grilled meats, clearly. So what do you mean it depends? I don't know. It depends on the donor. I can't eat donor anymore, the one that's the solidified one, spinny. That's obviously when you're very waved, the very junk that can run, but I can't do it anymore because I love like shawarma, like fillets of lamb that have been layered. And what it is is that the chicken, it's hard to get right because when you layer the breast,

normally they put breast in it, normally they layer breast. And when you layer it up and it's cooking, spinning, there's such a fine line of it being cooked, not cooked, juicy, dry. Whereas the lamb, it's easier to play with because, you know, once you've given it that one chop, all you have to do is kind of get that one sear and you know, you can get it down. Do you know what I mean? Whereas the chicken, it's like, it's not as easy to just sear the outside and it's cooked. You know what I mean? So sometimes you might get a place that does better lamb than chicken. And that's why sometimes I don't get it, but I do understand what you mean. If you can get vegetables, that's why I'm not in it. So are you going for a baguette from France? Or are you going

for a pita bread on its own? Or are you going for a full kebab for your pop of lobster bread? Sure, it's what's going on. I'm going to keep it real and go with the baguette. As much as I've just gassed up the Lebanese, I love pita bread so much, but pita bread is only good when it's fresh, you know? Baguette can go far, can go far. It can become breadcrumbs. It could do this, it could do that. There's so many things you could, don't get me wrong, I love that. In Lebanese cuisine, they deep fry pita bread and put it into salads. That's like one of the craziest things in the world. It's like croutons by Arabic, you know what I'm saying? But then, I don't know, a baguette, just like a French onion soup, like with that little bit on top with the

cheese all my days from. Even just like a banh mi, like a banh mi, I know it's not that it's specifically just like a same as a baguette, it's more of a salad, but it's just so crazy, the influence of that bread in a different country and how it's created like a proper different dish. I just love the way that you can do so much with that bread, man. I'm talking about so much, oh my god, I'm actually a fat guy. I love you. I remember being in a hotel in Bahrain doing some gigs and the bar snacks they had there in the Bahra area was just the deep fried pita bread all shredded up in a bowl. I got addicted to it. I got so hooked. When they just put it out for free, but you read it really quick and you

want to ask them for more free bar snacks and you're thinking, oh, how's this going to look? How many times can I ask for the freebies again before they realize I'm just filling up on all the deep fried pita bread? I love it so much. Do you want anything with this baguette or do you want like a baguette that's so good that you don't need anything with it? That's what I need, warm, buttery, or just maybe a coffee. Maybe a coffee. But you know what I love on the baguette? You know what I love if we're just talking simple, some apricot jam and some lapak. Can't go wrong. It's an interesting way to kick off a meal, Big Zoo, a baguette with apricot jam and lapak on it, but I respect it. A little coffee on the side. But you know, it's about the influence and the

heart. If you cut up a getting half, pull it on the toaster, put some butter, put some jam on it. I'm telling you, it's a spiritual journey from the top of the bite to the bottom because you have that crispy top nurse, then you have that spongy kind of breadiness, and then you have that base. It's so many textures in one little thing, and it's crazy how something so simple can be so nice when it's done so well. I think that's why I love Italian food a lot as well, because it's just that same kind of principle. You mentioned Le Pac. The little Le Pac man who has the trombone and plays all the songs on the advert, do you want him at the meal and what song do you want him to be playing on his trombone while you eat? He could definitely come

through. That one. Now, there's a tragic element to this, James, because you've got the Le Pac man playing a song on his trombone whilst he watched his Big Zoo eat what I'm presuming is the mashed up corpse of his relatives. Yes, but that's always the case on all those adverts. He's just there. He's often on a tabletop where someone's just spread some Le Pac over a scone or something, and he's playing his trombone, and he gets flicked over or falls over or something. They're not very nice to him. No, they're not. They steal his trombone a lot of the time. They take it away from him, so he can't play it. He's like, come on, then you're eating my family. At least let me play my trombone. You know what I'm making? Le Pac sound bad cute. Le Pac is not cute.

Le Pac adverts are like, do you not see the adverts when you're in a cinema and it's like, they're like, fry in the tomorrow, like, tomorrow. Do you know what I'm talking about? And it's like, epic, bread, peas, some fish. That's that. They've tried to change it and make it become epic. This is why we're charging you three pounds. That's what they're trying to do. Do you want Le Pac spreadable or do you want the hard block? You have to have both. I'm sorry, but they're not the same thing. I used to use the spreadable to cook my eggs. And then my ex's French was like, what are you doing? I'm like, bro, it's barf. I'm like, it's the same bar. No, it's not the same bar. I'm like, it's the same barf. I'm

like, don't melt the same. It's not the same. It's not made from the same thing. I'm like, who actually cares? Like, if I'm cooking some onions late night in my house, am I really going to be like, oh, we need to go buy some salted bar because there's not any left, but there's some Le Pac there. We still can't use it. No, that's the person I am now. I actually will go buy the salted bar because that hardness, chop it into the, it's different, man. That spreadable one, it's not made for that. It's not made for cooking. It's made for spreading. I'm interested. You mentioned if you're cooking some onions late in your house. How late would you be cooking onions? And what were they before?

Okay, I've changed my diet a bit. I've been trying to lose weight and be healthy. So basically, instead of ordering food late night, I'll always be like, can we cook? Can we cook? Can we cook? And the easiest thing to cook is like a tomato sauce, or maybe cook some wings with some onions, whatever. Do you know what I mean? And there's always a start on that. So that's fine. Like, before COVID, years ago, let's say we're like in a house party or something. And then people are like, let's order some pizza. I'm like, no, let's cook. People order food and when it's shit, they're like, oh, this is so shit, man. Like, when you knew it was going to be shit, if you knew you ordered food at 2am, it's going to be shit. But if I a little bit waived, give it

a try. At the same time, I guarantee you're not going to complain. You're actually going to feel happy. I made my first pizza the other day. Did you? What's on the pizza? What was on it? Obviously tomato sauce, cheddar cheese, little bacon bits, cut up pepper. What are you looking? Which sounds rubbish. I don't know. Bacon on a pizza is shit anyway. You said cheddar. For a start, bacon, cheddar, bacon bits. What pepper? What are you talking about? What are you talking about? Use cheddar, cheddar and bacon. What? What are you talking about? He's not respecting your pizza. He's not really respecting your pizza. He's really disrespecting it, actually. Why are you using cheddar? It's cheese on toast. My mum told me to get it. I was doing my cook along with my mum

and she toast me the ingredients and I'm going out and get them. Very authentic, then, if it came from Nona Raycaster. Yes, that is her name. And it was a scone-based pizza as well. It tasted good, man. I don't know why you laugh so much. It's not pizza. You've made a cheese scone. Maybe a cheese scone. What do you mean it was a scone-based pizza? Well, that's what she told me. She's had this recipe for ages. I've had it my whole life. Have you? That's when she used to do it at home. I'm sorry for disrespecting your memories, James, but it's not a pizza, mate. Well, I made it real nice. How did you make it? I made the scone base, rolled it out, put it in the tray, then covered that with the passata, brush that over, put the cheese over, then put all the

toppings over. I put anchovies on mine as well, on my half. More cheese on the top, more cheddar cheese, put it in the oven, bought it out, and I ate my scone-based pizza. I was very proud of myself. I thought it's going to be great. I'm going to be impressed. Bring Zou. When I tell him this, I didn't know I was going to get such an absolute dressing down. I respect your pizza making, rather. It's not sounding very… I don't know what a scone-based pizza is. Yeah, I'm still in the dark about a scone-based pizza as well. Like in Napoli. Like you used the stone that you put in the oven to make the base cook.

No, no, no. You don't need that for scone-based. What was in the scone-based? Butter, self-raised in flour. Here's scone. It was a scone. Bacon powder, cheese, a little bit of salt, and I rolled that all up together, and then rolled it out with my rolling pin. No yeast, nothing. It's a scone-based pizza. So you made a big scone when you put cheese and tomato and bacon on top of it.

Guilty, your honor. Zou, I made a lasagna the other day. First thing you do is you put blueberry muffins in the bottom of the tray, and then you pour over the tomato, and then you put the bacon in, and the cheddar cheese, and then you put loads of Twix bars on the tops. Delicious, proper lasagna. Well, I mean, you know, you've made yourself look stupid there, because clearly I would love to eat that, so it's not like... We come to your starter, Big Zou. This one was hard. Obviously, there's so many starters that man love.

I consider buffalo wings as a starter. I don't know who does, some people don't. I think that's one of the greatest. Like, buffalo wings with the celery, the ranch. But if I'm sitting there and I need something, it's going to make me feel happy. It has to be. It's going to sound so dead, but it's mozzarella and tomato. Yeah. With a little bit of drizzle. Yes.

I know it sounds dead. It sounds super dead, but buffalo mozzarella, proper buffalo mozzarella, with fresh tomatoes and a little olive oil, a bit of salt, a bit of pepper. I had it in Italy, and my brain was like, this is crazy. Why is this so nice? Obviously, I've had great starters, different things. I do love my little prawny starters, but for me, that is just so fresh. It's not heavy. I hate having a heavy starter because you're just waiting for that main. I'm going to get 14 starters, and when the main comes, I'll be ready. And then you eat all these starters, and you're not even enjoying your main. I don't like doing that because the main is what it's

called. It's called a main. I like sharing. I do like sharing. I'm not a person that's like, I'm buying my starter for me. The calamari is for I. Don't touch it. You got a portobello mushroom little thing. You eat that. I'm not like that. I like to get all the different things, but buffalo mozzarella, I don't know what it is when it's layered. Do you know when it's layered on top, like Tetris? Oh my God. I'll eat that all day. All day. That's my starter. Get some basil on there, some basil leaves. Yes. Fresh basil, fresh basil, fresh olive oil. You know what it is? I've had so many different versions. I've had, I've gone to so many different places, had ones where there's no

seasoning, there's no sourcing, and ones where they overdo it, and ones like, I can't remember where I was in Italy, but it was simple. Fresh basil, big fat wedges of tomato, circles of tomato, big massive buffalo mozzarella, fresh olive oil, bit of salt, bit of pepper. Oh man, every slice was like, oh. Balsamic? Yeah, a little bit of balsamic as well. All my days. I mean, it sounds, I'm genuinely hungry. That's why I've, you've now taken me there. I'm in Italy. I'm sat there with this incredible mozzarella. Is it a tricholore? Tricholore? The three color salad, because it's white, red, and green. It's the colors of the Italian flag, right? That's why it was invented. Oh, that's why that's on pizza as well. I don't think I've heard that before,

but that makes sense. So delicious. Shame to splash some balsamic on it and ruin the color scheme, I think. Sure. I like that as well, though. I like the balsamic. You know when the balsamic, I like balsamic with it, when you put like the random one, but you put red onion as well with the balsamic, a little bit of red onion with it. That's more like, you know, I like doing that. I like doing that in the salad more like, rather than just the plate. I never used to like balsamic. I started cooking with it more and red onion, mozzarella, tomato, any lettuce. It's so good. So, so good. I grew up like, my mum used to always make salad, always, always. That's probably why it's one of my favorite things as well, because growing up, my mum used to always make salad

on the side of our food. She used to force me. So like, naturally now, it's just so funny. All these things that you grow up saying, that's disgusting. You get a bit older and you're like, oh my God, it's so beautiful. Like, oh my God, salad. Make me healthy. Like, if I look back at myself telling myself a mozzarella and tomato will be one of my dream starters, will the dream start. I would tell myself, what's wrong with you? You stupid guy. Nothing. It's not fried. It's not fried. It's not even a spring roll. It's not even a spring roll. Come on, man. Not even some dim sun. What's going on, you know? But special shout out to Buffalo Wings. Yeah, you've still got to shout out to Buffalo Wings because what a treat they are.

When they're done properly, you know, fried, then the steamed, and then they, like, wingstop do it in a good way, but I don't love wingstop's wings. I like their boneless more about, they fry it, then they steam it, then they fry it again. And that's how you should make it at home. People are going to make it at home. Like, I know people try to make Buffalo Wings in so many different ways, whether it's baked or not fried or air fried, whatever. But like, if you fry them and then steam them in the oven and then fry them again, it just becomes like next level. So good, man. I'd never attempt that at home. I'd never do any deep frying or anything like that at home. I think my mum might have said something when I was a kid about like,

I'm not going to deep fry anything at home because it's really dangerous because she'd seen something on like a soap or something where someone's house had caught on fire. And I think that stuck with me like, I don't deep fry at home. I think I've only done it once. And that was last year I made a chicken parmigiana and deep fried the chicken cutlet. And I'm so glad I did. It was phenomenal. And that's not even a big deep fry. No, you don't have to put a lot over that one. Do you know what it is? My mum's definitely taught me that the safest way is deep fry stuff in a little pot. You know, don't go crazy and try to get this massive pan. Best way, little pot, do it in batches. That's like, it's safer, less dangerous. And it actually comes out better. You get the

seasoning of because the oil seasons the pan. And that's what creates flavour because fried chicken is never going to taste really that nice in fresh oil, even though it will, don't get me wrong. But like, the best fried chicken comes from oil that's had some chicken being fried in it. Do you know what I mean? So it's about, it's that kind of flavour that you get from it being in a pot. Like, wait, let's say you got a batch of wings that you want to make. Instead of doing it all in one massive pot, oil everywhere, do a little pot, couple wings, couple wings, couple wings. It's longer, but that's cooking in it. When we were kids, deep frying stuff and chip pan fires and stuff like that, we were warned about it like it was going to be a threat at every single, like every

corner returned in our entire life. That must be it. That must be why I won't do it, because that's just stuck with me. It was a massive thing. The amount of videos I watched where that was an issue and like I'd watch them and be like, why are people inviting this peril into their homes? Like, no one's, you know, like everyone just seems to be getting in their kitchen, filling a pan with oil for no reason, heating it up, then walking to a different area of the house and then coming back and their whole house is on fire and they're running around screaming and go, well, I'm never going to do that. It's always the curtains. The curtains go up first as well. If you're trying to make curtains. Yeah. Absolutely. And then that's it. So yeah,

I've never dared do anything like that. Big zoos doing it. Other people's house parties. Yeah, he's there. He's just doing it. He's got two AM. I'm about to burn down your whole house. What's caprese salad? Is that the same? That might be the same, because I've been calling this salad caprese salad. I've had it a lot during lockdown. We've been doing loads of them just like simple, easy lunch, just chop up tomatoes and mozzarella and get all the stuff on it and basil and I've been calling them caprese salads. And if it's a tricolage salad or something like that, oh man. No, you're right. It is a caprese salad. So I wonder whether I've got it wrong. Ah, interesting. I think I've got it wrong. So the three colors in a tricolor salad come from

mozzarella, tomato and avocado. But a caprese salad is the tomato, mozzarella and basil. So it's the combination of the three colors, but the green's coming from somewhere else in the tricolor. So it would appear that Ed's knowledge of Italian cuisine isn't as good as he once thought. So maybe the scone based pizza is the way to go. Well, of course, when I make a caprese salad, I use cheddar cheese and Victoria's sponge. Yep. Again, by example, sounds delicious. Now he's gone light on the starter because you said you're saving room for the main course. Is it going to be something big? So it's funny because all the things that it could have been is my love for American food. So I love like these trap boxes that I don't know if you guys

see them before, but it's like these big, massive platters that have like, they'll have like macaroni cheese, you'll have like fried chicken, you'll have like ribs and then they'll have like a random waffle in it. Like if you literally just go on Google or like trap kitchen, you'll see all the stuff that they do. Like they, it's like, it's pretty, it's pretty popular in England and obviously in America, but it's like these big massive, like moreish, tubaware boxes just full of mad things. And that's what I definitely love. I definitely love that. But I'm going to stick to my roots. I go back home and I got to go with Jalof rice. Yeah. The best Jalof rice, but Sierra Leone and Jalof rice, not Nigerian, not Ghanaian, Gambia, Senegal, the Cordevoir,

you could all go. It's Sierra Leone. So you have added a new dimension to a wall that's been raging on the off menu podcast since the first series. So we had, we've had Nigerian versus Ghanaian Jalof rice on the podcast already. I didn't know there were so many other players in the game. And are you saying Sierra Leone has the best Jalof rice? What makes it different? The best. We make it with love. I'm going to, I'm going to Google because I remember the original Jalof is called wall off. Yeah. It was with, it was with a W. So Senegal made it. Yeah. They made the thing. So they technically are the owners. So nobody can really talk to them because, you know, you originated the recipe, but same way, you know, people can remix things and make them

better. That's life. I think that Nigeria and Ghana, you know, they're good contenders, you know, massive countries, big GDP, a lot of economic growth where there's a lot of time spent on working and developing. We're Sierra Leone been through pain war. We ain't got as much peace. So you've got more time to focus on food because that's things that make us happy. And my mom said that to me. And that was a very random thing that she said to me. And I was like, you know what, that's a mad generalization, but I'm running with it. We ain't got as much of a city, but we've got more chefs. That's what it makes up for, you know, like you are too busy making dough. So how can you have such a nice recipe? It doesn't even make sense. We have more villages,

more chilled people, less workers. We're obviously going to be better than you are cooking. That's the, that's the idea. Now that's number one argument. Number two argument. These are blend. They blend it. We're in Africa in the, in the ends. Have they got a blender? They got no blender. So how's your authentic recipe requiring electricity when real Africa is not electricity. It's fire. It's fire on the pot. Yeah. So that's already just depreciated the value of their job. And then it's, it's, it's about, it's about one thing about my mom, my mom, my mom's dad is the same mix as me. So my mom's dad is Sierra Leone in the Lebanese like me. So my mom was raised with a little bit of a Lebanese temperament and the combination of Lebanese cooking with African cooking is

something that's very interesting. It's not something that's always brought to light on. Well, obviously I've tried to do my own little influence, but it's basically when the Lebanese moved over to West Africa, obviously they went over during war and they went over to get a better life and they became part of the society. It's not something that's always spoken about in history and in, in, in like global history. But obviously African cuisine was kind of like, it's built up of times of like tribal times and what was accessible at the time, you know, like that everyone else is cuisine. And in African cuisine, there's a lot of things that you eat that are not like typical, you know, like, like cow foot or the sheet belly or like

the skin, like cow skin, they call it cow kanda, which is literally just the skin of the cow. And then things like dried fish and dried pastes and sesame pastes, things like that, things that they was using to live off. The Lebanese came over and they were like, yo, listen, we ain't really, we're not getting involved in all of that dry stuff over there. We're going to take your recipes and put a little bit of an Arab touch on it. So a bit more onions, bit more garlic, like ingredients that were not commonly used in West Africa were more introduced through cooking, through the Lebanese in that sense, because they was more likely to be like, no, let's get some garlic, even though no one's cooking with garlic. So you have to go

source that now. Do you know what I'm trying to say? So my mom's kind of recipe for a jollof is very filled with garlic, filled with onion, filled with tomato stew. The process is so funny because it's actually high level cooking, but she just looks at it like, oh, this is what we learned, but it's funny because they boil the meat and that makes a stock. They boil the meat, take out the meat, shred it from the bone, deep fry it, and then add that into the stew. And then the stew is like, it's like onions, tomatoes, bag of seasoning, scotch bonnet, some bay leaf, cooked down for a long time, a lot of tomato paste, you add this shredded fried meat into there, you add your basmati rice, and then you take that stock, and then you use that to add all the water, and then

you let it simmer for like two hours, and that's how you get a jollof. It's very simple, but the cooking process is in terms of the meat being cooked three times, the stew being made over a long time. All these little things, they're like really nice bits of cooking, you know, people have their different ways, but I think always very good. And I said, I'm making a cookbook, the recipe's going to be in the cookbook, so if you want the big stew recipe, it's there. Look at me. Last time I saw you, which was when I did your TV show, I knew I was going to be eating loads of food. The night before, I'd actually had jollof rice for the very first time, and basically I had ordered a takeaway, and I just didn't know how big the portion was going to be, and also that it

would just seem to never end. I felt like it was replenishing itself as I was eating it, and it was just never going, the level was never going down, and I was like, I've got to do big zoos, big eats tomorrow, and I'm absolutely stuffed to the rafters here. I'm so full, it's still the next morning with jollof rice. Mate, and what's funny is that your amuse-bouche was the biggest amuse-bouche we made for anyone. It was huge. It was humongous, bro. It was like, Ed, if you saw it, you would have been a bit jealous. There was so much food. And what I didn't tell you on the day was that amuse-bouche. I bit into it, and I burnt the roof of my mouth immediately. And for the rest of the afternoon, I had a burnt mouth when I was eating all the food,

and it was all so delicious, but I was in pain, big suit. This is life. When life gives you lemons, you've got to make a lemon cake. You've got to do something different. Is there anything specifically about the Sierra Leone jollof rice that makes it stand apart from all of the others? Is there an ingredient or a spice or something that you can go, if you were blindfolded, could you be like, that's Sierra Leonean? You know what it is. They do normally use the same similar type of seasoning. It's the bay leaf, scotch bonnet, Maggie cube. These kind of things are paramount in the jollof. I think with Sierra Leone jollof, what you'd be able to tell is by the texture of the rice,

it's cooked. It's not mushy. It's not undercooked. It's that perfect, like, authentic vibes. And the taste of the tomato, we definitely, because our tomato isn't blended and then stewed, we actually let them cook down until it becomes a sauce. And then we use a lot of tomato paste as well. Whereas most countries don't use as much tomato paste as us. So our jollof is naturally more red. And what you might taste is that there might be that odd onion that didn't fully sweat down. So you might have a nice little chunk of like some char d'an onion in there. So it's like, those are the little things you'd be able to pick up on. The process is that it's very like an Italian tomato. So it's just low and slow, let it all come out. And then the rice is

soaking up all that flavour. You know? It sounds so, I'm so hungry. Is your side dish also in your cookbook? This one is definitely a shout out to my ex again. That's a family from our Jews. I'm cool with that. So it's like, I'm allowed to talk about her influence in my life. It's not like, I hate you. Forget all the memories that you gave me in life. And I think if you're going to talk about your ex, I think it's fine to say, here's some nice food that she introduced me to. I don't, that doesn't feel, you know, malicious. Yeah, it's not, it's not creepy, you know? No. If you were like, my side dish is inspired by my ex, it's a lies and deceit. Then we'd be like, big zoo. That's a little bit. Whoa, whoa. Rain it in. So obviously I'm

Muslim. So every Ramadan, I spend Ramadan with a family and a family like traditionally the Algerian but it was a French and they have the tradition where they make things called borax. So borak. Now borak, you might have had it from like a Turkish place or a Greek Cypriot place. There's so many different types of borak. A borak is basically like a spring roll. But it was never until I kind of went to their house and had the authentic borak, like Algerian Ramadan borak that I was like, this is unbelievable. Like it makes spring rolls, like a typical like Chinese spring roll look so dead. It makes it look like just go sit in a corner bowl because it's like so different, you know? It's sort of a field of like finely chopped veg and a lot of subtle seasoning. It's filled with like

meat and different flavors. And one thing that they use over in Algeria is a lot of cinnamon, which is weird. Like you don't really get that in a lot of meaty cooking, but you know, like a lot of North Africa, they like those like flavorsome kind of like vibrant things to go with their food. Like they like their dried lemon and they love their turmeric and they love things like they love their like sweet stuff. So cinnamon is something that they use and they'll fry the chicken with like just a bit of onions, a bit of water, bag of cinnamon, make a bechamel. So you mix it out. Now put some cheese, they chopped some olives, put that, mix up this mixture, mix it, mix it, and then they pull it into the spring roll deep fried, covered in lemon when it comes out.

Ah, it's like a cheesy, chickeny, olive-y spring roll. And then they got the minced meat one, which is again, onion, cinnamon, same thing. But then with this one, they fry omelettes, cut out a little bit of the omelette, put that at the bottom of the spring roll, put the minced meat, wrap it up and fry it. And then when you bite it, you get like the kind of like sweet, cinnamon-y meat with like a nice spongy little bit of omelette. Ah, it's so good, bro. Yeah, look, Algerian borax on the side with like 15 lemons. And do you want all those different types of borac as well in there? You want a big mix-up, Bol? Yeah, yeah, yeah, we've got to have all of them. Yeah, what's a nice borac as well? They did like, they're so, you've got to get

creative with it, like they got like basil, feta, and feta ones, which is kind of different. Because that's the one that I would think of, where if someone said borac to me, I'd think of like feta and spinach in the like cigar-shaped thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what I'm saying, there's normally like the cheesy ones and the spinach-y ones, like those are like the typical ones, but Algeria, they just got like, because there's not, there's not that many Algerian restaurants, you know, it means it's hard to kind of experience it, but they just have to know, they just, I don't know how they got a hold of a spring roll, but they got the spring roll, they're like, brother, we're going to put some bus stuff in this, yeah? It's all right, you look and put

some spinach and cheese and make it taste cute, we're going to get chicken and put cheese and olives and deep fried that shit. What I like about this as well, Zoo, is that you already said your younger self would be shouting at you for not picking a spring roll as the starter, so you've just basically elevated spring rolls in as your side dish, so now the younger Zoo's relaxing. Yeah, I basically, yeah, I didn't do it, but I did. So we've come to your drink, we've gone all around the world, we've been to France for the baguette, we've been to Italy for your salad, we've been to Sierra Leone for your jollof, Algeria for your side dish, where are we going for the drink? Oh, I mean, Ed knows my love for a supermalt,

because I made him try a supermalt. Zoo loves supermalt, yeah. You made him try a supermalt. How was your experience of a supermalt? I enjoyed supermalt, it's not a taste I'd had before, gotta say Zoo, I've not had a supermalt since then, I've not gone out to seek another supermalt, it tasted like Guinness, but with none of the fun. Interesting. I love Guinness, absolutely love it, I think it's delicious, but then you have a sip of Guinness, you get the taste, you get the cold sort of smooth, it slips down, it's so nice, and then, oh, a little bit tipsy, but not with a supermalt, you just get the raw taste of crops. Raw crops? Damn, you know what's funny is that it's one of the, it's like a big argument,

like within the Africa community, the Caribbean community, because they're such a loving thing, it's like mama, isn't it? Some people love it, some people hate it, but people that hate it, they say things like that, like really hurtful, sad things that you wouldn't cost any other drink like that for, you know? But like, I sort of threatened the other day, reasons of why supermalt is bad, like why are you doing this, you know? Go argue with a politician, or Piers Morgan, breaking down a drink company that's been a pivotal member of the African community, you know? Hey, you don't hate mama, you just don't like it, because other people love it, you know? Yeah, you don't understand it, that's what it is, it's actually, they just don't get it,

and maybe I'm the same with supermalt, I don't get it. You will one day. How many supermalt are you drinking on a regular basis though? Bro, I'm not going to lie, I cool it down, you know, it used to be like something that's always in the house, but then now we've kind of changed that, we don't drink as much cheaper mom, so I would say like maybe two a week, but supermalt's not my choice to drink, my drink of choice is the wonderful, the one and only Kavosier with Sprite and Coke. You can't just have Coke or Sprite, you have to mix both, you have to mix both of the physegents.

I've always said, what is the mix of a brandy, you know, whether it's Kavosier, whether it's Hennessy, whether it's Remi Martin, people like to do apple juice, that's a new one, don't really like apple juice one because I like the fizz, but I'm telling you, I unlocked it one day because I didn't have enough of both, I had a little bit of Sprite and a little bit of Coke, I had a lot of Kavosier. So I thought, how are we going to make this work? Mix the both, absolutely beautiful. People don't like brandy because it's very strong, doesn't taste that nice.

When you mix it with these sugary, fizzy drinks, but then you combo them, it creates like this, like have a Kavosier and Coke on its own, you'd be like, oh, have a Kavosier and Sprite on its own, you'd be like, oh, but then you have a Kavosier with Coke and Sprite, I swear to you, I don't know what happens, but it just tastes like liquid goodness and you also get very waved. Now this is the first time in the meal that the MCs really come out to play with dropping Kavosier in. Yes. Now that's straight out of a video now.

You see plenty of videos with the MCs rolling around with a bottle of Kavosier, never seen them popping open the Sprite and Coke though, do you? Yeah. No, no, no. They always have it straight, you know, I'm trying to make you guys have a good life rather than the short one. I want to see you do a video, Zooey, where you're in like a jacuzzi with a bottle of Kavosier and then just ages trying to open a bottle of Sprite without it spraying in your face.

Yeah, that's the next video. The next video is me teaching them the mix. Listen, try the mix. Give me a shot. If the mix is so good, I've actually put it in the cookbook. How long is that fucking recipe? You're really padding for words there. Go, Zooey, we're supposed to have 100,000 words in this, mate.

All right, we'll do three pages. Kavosier and Sprite, Coke, mix them. Yep. No, I get that. That's not the best representation of the book. We have great drink recipes in there, smoothies, listens. Open a bottle of SuperMolk. That's the other drink recipe.

That's the other one. No, honestly, no. I'll put it in there just so that people know, innit? Are you the kind of person, Big Zoo, who when you're like in Nando's or, you know, Burger King or whatever, and you've got to go and do your drink, do you mix them up? Yeah, what Millie ever said, I've always been that guy. I don't know why. I think, you know, the fact that it's free, you're like, yeah, let me abuse

your free-ness, you know? I'm going to Nando's, asking him for a water, looking him in the eye, going over there in front of the same manager going, crazy. They're hitting every single one, getting bare eyes. Oh my God. Yeah, that was me. Nando's, I love a Coke and Fanta, you know? That's a good one.

Coke and Fanta from Nando's, I used to work in Nando's, so I kind of got sick. You know what was the best thing? I never knew that Nando's so juice. And I was like, fam, I've been asking these up for tap water this whole time. I've never actually looked at the juice menu. And they've got the best juice. They don't sell it anymore because of COVID, but when they open up again, if you ever go to Nando's, ask them for like a mango juice or lemonade.

And it's like, this is so much better than this diluted bloody Coke that we always get, man. It's so much better for your chicken. Getting trust me. Or they've got orange juice, mango juice, lemon juice, apple juice, but it's like proper, beautiful juice. Oh, nice. I didn't know that. The mango juice sounds amazing.

I always find the Fanta, it makes them the Fanta in it. That's when it gets a bit muddy for me, the Fanta and Coke. I think Fanta and Coke and Sprite, Fanta and Sprite, that all makes sense. Coke and Fanta, the flavors get a bit muddied and I'm never sure about that. It gets a bit sludgy. I get it, it goes like this weird brown and it depends, it depends, but there's a certain Christmas of that caramel-y orange. You know what I like?

What's the problem with our Fanta? Our Fanta over here is so fucking shit. Our Fanta is the worst Fanta. Yes. We got dead Fanta. When you go Europe and stuff, you proper get to enjoy Fanta. It's too orange. The one that looks like a umpa-lumpa.

Yeah. That one. We got the one that looks like The Simpsons. One of my favorite drinks I've ever had. Recently, Ed and I did our dream menus for our 100th episode and I chose a different drink for every course and the one drink that didn't make it in that would have been one of my dream drinks and genuinely one of the best drinks I've ever had

is the Fanta that I had in Kenya. It had a flavor to it. I don't know, there was more than just like sugar and fake orange in there. It properly had a delicious aftertaste. I don't know, there was like some spices in there. It was so good and like this burnt taste to it. When I go to like Spain, it's crazy. So I can imagine that Kenya one just hitting different,

especially when it's super hot as well. Was it in the glass bottle? Yeah, yeah, it was. Yes, it was a glass bottle. Yeah, come on. You know when it's from the glass bottle as well? It's got that extra, it's got that, I mean coke from a glass bottle is always the best compared to the, I hate the machines.

Only in America, see America? They're like 400 years light years ahead of us. I went to America when I was like 14. And I couldn't believe it, like McDonald's had its own, like the drink machine. I was like, what's going on? Why are we so far behind? What's going on?

But then it's like, the drink machine has everything. It's got like Kool-Aid, it's got lemonade, it's got water, it's got juice, and then it's got all the fizzy drinks. And then like we just had Subway, the boss man saying, you can't refill again, which is what he always told me. I'll eat my, I'll have my Subway the day, have my one drink, trying to have another drink before I leave.

Brother, what you doing? So what boss? You cannot fill again. And I just said, bruv, come on, man, come on, man, you're going to be tight. Yeah, had a lot of arguments in Subway still. Subway, Subway never go along with me, man. Never.

Yeah, Subway never got on. I love the Coke freestyle machine in Burger King, where they've got like flavours that you've never heard of before. And I do a radio show every Sunday, and obviously Burger King is shut at the moment, but I have to arrive really early. And I walk past the Burger King at 7 a.m. on a Sunday,

and I look in through the window, and I can't wait until COVID's over, and I can go and use the freestyle machine again. Raspberry Diet Coke, what the hell? Why can't you get that in a can? I know, it's not fair. It's actually not fair. On those freestyle machines, again,

this is one of the things that Ed will get angry about when I tell it. I don't think Ed knows what I get. Maybe he does know. Maybe we've already covered what I have on the freestyle machines when I go to Five Guys. I don't think we have. But I go in, oh, you're going to get angry about it.

I don't know why I've bought this up. Oh. I have Fanta, zero, no bubbles, grape, and mix it with maybe some Fanta, no bubbles, zero, cherry. And I kind of mix those two. What? Yeah. And as I was saying it, I was like, it's going to be angry.

So you use the most brilliant drink convention in the world to have a worse version of something that already exists. I basically have like a squash. It tastes like squash, really. I don't think anyone's ever done that combo. No. As much as I'm sure all the combos have been done, I don't think there's anyone going on the zero bubbles.

I'm going, yeah. Yeah. Let's fucking go. Which brings us to the dessert now. I know you haven't really talked that much about loves of desserts, right? Yeah, you haven't brought it up so far. I don't really know where we're going here.

I've got a sweet, I'm a sweet tea person. I love Harry Bowie stuff. But like desserts growing up, I'm African, man. I can't tell you about African desserts. I'm sure there's a lot in the whole of Africa, the continent. But fam, we're not the ones. Now, France, if France wanted to battle us in a dessert war, they'll definitely take down a lot of Africa first.

So I think it's one of those things that my mom never really used to have a sweet tooth as well. So we never grew up eating desserts. So all my desserts growing up were just primary school and secondary school. That's when I'll have a dessert, you know? Like a little crumble or cake or whatever. But then, again, speaking about my ex,

which is hilarious, obviously, she's French, isn't it? So I spent a lot of time with her, do you know what I mean? So her family showed me about French desserts and stuff. And all my days, I don't know what it is yet, but you know a fleur, just a fleur? Just a fleur. But a good, good, good, creamy, emotionally baked to the highest level fleur.

That thing there, man can eat that all day, yeah? Now, there's probably some man there who's just like, what's a fleur? What is that? Fam, how do you explain a fleur? I don't even know what's in it. I've only ever had it when, like, having pizza, because you can have a base, a fleur with pizza.

So that's the only time I've ever really had it. Well, no, it's like cakey, isn't it? But it's like really airy and light and flat. And it's just like custardy. There's different types. So there's the creme caramel version, that's like a more wobbly, wobbly version. Yeah, that's the one I'm talking about.

That's the one you're talking about. Yeah, it's sort of like a baked custard pie, right? Yeah. With a pastry base, like a thin pastry base. Yeah, I see what we're talking about. Thin one. But when it's done correct and the custard is just nice and creamy, the base is nice and crispy and just odd.

Oh, my God, I've got to give a special shout out to Crumble with cold custard. I know that sounds random, but some people don't like that. But I think you have to have hot with cold, you know? Like, so special shout out to my Crumble. What fruit? I like an apple, simple apple, but I've been having like apple and blackberries.

Yeah, apple with the blackberries, because I don't know what it is, the blackberries, just bring a certain happiness out of the apple. I like putting the top of my crumble. I've been putting a lot of like oats, because people used to tell me put oats, and we're talking about it's just a butter and sugar thing. But now put some oats and stuff,

that gives you that extra happiness. But I don't know what it is about a flan, like it's got such a nice texture. It's like a creme brulee, like some people think like creme brulee is disgusting, some people love it. It's just sometimes the texture of a dessert is what you like, you know? You like that consistency.

I love the consistency of a flan. It's like nice and creamy, but it's sweet, but it's not too sweet. It's not like after a big meal, like after all of that, like you don't want something too mad sweet to like kill you off, you know? Because I know some people are thinking, what flan, that's so boring.

But I've had some good ones where you're like, you're putting your spoon in and you're like, you're like, what the hell, bro, yo. And that's how food's supposed to make you feel. Food's supposed to make you feel gassed and it's like, a flan is something that's so good I can't make it. It's so good I won't make it because like I know,

I ain't got the hand. Like I'll try, that's why I can't say a crumble. Can't make that, you know? That's something I can make, but a flan, that's like, when I've gone to certain places, I've seen it in the window, the top's looking all nice and brown and you can see the sides looking nice and all. Now, yeah, let me go that flan.

I think you should try and make it. I want to be at a house party with you one day and at two in the morning. You're like, where's Zoo? Oh, he's in the kitchen making a flan. How much longer do you think this relationship lasted because you didn't want to cut off your access to all this great food?

Oh, bro, that answer is just going to never be right. Yeah, you've put in a quarter on that one, Zoo. You can't argue your way out of that one. Mate, all I can say, it was all part of the journey. It was all part of the journey. And like I said, it's crazy because my influence of the food that I love comes from the people that were around me growing up and my family.

It's like, I can't tell. I'm very deep rooted in that with the food that I love because it's kind of what you're used to experiencing and used to having. And you can talk about food forever and try to make yourself seem like you love something forever, but what you love is what you love. And it's nice to speak about it

because you're kind of like, oh, that's why I love it. Yeah. Well, Zoo, you've gone all over with yours. Water. We're going to Turkey. Turkish boss man, still water. Pop it on his upper head. Over to France for the baguette

with some apricot jam and some leopak. Starter. Over to Italy for some buffalo mozzarella, tomatoes, basil, balsamic, caprese salad, olive oil, salt. Lovely. Main course. Sierra Leone, Jollof rice.

Side dish. Platter of Algerian boric. Drink. Cavossier with sprite and coke. Dessert. A French flan. Sounds good. You're happy with that?

You were doing the face I do when I'm really enjoying thinking about food. You're like, it's proper like screw face. You were like, you're like, you're imagining it all lined up that you were going to fucking ram your face into it. So aggressively excited. Yeah.

I didn't even cook now. I was doing that, but I know I was. I know I was. I know I was doing it for the whole time. I know you got me. Yeah, yeah, I'm happy with that. I'm happy with that. It's like, it's a combo of classic cooking, isn't it?

Italian, French cooking with a little bit of my Sierra Leone influence in there, man. That's what I am. That's what I am. Love it. Thank you very much, Big Zoo. Thank you so much, Zoo. Big love.

Well, there we are. What a lovely episode with Big Zoo. I think that was a top food episode. And a lovely, quite, felt like we were making some emotional connections with food that often we don't make. Yes, it was beautiful. Big Zoo is so good at talking about food, man.

And I can't wait to dive into that cookbook. It sounds like a treat. I'm going to make that jollof rice for sure. I'm going to make that drink. I can imagine you just like cutting about your house with a big cup of corvosier and Sprite and Coke. Well, you're going back and forth between the cookbook when I'm making it.

Okay. What's the next step? What do we do now? Come on. Oh, no, I don't have two of the ingredients. I'm just going to have a Sprite. Just have a Sprite. I'm going to place the other two with more Sprite.

It was a great episode. Thank you very much, Big Zoo, for coming on. Remember that his new series of Big Zoo's Big Eats starts very, very soon. And his cookbook is out very, very soon. Big Zoo's Big Eats Cookbook. And we can't wait to cook from that, like we say. And he didn't say the secret ingredient.

He didn't say chicory. For not saying chicory, Big Zoo. Because otherwise we wouldn't have heard about the flan at the end. We wanted to hear about the flan. I mean, I'd say flan, but he pronounced it correctly. And he refused to pronounce it any other way. And you've got to respect that.

I'm never saying flan again. Flan all the time. James, anything that you would like to plug? Yeah. Just be nice to each other. Cool. I'm behind that as well. Oh.

The thing is, you can't now plug something that is actually yours and that earns you money now. If you've plugged, be nice to each other. I feel like being nice to each other should come after the actual plugs, James. Are you going to plug something properly now? Maybe at Off Menu Official is our Twitter. Yeah, that's good.

We can do that. Yeah. Atoffmenupodcast.co.uk. Yes. Is that right? Yeah. That's our website. There's a whole, there's a page on there

devoted to all the restaurants that get shout outs. I mean, you said atoffmenupodcast.co.uk, but I think we know what you meant. You just mean atoffmenupodcast.co.uk. I haven't used the internet in a while. Atoffmenupodcast.co.uk, whole list of all the restaurants that ever get mentioned on the Off Menu Podcast is on there for one day.

I mean, we're currently recording this in a lockdown, but one day that this is going to come in handy. It really, really is. Thank you very much for listening to another episode of Off Menu. We will see you in the Dream Restaurant again sometime soon. Goodbye. See you soon. Yum, yum, yum.

Hello, it's me, Amy Gladhill. You might remember me from the best ever episode of Off Menu, where I spoke to my mum, and asked her about seaweed on mashed potato, and our relationship's never been the same since. And I am joined by... Me, Ian Smith. I would probably go bread.

I'm not going to spoil it in case... Get him on, James and Ed. But we're here sneaking in to your podcast experience to tell you about a new podcast that we're doing. It's called Northern News. It's about all the new stories that we've missed out from the North, because, look, we're two Northerners, sure, but we've been living in London for a long time.

The new stories are funny. Quite a lot of them crimes. It's all kicking off. And that's a new podcast called Northern News. We'd love you to listen to. Maybe we'll get my mum on. Get Glill's mum on every episode. That's Northern News.

When's it out, Ian? It's already out now, Amy! Is it? Yeah, get listening. There's probably a backlog. You've left it so late.