Off Menu with Ed Gamble and James Acaster - Ep 109: Nicola Coughlan

Episode Date: July 14, 2021

It’s time to serve up another series of delicious chat, and who better to kick off series 6 than ‘Bridgerton’ and ‘Derry Girls’ star, Nicola Coughlan! But will she get locked out of the dream restaurant?Follow Nicola Coughlan on Twitter and Instagram @nicolacoughlanRecorded 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. Sorry to interrupt the Off Menu, but I'm allowed because it's partly my podcast. But very excited to say that I'm going on a national tour in 2022. The show is called Electric. I'm very excited to show it to you and to be in front of real people again. That's going to be the most exciting thing. So please come and see it. If you don't come and see it, I will get the great bonito to work out so that you listen to the podcast and you haven't come to see me on tour and he will block you from the

podcast. EdGamble.co.uk. Check out where I'm going on tour, buy some tickets, and I'll see you in 2022. Anyway, on with the show. And what you need to do is to get the oil of chat up to 300 degrees and then quickly dunk in some freezing cold anecdotes for a crispy, crispy podcast. Hello, James. Ed Gamble, what a brilliant introduction there. I loved it so much. Thank you. Really painted a picture, painted a vivid picture in the morning. Oh, did it take you there? Did it take you there?

Yeah. How are you imagining the anecdotes to look when they went into the hot chat oil? Like cubes, just like solid cubes, but like they're kind of opaque, solid opaque cubes. That's interesting. That's what you imagine an anecdote to look like physically is a solid, opaque cube. I guess so. I mean, it says a lot about the quality of my anecdotes, I guess. Yeah. I was thinking more of an egg. Oh, yeah?

Yeah. Anecdotes are eggs. They have a lot of potential. Oh, right. Yeah. You don't know what's going to hatch from them. Yeah, you don't know what's going to hatch from them. Yeah. I just imagined a stale cube. So a bit of a shame there. And your specials available now, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. Go to Vimeo. Watch my special on demand. Loads of anecdotes. Stale cube hate myself, 1999.

Yeah, exactly. But this isn't stale cube hate myself, 1999. This is the off menu podcast where we invite a different guest to the dream restaurant every single week and ask them their favorite ever start at Mancliffe's Dessert Side Dish and Drink. And our special guest this week is... Nicola Cochlan. Nicola Cochlan. She is a wonderful actor. She is in Dairy Girls.

Dairy Girls. She's in Bridgerton, James. The most watched show in Netflix history. Matt. I've watched it. My mum's watched it. And that should tell you something about how many people have watched it. Because it's rare that me and my mum have watched the same thing. Absolutely. Your mum hates most things that you like.

Yes, that's true. We don't get on. But we both watched Bridgerton and boy, oh boy, did we both have the same reaction to it. Mainly being we both had to shut the curtains in case the neighbors happened to walk past and see some of the saucy stuff that was going on in that show. Oh, really? Oh, man. You and your mum like the same stuff, huh? No, we didn't want the neighbors to see what was happening on the screen.

Not in the house. Oh, sorry. Apologies. Don't you worry about that. I don't mind the neighbors seeing me do that. Oh, yeah, of course. It's 2021. It's 2021. Get the blinds open.

She's wonderful anyway, Nicola, so we're in for a real treat. I've interviewed her before on my other rival podcast, James. The Taskmaster podcast. Nope. It's not a rival to us. We're not even a podcast. Ah, OK. I can't be bothered.

But if Nicola says a secret ingredient that we have agreed upon, she will be kicked out of the restaurant, James. Bridgerton or no Bridgerton. That is true. And this week, Bleasdale has chosen... It's not Bleasdale, is it? Papa John's Garlic Sauce. Papa John's Garlic Sauce or Garlic Butter, whatever they call it,

comes in a little pot in the pizza. The only good bit about it is it comes in a little recess in the box, which I find very satisfying. But the actual sauce or melted butter or whatever it is in there, it's like melted margarine. It's horrible. I don't like it. It's unwanted.

Stop giving it to us. It's like the U2 album. Yeah, it is. It's the U2 album of sauces, James. U2 more like me, no. I thought you were going to say me, too, then. Not me, too. If someone's saying, hey, we've got this garlic sauce.

We're going to eat this sauce. U2? Like, no, me, me, no. That's what you'd say, isn't it? If someone said U2? Yeah. You wouldn't just say no. Well, yeah.

So they're saying U2. I'm like, no, me, me, no. Oh, no. Okay. Well, I think you would say that maybe, but you're getting the inflection slightly wrong. So you say U2. You go, me, no.

Yeah. That's it. Not me, no. Me, no. I go, me, no. Yeah, that's what I'd say. Yeah, yeah. Okay, good.

So do it again. Me, me, no. The inflection wasn't quite right on U2, though, but it doesn't matter. But anyway, if she says Papa John's garlic sauce, she's out of here. Thank you, Bleesdale. Bleesdale.

Bleesdale. Ah, Benito tells us it wasn't Bleesdale, but you'll enjoy this. It's James Ribbard. Ribbadi, ribbadi, ribbadi, ribbadi. Ribbadi, ribbadi, ribbadi, ribbadi, ribbadi. You enjoying that as much as Bleesdale? Nope.

I'm trying to. But Bleesdale will always be number one. Genuinely trying to enjoy Ribbadi, that. Really putting all my heart into trying to enjoy Ribbadi as much as I. And it is great. It is fun. I would, I'd accept James Ribbadi as a friend of Bleesdale.

I mean, I'd imagine Ribbadi's lived with Frogjokes his whole life, right? Yeah, always his whole life. And we're not about to add to them. Ribbadi on its own is funny enough, so I don't know why people are trying to turn it into Frogjokes. I like that his name is Ribbadi, and I like that Bleesdale's name is Bleesdale.

So I would like Bleesdale and Ribbadi to find each other on social media, connect. Yeah. Make a double that. Bleesdale and Ribbadi. No, Ribbadi and Bleesdale. It's Ribbadi and Bleesdale. It's got to be Ribbadi and Bleesdale.

It's Ribbadi and Bleesdale. Yeah. And that's what I want to see. Always starts with Ribbadi on stage, and then he says to the audience, well, it's about time we got Bleesdale out here. But we know what we've got to do to get Bleesdale here, don't we? And everyone in unison.

Bleesdale. Bleesdale. But when he comes on at the beginning, you know, he comes on to like a track when Ribbadi comes on. Yeah. Ribbadi, Ribbadi, Ribbadi, Ribbadi, Ribbadi, Ribbadi, Ribbadi, Ribbadi, Ribbadi, Ribbadi... and en, en, in your voice on... Yeah.

...ocado到, in the crowd, he's Ribbadi, Ribbadi, Ribbadi. And then he's like, we got to get my friend out. He's a bit shy. Bleesdale! He comes out and then, that's the end of the show.

Yeah, it's a good show. If Nicola says Papa John's garlic sauce, she is out of here. Hopefully, she won't, looking forward to chatting to her. Here is the off-menu-menu of… Nicola band! Nicola Colchler!

Hi-ya-ya-ya! Welcome, Nicola, to the Dream Restaurant. Thank you. I love what you've done with the place. Thank you very much. Oh, no. Welcome, Nicola Coffin, to the Dream Restaurant. We will be spending you for some time.

This is very nice here. I like it very much. Thank you for having me. Sorry, there's a bit of a commotion in the flat that I'm in, and it made me really rush the intro because I panicked that I was having to shout over the... What was the commotion, man? I was in the kitchen, rapping around all the bowls and stuff, naming no names, Jason McKenzie. Right.

OK. Well, I live on a street that's like a street from a musical, like West Side Story, so a man just cycled... It's a one-way street. Cycled backwards down a one-way street singing really loud, and Mid-Indo God is always something really weird happening, so there might be several interruptions, which I apologise for in advance. Is there someone going to go past selling ripe strawberries ripe?

That was always given to the girl at Skilu who had the best voice. Yeah. That's often number three. That's Oliver James, sorry if it's not. I know Oliver. I know that scene where he's in the rich man's house and everyone outside is selling stuff and they're singing it. It's an awful song.

I hate it. Well, you better hope Lionel Bart doesn't listen to this podcast because I heard he's a huge fan and he's going to be really sad, he said that about him. He's also really litigious. I'm glad he hates it. The whole thing, and this is more of a diss to Dickens than him, I guess, but like the whole notion of, I mean, a little worker boy in the workhouse going up and asking for more is ridiculous.

That would never happen. So the whole thing that it's built on is stupid, Oliver. But it's unusual that it happens, right, because they all bully him into doing it. So it's out of the ordinary that it happens. It's not a regular occurrence. So I think Dickens might have got you there, mate. I forgot that they bully him into doing it. I thought it was just a precocious little shit.

I used to think it would be really cool to be a little orphan as a kid because I had a VHS double-sided with Dad and Annie and I was like, this is the life. So much fun. And I was sad when I moved to London that it was nothing like Oliver. I thought everyone was going to be like, welcome to the city, little lady, what's happening? And that didn't happen. I was just a little depressed. Did you tell your parents that you wanted to be an orphan?

Well, I used to like sit by the window and you know that bit and Annie was like, betcha, he reads better she sells and I used to always also play, my friends and I used to play famine ships because obviously you learned a lot about the famine in school. So we used to like any poverty based games we were just like very into as children. I don't know what that says. Am I the only person who doesn't know what famine ships is? You should do because it was literally your ancestors, James, but OK. Basically, when the famine happened and Irish people had to go to America to start a new

life because we were all starving to death because the English wouldn't give us food. Oh, pretty rude of you guys. I'm familiar with that. I'm not familiar with the term we played famine ships. We didn't do that in England, James. We wouldn't play famine ships in England. Pretty bad if you guys. Yeah, because we would be on the other side, you see.

So the game wouldn't work for us. Yes. But what's the game? The game was just, oh, it's not like an official game. We just made it up. We like pretend we're on a coffin ships going to America. It was pretty dark, but I was into it. Right. I mean, I don't think it's on me that I didn't understand that. No, no, no, no.

I read into what Nicola was saying. And I thought, well, leave that. It seems like a sensitive issue like the border. Is a good instinct was good. If anyone wants to know in my school's production of Oliver, I played Charlotte's The Underkeeper's Daughter. That's a good song that's not in the movie. And I had a blonde ringlet wig and I looked smashing.

I bet you did. How old were you? That was probably 13. I know you played the Undertaker's Daughter. I did. I played the Undertaker's Daughter. Marcus Mumford was the Artful Dodger, and all of the adult parts were played by teachers. No. That's so weird.

They went, right, we're casting a production of Oliver. All of the adult roles will, of course, be played by us, the adults. And then you get your pick of the children's roles. That's fully insane. There's loads of adults like Bill Sikes, Fagy and Nancy. Yeah, they did well to get Marcus Mumford. That's impressive. Yeah, it's pretty good, right?

I mean, I'm not even as famous as Marcus Mumford now, but if his school asked me to be in their production, I'd say no. I'd turn it down. No. Have you ever been in a musical, James? Yeah, some school. I'm looking up, well, you know, obviously, the gang show. There's loads of musical numbers in that.

So every time I did the gang show every year. What do you mean, the gang show? Well, it's the Scouts. Right. And like every year, the Scouts puts on a performance at the local theatre. And we do like sketches and songs. And yeah, I just sing a few songs in that. See, the way you said the gang show there was as off hand

as Nicola said, famineships. Well, obviously, you did the gang show. Yeah, the gang show, yeah, sure. But I mean, Nicola's one had the most famine in it. It's a bit more... Yeah, yeah. A bit more hefty to drop that in. Yeah, true. Do you like food?

I love it. Honest? You don't have to say it just to fit in with us. No, no, it's a really true story that I really do. But I do want to fit in as well. That's another part of it. Yeah, great. But I remember like, like, do you know when you were a teenager

and you have to come up with one edgy thing, like that you're like, well, actually, I don't even give a shit about cats. I think they're dumb. And I don't like, well, yeah, I knew this one guy who I fancy. He was like, I don't like food. And they freaked me out so badly. I like never looked good in the same again because he was just trying to be edgy.

But I was like, how can you not? And he was like, it's just fuel to keep you going. And I was like, you're a freak. Bye. Did that stop you fancying him at that point? Yeah. Did you not fancy him more? I mean, you've been playing games

when you pretended you were in a famine. You must have loved this guy. I was like, that's right up my alley. He was playing the game at this point. There was a few famine ships was probably about eight years old. This was a little older. Thank God, it would have been really weird if I'd been doing that as a teenager.

Let's just put it out there. That's how you met him in a game of famine. I don't even like food. Mate, come on. We always start off with still sparkling water. Do you have a preference, Nicola? Yeah, one still water, please, because I think sparkling water is disgusting.

It's just like burning on your mouth. And I also do always steal it out of hotels. So like if I bring it home and put it in the fridge, so if someone comes over, I'm like, do you want water still or sparkling? Oh, nice. And they're like, she's got her life together and I don't. But that makes it seem also I didn't even pay for the water.

But sometimes you ever have like a lovely cold gas of water. Go, this is amazing. Yes. Yeah. This stuff's free. This is the basic stuff and it's so good. It's so good. And then you also to impress,

we just have some ice in your freezer. Like I've had friends go over that it's blown them away. They'll have an icy glass of water and they're like, this is just the writs. You've done very well, Nicola, by choosing friends who have a very low bar. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Who are these friends? A cycling pass on a bike backwards. The cycle, like, come in here. Come in off your bike and come for a cold glass H2O. Yeah. Actually, the backwards bike guy probably isn't going to be impressed with ice, right? He's riding on his bike all the time.

I kind of hope he does come back now. So it doesn't seem like I made him up. I really didn't. Do you think he'll come back forwards or backwards? That's my question. I don't know, often Deliveroo guys come the wrong way down this street, but I find it kind of exciting

because it means I'll get to you quicker because I'll see the Deliveroo coming and then I'm like, oh, you have to go around in order to get. But then sometimes they're just like, you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, edgy. I'd say it's as fair. You're having quite a typical lockdown experience by the sound of things, just looking out your window

and watching people go past and investing in their stories. I've been hanging out with my mom a lot. I went back to Ireland and spent most of it there. But then she decided that she didn't want to cook anymore. So then I had to cook everything. And then she was like a really strict, she'd really critique my meals. So I got the New York Times cooking app

and I made this one thing with spring onions where you cut them long and she was like, you choke on those. Because she's an Irish mother and still thinks there's danger lurking everywhere, especially onion. I made really good cauliflower cheese. Is that from the app or from your brain? That's from just BBC Good Food, cauliflower cheese.

Those BBC Good Food recipes are always really solid and good. And simple. An extra bit of mustard in it and some paprika will just bring it up, up, up and it's so good. And then some lemon zest and parmesan in the crumb. Oh yeah. That's really, really good.

But she loves that. But then she kind of wants it with, she's a bit like a toddler. Like she kind of wants it with everything. So I made lemon soul with like a sauce beer. She was like, and cauliflower cheese. And where is my cauliflower cheese this evening? And then I made the mistake of showing it to my friend Camilla's boyfriend who's a chef

and he was like, why do you have a white fish with cauliflower cheese and roast potatoes? I was like, because it's not a restaurant, it is my house. And I can do what I want, okay? Exactly. So you only eat white foods? Yeah, obviously. It's an Irish thing.

We just hate any colour in foods. We're like, no, no, it must be as grey as the sky above the Greenland. Yeah. You'll actually be able to get away with anything in this podcast is by telling me that it's an Irish thing. Yeah.

We've already fallen for famineships, which is definitely made up. Famineships, the well-known game. Yeah, there's many more things, only grey food. There'll be many more to come, don't you? I'll teach you the ways of our trickery from Ireland. No problem. Nicola's not even Irish.

This is acting. What? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, she's not even Irish. What? No, I am. She went to that drama school where all these tenders people go and she learnt how to be Irish. I don't know.

What part of Ireland do you come from? Oh, good test. Galway, like the song. Where's Derry? Derry's up in Northern Ireland, up north. James, do you know where Derry is to do this test? Huh? Do you know where Derry is?

Because testing Nicola on Irish stuff doesn't work if you don't know any of the Irish stuff. I was just going to ask Nicola, when playing that part, how much you had to change about, did you do much research? Or did you just know it all from coming in from Ireland? Or did you have to do loads of different stuff? I was actually just building up to a very, but I had to get my facts straight first

before the question. It wasn't a test. I just thought you didn't believe I was Irish, so I was trying like, how do I prove it? And then I was like, I've got my passports. I could get that. No, I had to learn a lot because I'd never been to Derry and the accent's really different.

You can't talk like this, and he's sort of like that. And it's not how I speak, so I had to, yeah. That's not how you do all your lines, right? Yeah, a little bit. Here's the thing. We spoke to, I don't know what order these episodes are going to go out in, actually, but we spoke to someone else, a nephoractor recently,

English actor. And he said, when he tries to do an Irish accent, he just goes, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, and does that as well. And then you've done it as well now. Is this a thing? But also, that's why there's so many bad Irish accents on television.

We're like, I am Jimmy. I am from the IRA, and I'm coming out hell, yeah. And you're like, no, no, that's not, that's not, no. You don't sound like that. It filled me with fear, that character. Scary Jimmy. Jimmy. I don't know.

I'm pretty convinced by Jimmy. Is that bad? I thought it was pretty good. Pop it up, it's all bread. Bread. Pop it up, it's all bread. Nicola Coughlin. Pop it up, it's all bread.

Bread, bread, James, it has to be bread, bread, bread. Every day, I love bread so much. It's so delicious. Although, I've cut it out in the past at times, and I go, gosh, it feels so much better. It's so much more energy. I just feel like I could do it. And then I smell the bread.

And then I'm like, oh, no. You have me in your yeasty grasp yet again. It's so good. I love a crusty. I remember years and years ago, and I only had it once, it was this restaurant, where the bread came in a tiny little stone thing, and it was really crunchy, and it had rosemary and sea salt on it.

And it was really crunchy on the outside, and fluffy in the middle. So good. It's the best stuff, really, isn't it? It's the best stuff. I, too, try and cut it out quite a lot. And then whenever I eat it again, I think, what a waste of a life.

I know. All those days where I didn't eat bread, what an absolute waste. What a stupid, stupid thing. And also, have you ever had proper Irish brown bread? No, please talk about it. Some people call it wheat and bread, but it's the wheat grain with everything in it.

They don't take it out, so it's really rough. But that, with fresh butter on it, is heaven. It's so, so good. And it's really better for you, because it's not all refined flour. But that, fresh out of the oven, and sometimes you can drizzle a little honey over it when it's just been cooked,

and it soaks down in through it. So good. And can you get that in England, or do you have to go back to Ireland to get it? Not really. We make it with buttermilk. It's really easy to make, and you can make it, and then you don't need to have a special dish for it,

or anything, and you don't have to wait for it to rise. There's no yeast in it, or anything like that. It's so, so good. Do you make it? Yeah, I make it. My mom taught me, also, my mom taught me how to make the recipe, but then she's like, I've been making it for 40 years,

and you just put a little bit of this thing in a little bit. And if you watch Bake Off, if you know Michael Chakravarti, who was on, I think, two series ago, and he wants me to do an Instagram live with him to teach him to bake something. So I was like, I'll do a bar and bread. But then my mother's ingredients,

it was literally like an Irish photo. She was like, a little dash in this, and a handful, and do a sprinkle, and I was getting ready, and I was like, you need to tell me how much people are gonna try and make this at home. But then it worked out really nice, and it was delicious. The more I hear about your mom, the less I like her. She's gonna be really upset.

She thinks you're great. I showed her you on Bake Off, and she said, you also really remind me, and always have of my nephew. I do. No, I completely understand. I've not met your nephew, but I think James would remind a lot of people of their 11-year-old nephews. I could show, I would never show a picture of him,

but he could show you a picture of him because this is just audio. I think he'll be able to get the vibe simply from the picture. That's a cookie I had earlier. Yeah, that's a good cookie. I was like, is that glitter on it, or gold on it? What's that on the top?

It was salt. Well, the light was catching it in a certain way. Don't you see the similar vibe? Do you get me? Yes, yes, I completely get you. James has got strong 11-year-old energy. Yeah. Yeah.

Naughty boy. Yeah, I mean, we probably can't really describe that photo, but just imagine a smaller version of me, and that is what he just showed us, pretty much. Yeah. He's a nephew type. Well, my nephew did a thing once. It's a thing in Ireland called the Fesh,

which is basically like... No, there is a Nicola. Stop making stuff up. It's not made up. I swear to God, I don't know what he's talking about. The Fesh. The Fesh is real. The Fesh.

It's, yeah. It's like a competition where you can do Irish poetry, you can play an Irish instrument or whatever, but my nephew, when he was about five, he's literally alone to himself. He was like, I'm going to get up on the stage, I'm going to do it like a robot. And we were like, you can't do that.

He was like, you just can't do it. And then literally, he was away from us, so he didn't couldn't reach him. And they were like, they called his name, and he just got up and started going, the whole way up to the stage. And I feel like that's also your vibe a little bit. Yeah.

I would have done that as a kid, and it would have haunted me for the rest of my life. But at the time, when I was a kid, I would have thought this was the best idea ever. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I've got up on stage and done it, and then I would have realized it's not, and then I would have thought about it forever

until I was 36, like I am now. And I would constantly be thinking about it. I once got up on stage with Ronnie Corbett at a pantomime. He asked kids to come down to the front if they wanted to come up and do a skill. And I got up on stage, me and three other kids, and then he got to me and I panicked because I realised they didn't have any skills

and just sort of waved at everyone. No. Corbett was mortified. I know that sounds impressive, but Eddie and Ronnie Corbett are the same age. They went to the same school. It's not a big deal. They're just having to hang out together and work.

Yeah, he played Oliver. Yeah, it wasn't a famous shit. It wasn't really a big deal. He was almost a mum for his sons, but it just didn't work out. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I remember me and Ed and Benito, to be fair to him, when we were going to America to do some interviews,

and we were waiting in Nando's for our food, and there was a little kid in the booth behind us whose mum was on the phone. So he started talking to me, and then I started talking to the kid for a while, and then after the kid went away, Ed said that he loved seeing when kids meet me because the kids are really confused,

going, you're not meant to be like this. You're an adult. You're not meant to speak like this to me, because he was like, hello, and I was like, hey, man, how's it going? We're waiting for our chicken. I was like, speaking exactly like it. I have the same thing because I'm also very small,

so I sometimes go and pick up my niece and nephew from school, and the other kids will go, why are you so short if you're an adult? Why do you look like that? Why are you? And you're like, I don't know. And then some of them in like, they're still in primary school,

but some of like the sixth class who are like 12 are like, same size or bigger than me. And I'm like, yeah, it's intimidating. That bread sounds really good. There's just, and there's so many different types of bread. Do you remember? I don't know. I feel like it's like a Jamie's Italian.

They used to give you a bread basket with loads of different breads in it. You know, when you get a bread that's like a sourdough with a bit of olive in it, and it's just like such a spicy surprise. You just can't believe it. Lovely, it's actually great. And I love like, oh, I used to live in Malta, right?

I love this bread there. Yeah, I did a Rasmus for a year when I was at uni, but they have this bread there. You literally can't get anywhere else in the world. And I think about it constantly. They make it in a stone oven like pizza, and it's like really flat and really crispy. It's like a chia butter, but not like springy on the inside.

We used to go and buy it, like after a night out, we'd be drunk, we'd walk down to the little bakery, and it was a treat of hole in the wall, and you'd get this loaf of bread. It's like a giant flat doughnut, and then you take it home, and these just when I rub that tomato on it, and salt, and olive oil.

It's called Hubsna, multisword. And that's like one of the best breads in the world. That sounds incredible. Yeah, I love it so much. Well, the question is, what do you have as your bread then? Because you've shouted out a lot of breads that you really, really love.

You did mention the, you weren't sure if it was Jamie's Italian, where they have an assortment of breads. Yeah. We've had a lot of people on this podcast, Nicola. I've never seen anyone look so worried about having to choose a bread. Yeah, I did feel really upset. Okay, well, because I haven't heard it in years,

and you can't get it anywhere else. And I've looked for recipes for it, and you can't find it online. The multis are very mysterious about their bread making way. So I'll have the multis bread and some olive oil and salt, and balsamic vinegar. Amazing. Right, yeah, you can have that.

You can have the multis bread. Feel okay about that? Yeah, I feel good now. I feel better now. I got stressed for a minute, but I'm all right. Yeah. We come to your starter then. Yeah.

The meal begins proper. Is this from Malta? This is not from Malta. This is from Galway, where I'm from. There's this place called Mourins of the Weir, or they now call it Mourin's Seafood Cottage, and it's these crab claws they do. And it's crab claws, literally swimming in butter.

It's like, again, as I said, I'm gonna have to find pictures to show you, which people can Google them. People can do Googling. Yeah, yes. People love to Google these days. They're all about it, but the crab claws they do, like, you've just never had anything like them

in the world, and I tried to make them at home. It just doesn't work. You need to have the ones that are there. Also, normally when people say things are swimming in butter, it's not things like saying crab claws swimming in butter, literally puts an image in your head. Oh, yeah. Oh, wow.

Is that some crummy? That's a hell of a lot of butter. That's garlic. That is garlic. It's so much garlic, so much butter. It's literally like a butter. Yeah, it's just, it's amazing. And you can get that with a little of the brown bread

on the side, and then you dip it into the butter afterwards, and it gets all over your fingers, and it's so good. There is that. I do have a second option, but if you can get more of the monster there, kind of. Well, I don't know. I don't know, let me put it out there. Good.

I don't know. I'm just gonna throw it into the room. So, there's a place in New York called Ivan Ramen, and they have this starter which is called curry flour, and it's this cauliflower that's got like a curry miso butter on it, and like pickles, ginger. I'm actually not like a huge ramen fan, but that cauliflower, I've thought about it every day.

That looks amazing. It's so good. Like, it's like, who knew a cauliflower could be that delicious? Cauliflower is the underrated king of the veg world. Quite gutted now, because I went to New York with my mum and girlfriend. That was a fun holiday.

I know it sounds bad. It doesn't sound bad, sounds nice. Yeah, well, I know. Two different people. Two different people. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Ha, ha, ha.

Come on, if you leave that goal open, I'm gonna tap it in. Sure. Fair enough. We were searching for somewhere to eat one day, and I think someone wanted ramen, and Ivan ramen came up on the, but we didn't go there for whatever reason.

It came up on our Google Maps looking for places. We didn't go there, and now I'm pretty gutted, because I remember the name, and now I'm quite disappointed that, because you always think, well, it doesn't matter. Yeah. Wherever we pick will be where we have food, and we won't even know how good the other places were,

but now you've mentioned a place that I remember considering going to, but not going to. But then you can save up to go back. That cauliflower was so good. We ordered three dishes of it. We kept ordering it, because we kept finishing going,

this is the best thing ever. Yeah, did you have a main? I had like the ramen as a main, but I wasn't as crazy about it. The cauliflower was the real star of the whole thing. And we just kept, you know, sometimes when a waiter, and you're like, this is so good.

And the waiter goes, yeah, like I'm waitress, and I wouldn't, I've never been cared, but like when you're the person consuming the food, you're like, do you know this is delicious? Do you know how good this is? Are you aware? Why won't you talk to me about this? Come on, sit down.

Let's have a full. Be my friend. I will make you icy water. Again, that's the thing about being a member of staff. I guess you do have to put up with constantly people, either telling you how good something is, or wanting to engage about the menu, and you're just like, okay.

Yeah. I'm happy that you're happy, but please just get out so we can get more people in. Oh, well, I used to work at a restaurant that was just a chain restaurant that you used to think was all like fun and homemade, but then everything just came in like a bag. So they would just put it in and boil it,

and then put it on the plate. But sometimes people would be like, this is lately a little bit too much. And just if it was seared a little bit, and you want to go, this came in a vacuum bag, chef does not care. They're all outside smoking. Someone just buzzed my door.

I'm sorry. Oh, no, it's not. Hang on, one moment. I'm sorry. Go for it. See you later. Such nice weather today. It's amazing, isn't it?

I went for a little walk before this, because I knew I probably wouldn't get a chance otherwise. A lady sort of recognized me. Oh, yeah. But got my name wrong. So I was walking along. Josh Whitakam? No, no, you'll love it.

I looked up, and she saw me across the road, and she went, James Pendergast! Yes? Hello? I went, what? She went, oh, nothing! I went away. James Pendergast.

James Pendergast! So I got locked out of my apartment. Just now? Yeah, that's what just happened. Also, I went downstairs, and I've only just gotten used to putting the latch on, but it turns out I'm not very good at it. And then the Addison Lehman courier,

he came back with the thing that I sent away, and then I came back upstairs, I was like, it's not. And then I couldn't shout in the door. To us. So I had to go into my neighbor's apartment, and she wasn't there, and I don't know where my key was, so I had to search around her apartment,

and find my key, and now I'm here, and that is the story of what happened to me for those five minutes, and I disappeared. Matt is all staying in, unfortunately. How did you get into her apartment? Well, she has a key, she has a cat. It's a whole... What?

Yeah, I don't know, it's her choice to... I don't know. What do you mean she has a key in the door because she has a cat? She's afraid about the cat. I can't remember what the story, but yeah, but she's a very lovely lady, but she would remember,

but yeah, I've lived here two years, I've never gotten locked out. Got locked out twice today. I've never done it before. It would be amazing if you just never came back to the recording, though, if you were locked out for hours. Well, I did think about that,

and my phone is here. It's been so funny. But I was like, what are they going to think? They're going to think I got murdered. They're going to think I went down to the Addison Lee man. He literally said, I couldn't find where to put this, so here it is back, a career to dress back, and he couldn't find us, he just said,

no, forgive, I give up, here it is again. I thought that's not helpful, and then I was locked out, it was very dramatic. Are you feeling stressed? Ah, no. Why would you bother? But I also have, it's funny, my sister and I had this happen to us years ago,

where we went for a walk in the prom and go out right by the beach, and then we came back to where we thought our car was, and we were like, the car got stolen. I was just like, okay, okay, we just have to deal with that. And then another car pulled away, and it was just behind the other car,

and we were like, but that was good, wasn't it? The way we just kind of dealt with it. Just went, well, the car's gone, the end. So it's good to know how you react in that situation. Yeah, but I just thought, can I sit in her house? She's got a big fright, she comes in on the couch at 8 p.m. And I was like, I locked out,

and I was doing a podcast, and I got locked out. James, how long do you reckon we would have sat here waiting for Nicola to come back? Quite a while, I think. Yeah, that's nice. I think after maybe 20 minutes, we would have phoned you, and then we would have seen your phone ringing over the Zoom, and gone, uh-oh, that's not good.

Yeah. And then I think we would have, well, we could have phoned your PR and said, look, something has happened, and Nicola's gone, and she's not here. It would have been interesting. We've never had someone go missing during the podcast before.

Yeah. Sort of a mystery element I thought I'd bring, you know? Suddenly become a true crime podcast out of nowhere. Yeah. That would be such a good start to a true crime podcast. Yeah, really would. We were asking her, bread or poppy-dums, and then she died.

You've been locked out twice today. We haven't heard the first story of when you first got locked out. Oh, I first got locked out, and a man came to do a COVID test for my work, and it's because someone was like, you don't know how to put the door on the latch, and I felt very embarrassed

or they didn't know how to do that. But it turned out, I think the door is a bit faulty, so it doesn't really latch very well, hence why I got locked out twice today. I was in a habit of taking my keys with me everywhere. I'd go going downstairs, even to get the delivery man's presents, which is how I like to think of them.

I think you should keep that habit up. It's going to come back. It's going to make a roaring come back as of right now. Before we do the main course, I don't think you picked the starter. I think we were well into you picking the starter between the two things, and then you ran away from the podcast.

I think I'm going to go with the garlic crab claws, just because they're so insanely good. I've never had bad ones. Yeah, they're just from a restaurant right by the sea, and they're so delicious. Did they shell them for you, or do you have to crack them out of the shells? No, no, no, they shell them for you,

and it's just like a load of them in the bowl, and then it's like a restaurant where loads of famous people have been, apparently Julie Roberts has been there. Oh, yeah? But then also there's frame pictures of all famous people that have been there. But then a lot of the people have then turned out

to have been criminals, because they were like, the director that you really loved from like the 70s, 80s, 90s, they've all done a horrible crime. Yeah. So it's like, oh, there's, oh, yeah, oh, yeah. Oh, dear, he's not best anymore.

My main course. Okay, so I used to live in Peckham, and there is this fried chicken place in Peckham that is God tier, insanely amazing. It's called Other Side Fried, and they do this. Again, I have to show you a picture, but people can look it up on the internet. They do this chicken burger with like a brioche bun.

It's like properly, so crunchy. It's got Parmesan shades on it. It's got, hang on, when I show you this. This is another picture. Great for podcasts, aren't they? Everyone, just take this time to Google it now. Other Side Fried. Other Side Fried.

Oh, wow. Yeah, that looks absolutely immense. It's absolute filth. Oh, man. So much Pocrumbli Parmesan. I think it's like a Caesar sauce on it. Garlic butter mayo on Parmesan, and pickles. I love pickles.

So this is your dream main course? Yeah, it's in Peckham Levels, and they do really good, dirty fries as well. They have a really limited menu, which I think, if you're a restaurant, that's kind of like an arrogant move in a good way. If you have a menu that's like, we do these seven things, you're like, well, they're all gonna be really good, right?

Yeah. Yeah, but they do really good fries there as well, but it is complete filth. But it's delicious. It would be amazing if there was a restaurant that had three things on their menu, and they were all shit. Which also I would kind of respect.

Yeah. It's okay. We've realized when we started putting together the menu, that we can't cook, so we stopped at three. What would you call it? Something like egg, eggy slap, or I don't know, like... Egg, eggy slap? Egggy slap.

Here at eggy slap, we do egg, eggin', egg cake, egg, egg balls, and egg dessert. And that's all you're getting from eggy slap. And we slap it down on the plate, it's an absolute mess. Yeah, it's disgusting. No condiments, season nothing here. So what's the menu at eggy slap? It's egg, egg balls, and egg dessert.

Yeah. And egg cake. Egg cake. And they're all horrible. Egg, egg balls, and egg cake. Yeah, egg cake. Yeah. And egg balls are just eggs, right?

Yeah, but they're not, no, it's like, you know, like a cake pop. Right. So like, you know, you like mash it up, and then you re-bowl them with egg balls, obviously. Egg balls. Clearly, yeah. What's the egg cake?

Egg cake is an old cake. It's an old, call him the caterpillar, with an old cold fried egg on it. What part of the caterpillar were you putting the fried egg on his face, though? Yeah, the face, only the face, and we throw the rest of the cake. Very bad for wasting the jewel,

it's like the opposite of good for the environment, is at eg slap. Yeah, egg slap. Eggy slap, sorry. Eggy slap, yep. Have you got like a logo, a mascot, anything like that? It's an egg, and then it's a sa, it's Fido Daito from Seven Up, in the 90s,

and he's beside the egg going, mm, big thumbs down. Fido Daito, doesn't like it. Fido Daito hates it. Everyone hates it. Yeah, everyone hates eggy slap, but it's an arrogant restaurant, so it doesn't care what you think.

Yeah, and it's doing well. So what's this chicken burger called? Let me look at it. Cause the thing is, I haven't lived near one for ages, so it's really sad. But also their Instagram, you just want to lick it. Yeah, it's a lot of good photos of burgers on there. Yeah.

Do you know what? I have a really bad pet peeve. When people post pictures of food in the internet, and they don't explain what the food is, who do you think you are? What is it, how would I know if I wanted to eat it? What if I wanted to make that, and I could never make it? Why are you being so rude to me?

I've never experienced that, but I can completely agree with you straight away. What's the point of going, here's a great picture of some food, but you know what you look at. So how are you going to get excited about it? But also, yeah, when you know when you look at something, you're going to go, oh, I can taste that.

Oh, I can't think, I know what that, but I'm like, I don't know what this is. Remember in the 90s, seeing Robbie Williams on a Take That VHS, he went stoke on train, and he was eating a thing that was in a wrap, and he was like, oh, this is a special thing, you're getting stoke on trains, and I've always wanted it, and I don't know what it is.

And it's annoyed me since the 90s. Okay, again, though, Nicola, we're not moving on from that. I'd like to know more about what you've just said. What was the Take That thing that you were watching? Okay, so my sister was a big fan of Take That, therefore I was a big fan of Take That. I was only about seven, and we watched the video of them

all going to where they were from, and he went to the local football stadium, and he was eating the thing that looked like a pancake or a wrap, and it was savory, and I was like, oh, that's delicious, but I mean, I'd have to go back and re-watch it to find out what it was, but at that age, I was like, I want to eat that.

So he just says, this is a special thing you can only get in stoke on train? Yeah, but I can't remember. He did definitely put a name in it. I imagine if it was just like a fajita and all these years, I've been like, what was the magical Robbie Williams food? The likelihood is that it was just a wrap.

Yeah, but we didn't have wraps in the early 90s, really. Yeah, that's true. It was more of a 2000s thing. How often would you say you think about the Robbie Williams wrap? And by the way, when I say the Robbie Williams wrap, I don't mean the one on Rude Box. I would say I think about it every three months.

Yeah, it's one of those things, but the problem is now I'm going to think about it every three months, and I didn't even see the video. I've Googled stoke on Trentwrap. This is places that sell wraps. Wizardswraps, Stokewrap, U5wraps, Spectrumsigns and Graphics, signmakers, I think they've...

Sorry, but by that point, I don't know, I think that's for all the wraps. No, weirdly, so it goes Spectrumsigns and Graphics, signmakers, Choicegraphics, stoke, and then it goes Pavilionfusion, Barita, and Wrapbars, and then we get back into wraps. So I don't know what those two were on there for. FDwraps, then there's some packaging supplies.

I'm going to have to go back and re-watch the Take That video. I'm going to get it out of my mum's garage and watch it on the VHS and I'll find out what Robbie Williams' wrap was. Or it was a weird tweet of, what was that thing you ate 22 years ago? I reckon he'd answer, don't you think? Oh, my God. Yeah, he'd answer.

Don't you think now, like, he's probably seen Bridgerton. Everyone's seen Bridgerton, right? So I think if you... I feel like that's a really weird... That's like, that's a weird question to ask him. It's a weird question to open with, I suppose. But I think about it all the time. Sometimes when people...

I can ask friends if they put a food on their Instagram and I haven't seen them and I want to go, what was that thing that you ate then? Because I can't not know. But I think when this podcast comes out, we're going to get a lot of heat around this question. And I think it's going to get to Robbie Williams. And I think Robbie seems like a sound guy.

He's up for a laugh. I reckon he's going to tell you exactly what that wrap was. What do you think is going to happen when you find out what the wrap is? Do you think you're going to suddenly have a really good night's sleep? And you're like, I've not been sleeping well all these years. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It will just solve all of the questions that I could...

Yeah. It'll just fall over me all this time. Oh, my God. I mean, I'm Googling everything here. I've Googled food, you can only get in stoke on Trent. There's nothing. I got... If I put in into YouTube,

Robbie, take that stoke on Trent. I don't think I've ever vocalised that I've thought about this before. But it has been a huge thing all of my life. I understand. I think about Matt Dawson fighting into the baked Alaska all the time. I've never had a baked Alaska.

That was in Annie. Well, was it there? Yeah. Matt Dawson was in Annie. No, not the Matt Dawson thing. He's the best part of it. The burger is garlic butter mayo. It's £7.45 worth every penny.

Fried chicken, parmesan, garlic butter mayo, pickles and lettuce. Now, here's the thing, though. Do you want that? Yeah. Or do you want the Robbie Williams wrap? Do you want to gamble and take the Robbie Williams wrap? Yeah. I don't know what to do with that.

Yeah, I do. I want the Robbie Williams wrap. I feel like it was Indian. I don't know what it was. I obviously don't know what it is. Oh, my God, that just made me feel magical things. I feel so excited. This is the first time in the history of the podcast

that someone has ordered something that they don't know what it is and neither do we. So we don't know how the genie's going to get it. He has to go back into the VHS and pluck it out of Robbie Williams' hands. Yeah, I've got to go in the VHS. Or I've got to read Robbie Williams' mind right now, go into his brain, find out what that wrap was,

go to the place he bought it from, get it. Maybe that specific point in time, even. You can have the exact one that he was going to eat, but I get there before he gets into the takeaway place. I get there. I get the one that was meant for him. You eat the exact one Robbie ate that day. I have a tear in my eye.

I can't actually see it. I can't even fathom how excited I am. But oh my God, wow, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Fried chicken schmicken, Robbie Williams' wrap. The problem with that fried chicken sandwich, though, is that you know what that is. That's boring. You know what it is.

I know, I've eaten it with my mouth. Yeah, you want a mystery wrap from a VHS in the 90s. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh my God, yeah. Great. So that's the main course, Stoke or Trent Mystery Wrap. Your side dish.

May I suggest the gray stuff from Beauty and the Beast? That's something that I think about a lot. Well, that's just made me think of, oh my God, do you remember in hook the food fight foods? Bang-a-rang. Yeah. Bang-a-rang. I was going to say truffle parmesan fries,

because I love it, but no, no, I won't. Now you have broadened my mind. Now I want the gloop from hook. That you throw it and it becomes real food. That movie's so good. I love it so much. I think we spoke about this scene on the podcast before. We spoke about our different relationships to this scene.

I saw it on a ferry hook when I was a little kid and also a friend of mine when he was little, him and his brother, when his parents went out, got loads and loads of ice cream out of the freezer, opened all of it, got two spoons, and then looked at each other and shouted bang-a-rang and then they ate it all until they were sick. So when you say a friend of yours, James, his friend,

do you mean you and your dad? Oh, I mean, me and my dad would do that now. When I was a kid, he probably wouldn't let me do it. But now, if I said to him, do you want to do a bang-a-rang? He's really like, yep. Let's do it. Come over. It's called doing a bang-a-rang.

Amazing. It's called doing a bang-a-rang. Let's do it. Come over. It's called doing a bang-a-rang. Amazing. Dad, do you want to do a bang-a-rang tonight? Yeah. Of course I do, James.

You're a poor mum. Just walking in to you guys halfway through a bang-a-rang. Food all over the walls. We've been having a food fight and eating it all. I once went to a real-life food fight restaurant. What? What? Yeah, I swear to God. I'm not making these things up.

I think I'm just weird. It was a food fight restaurant. So it was like German food. And you ate it all on the table, which is really disgusting. It was like a lot of roast ham and meats. And sauerkraut and pickles and stuff like that. And you put on these bibs. And then you're eating and eating.

And then at one point, this giant man comes out of the kitchen and hits a gong. And then you just start throwing the food at one another. But it's like tremendous. And you start whining each other's faces. And I remember it was just disgusting. And actually, maybe partly why I can't even look at pork anymore.

But my friend took a giant slab of ham and rubbed it in my face. Sorry, hang on. So does this only happen once a sitting? Or does it like every 50 minutes like the wave machine? No, it's once a sitting. So you book out the restaurant. It's like one long table, like very medieval.

And then you don't know when they're going to ring the gongs. You're eating your food with your hands and they ding. And then you just absolutely eat. Because you don't know when they're going to ring the food fight. That sounds awful. What a horrible experience. Yeah, it was cemented. You had six times of beer and stuff. And you're just disgusting after it.

You're just like your clothes are ruined. We were young. So is there a chance that they might just ring it like 10 minutes in? Yeah. Anarchy, they can do whatever they want. It's a mad place. If I worked there and it was my last day, I'd do it after 30 seconds. I'd literally serve everyone.

And then on my way back into the kitchen to smack the gong. There you go. I quit. Yeah, that would put me off pork if my friend had rubbed a big slice of ham in my face. Also that, and I saw a video of a tiny pig in a sink having a bath. And then I was like, well, that's over.

And I haven't eaten pork in like three years. The pig in the sink having a bath. It's a little baby pig in a sink. He was having a great time and I thought, I can nest on now. That's over. Let me throw this at you. I thought you meant the little pig in the restaurant. The little pig came in.

We used that in the food fight. I bought my own ammo with me. A live pig. No. What if you discovered that the Robbie Williams wrap has pork in it? I swear to God, I had that thought. That would really upset me.

Not just any pork. It easily could. Why could it not? It could have literally anything in it. Not just any pork. That exact baby pig that was in the sink. It's a specific dish. And it's sink pig lit wrap. No.

I'd have to like ask for the bowl back from my starter and drink the garlic butter out of it. Like a shot. And then just have no main. I couldn't eat. I couldn't do it. I couldn't eat this. I can't eat the sink pig. Even if it is in the magical Robbie Williams wrap. That's a sentence I never thought I'd hear.

I can't eat the sink pig even if it's in a magical Robbie Williams wrap. How do we get to this? I don't know. I imagine that's another Irish thing we don't know about that saying. The legend of the sink pig. Oh my God.

So your side dish isn't truffle fries, it's bangerang. It's bangerang. What do you think the goo tastes like, the colourful goo in hook? In my head right now I'm like Kato, but then the thing is it's your imagination. So it can taste like anything that you like.

So do you want it to be the goo, it's bangerang. Yeah. So I just had to mind me eating it just to check because I thought that would clarify with it. I love truffle. I always want to buy a truffle.

I haven't done it yet in my life, but I will one day. You want to buy a truffle? Yeah, but buy a truffle, but I like high and low food, so imagine if you've got a craft box, mac and cheese, rubbish, with truffle on it. I like a bit of truffle on something.

And I'm like, oh, so delicious. Sometimes I don't think it's delicious. Really? Yeah, I just don't get the flavour that you're supposed to. Sometimes I like that proper nuclear fake truffle oil taste. That's what I'm into. Oh, there's nothing wrong with that.

I had it in my house. That's not real, that's chemical. It's delicious. I love chemicals. I love chemicals. There's a film apparently called Truffle Hunters about a man and his truffle hunting dog.

We've not seen it, but a friend of ours went to see it. Yeah, he did. When they're miming eating the food before you can see it, is that more delicious than when they actually are doing the food? When they're miming eating it, those kids are so good at miming eating that food.

And they're like scooping their hand in the bowl, they're licking their fingers, they're holding something that's like a corn on the cob, they're like showing their teeth, they're eating along the side of it. That's like whatever they're eating, and Robin Williams feels really hungry just watching the meat.

In that scene, they're sort of playing the opposite of famineships. It's true, American kids, yeah, got to play bangerang and we Irish kids got only famineships. Could have done a version of hook where he's like hanging out with you and your friends. And we're like, there's no food.

See, it would have saved a lot of time at the top of the record if when James said what's famineships, you'd said it's the Irish bangerang. It's the Irish bangerang. What's your drink? I feel like this started off like actual adult food and now it's just

dented into loads of weird stuff. I feel like I need to pick something weird. Have you ever had a basil margarita? No. Do you like margaritas? Yes, I love margaritas. I like basil as well. Okay, so it's literally you just smush loads and loads of basil and then you make the margaritas normal,

but it comes out like this amazing green, which I feel like would be a delicious compliment to bangerang. And then like the salty and like on ice and delicious. It sounds like it was invented when someone got mixed up between margarita pizza and margarita the drink and they ordered a margarita

thinking they were asking for a pizza and said can I have some basil on it as well and the barman ran with it. Do you know what? I think it's fine. I don't think there's any way that's wrong. I think if anyone says it's wrong they should go to jail and never come out of the jail. Good rule. Yeah, I don't basil marg marg

but I always forget because I normally when I'm out I will drink prosecco but then I forget how much stronger spirits are and then I'm like, why is my brain drunk? I'm like, oh yeah, that's why. So I don't really drink them when I'm out. But you drink them when you're in? Yeah. Constantly, never stop.

I mean, I think we can literally see a basil plant in the background there. Is that a basil plant? It's not. I don't actually know when my friend bought it for me. I don't know what it is but it's alive. Yeah, that's the most you can hope for with plants. Do you want to see my tequila? Yes. Yeah, yeah, sure. It's really cool. Hang on. In a second.

There we go. Nicholas is going to get locked out in the house again. He's just getting something from the shelf behind her. That is really cool. How good is that? Really good. So for the listener, that is a skull bottle. A white skull with black kind of like facial detail drawn in it. It's like a day of the dead sugar skull, right? Is that what it's like? Yeah.

Yeah, it's like car tequila. But it has been imported from Mexico and it's really hard to pour. It's really not good ergonomically. Is that correct? Ed will love that. Ed's got skulls all over him. I love skulls. Ed's covered in skulls. I've got skulls on my body. Go on skull boy.

And the main one right here. A real one. Yeah, got a real one. So scary to think so. Do you ever get scared imagining that you've got a skull? Yeah, awful. The worst is when you're a baby and you're born with all your teeth. Have you ever seen a baby skull? Not good. Teeth all up here, baby teeth,

disgusting. I don't even know what we're talking about now. Skull baby skulls. Baby skulls James. Baby skulls. And also children have more bones than adults. Do you remember that from the milk ad? No, this is another Irish thing, isn't it? Oh, maybe. It was like them bones, them bones need calcium

and they were like, an adult has 200 bones and a child has many more. So your bones fuse into each other as you grow. So you're actually born with more bones than you have with an adult. How many bones do the children have then? Loads. Children have more bones than adults. That's what...

Yeah. I'm going to Google that. Benito's done it for us. A baby's body has 300 bones at birth. These eventually fuse, grow together to form the 206 bones that adults have. That's crazy. They've got 94 more bones, babies. Yeah, I know. Scary. Really scary. Yeah, Google baby skull if you really want a bad phrase.

I think. Our search history is going to look very weird. It's just like stoke on trend cuisine baby skull. Yeah. One after the other. It's like Google's going to think that you were trying to narrow it down and that's what you think they might eat in stoke on trend. Yeah. Maybe that's what Robbie was eating.

Was it a baby skull? Maybe. Yeah. Sink piglet and baby skull. So you're going with the basil margarita for your drink? Yeah. Because it's just like when it's made well and when it's properly green and everybody goes ooh, what did you get? Because you want to have that effect on a table.

You don't want to be like, I got a peanut grease. Oh, boring. You want to be like, what's the green thing? Like, what? Let me tell you. It's basil and a margarita, not the pizza, a drink. Oh, so you want to get people's attention with your drink? Yeah. You want to be like the center of attention drink wise? My Bangorang hasn't done it already.

The basil margarita will really throw them over the edge. I have a thing, like this always happens to me whenever like if there's a big cocktail list, everyone orders a cocktail and I pick the one that sounds the nicest for me and it always turns out it's always the most boring looking one. It's like in a little glass and it's all brown

and stuff and then someone else will arrive and it's got like a parrot in it or something. Yeah. I don't get pouring star martinis. Why do I want a tiny thimble of prosecco? What's that about? Yeah. A lot of cocktails are bad. Yeah, they are. I just said it. I don't care. Come at me. I've got a question about the Bangorang again.

Sorry. Okay. Because you said about people being impressed by it at the table. Yeah. But is it invisible to them and you're imagining it and then to you it's real? Or can they see it like in the film? At first it comes and they're like, actually you didn't order a main and I'm like,

and then I start like lifting up. I'll do the corn and she's good and they're going like, she's lost it. She's finally lost it. We all knew it was going to happen, but now's the time. And then I'll bang around one of them in the face. And they're like, what have you done? You crazy girl. And then they'll be like,

it's Bangorang. And then I'll share the Bangorang around. And then like, you give me a bit of your tips and I'll give you some Bangorang. It's amazing how quickly your friends are on board there from thinking you've lost your mind to then getting hit in the face and then immediately they're like, it's Bangorang. Of course that's what it is. Yeah, well once you understand

it's Bangorang, what are you going to do? And then you want a drink that makes people go, what have you got? You like it when people go, what have you got? I clearly like attention. Look at my, but it's like, you know when someone orders fajitas and it comes out all sizzling and everyone's

like, you want to have that sizzling effect. Maybe I could have it and it comes on a plate with loads of dry ice just for like an event. It would be the same drink, just presented for real. Definitely. One of the very early things I tried to do in stand-up that didn't work that now I think I might give

another go is I tried to do I think a lot of stand-ups do this when they start out. They try and do deliberately bad impressions of really obscure things because like there's been a lot of comics have done like, I'm going to do some impressions for you and then they do it and one of mine was a

shy waiter who has to bring out the fajitas. It's really good. Maybe I should try it again. I really like that a lot. I think the way I introduced it was funny of the natural impression that I did at the time. My whole microphone fell off the table. Did you hear that?

What is going on? And now we arrive at the greatest course of all time. The headliner. The dessert. Yum yum yum. That sounded like I wasn't excited. I'm excited. I'm excited. I think I just burnt out on buying a ring.

I got too excited and now I'm like, oh dessert. But no, I'm excited. What I would like for dessert. I would like an apple tart with ice cream made by an old Irish woman with her by her hands. Like a proper granny. Just lovely chocker's pastry

and ice cream or even like I prefer cold with the hot. English people really love custard. I do like custard. Don't get me wrong. The cold and the hot mix is so sassy in your mouth, isn't it? It's just like delicious. I agree. It's all about

the ice cream on like a hot apple pie or a hot apple crumble or something like that. It's just starting to melt but then you've got to eat it quickly to make sure it doesn't melt too much. Or cold custard. I like cold custard on an apple pie on a hot apple pie.

I could see that working. Sometimes my mum used to put cloves on an apple tart. But you take them out. You don't eat a full clove. But that's always the danger, isn't it? It's dangerous then because you're like the clove might sneak up on me at any point

and might crunch down on it. For a woman who you claim doesn't enjoy danger or things lurking around corners, I can't believe your mum's packing a clove in an apple pie. Maybe it's because her revenge for my trying to choke her with some spring onion. For the long spring onion instead. She's like I'll get her with the clove.

I know that about chicken as well. She still thinks I am 12. It's a recurring theme in my life. But cutting across the grain is a good tip, though, isn't it? It is. It is. But this New York Times menu, it was just like because they do trendy stuff on there. They're like why do you just put loads of shallots in a pan?

You're like okay. Sounds crazy but I'll do. I'll try it. But she's like a traditional and she doesn't want the long spring onion. She wants it chopped in little bits. When you say this is made by an old Irish lady, or just any old Irish lady. And it's like an old lady with a cardigan.

And her kitchen really smells nice and really bakery-ish. And then she'll come out and she will bring it out. And she'll be like how are you love? Here you are, aren't you great? And then she'll give it to you. And she'll be like would you like that now?

And would you like anything more? And then it would just be the whole experience of her being there. She's an amalgamation of many wonderful things. She looks like maybe like Brenda Fricker or something. I don't know. She'll just be very comforting and nice

and have a lovely apple tart. This is our first shout-out for Brenda Frick, is it? Brenda Fricker. Oscar winner. Oscar winner and of course the pigeon lady from Home Alone 2. Yes.

I was going to say, is that the pigeon lady from Home Alone 2? Do you want her to be dressed as the pigeon lady when she brings her your apple tart? Why not? For a bit of the experience? Why not? I'll tell you why not. She's coming in shit. For a kick-off.

Yeah. That's why I choose not the pigeon lady. Yeah. Maybe the pigeon lady post-shower with apple tart. That would work for me. She never gets the shower, does she, poor lady?

Yeah, and they've got that massive room. She should be up there having a shower at the end when they're all there. She should pop out the shower all clean and nice. Thanks, Kevin. Instead, he just goes down to say goodbye to her again and while he's saying goodbye, his dad shouts so loud from within the hotel

that they hear it in the park of him going, Kevin, you spent this much on room service! And he's just looking at her and she's probably like, you had a hotel this whole time, where have you been staying? Oh, the fanciest one. Oh, I gave you a turtle dub, for fuck's sake. Do you know what I had when I was a kid?

A talk girl, which is like the girl version of a talk boy that recorded. Oh, great. And you could record your voice slow on it. But then I used to think I was going to be like a master's teacher. I was like, I'll record this and be like, hello, this is the resident. I'm going to go with a gun.

It's too scary to do that, but I did have a talk girl though. It's mad that in the 90s, they were so obsessed with gendering stuff that they even extended it to voice recorders. So stupid. We'd better call it a talk girl, otherwise girls aren't going to want to use it. Was it pink?

It was pink with a purple microphone. It's actually the same product. This is a talk girl. It's probably way more expensive as well, inevitably. Finally, something for us. Hello, this is the president. I have a girl.

You can record yourself backwards as well. You can try and figure out how to say things backwards and say your name backwards. My name backwards is Alokin, but it never sounded right when you reversed it. Alokin, I was a lonely child obsessed with orphans.

Yeah, because I'm alive right up your street. He's temporarily an orphan, right? He gets to live the orphan life for a little bit. Oh, yeah, definitely. I don't think he's living the orphan life. I'm sorry to butt in here. I don't think that's what I took from the film,

but it's kind of his. A bit, a bit. I don't think orphans get the house and have to protect it. I don't think that's part of your parents' dying, is it? Your parents aren't there anymore. Yeah, you've just got to pen for yourself. Unfortunately, your parents have died, but don't worry, we're sending you to New York

for a spending spree. Yeah, just do what you like. But it's like, I used to have a running joke in my 20s that I thought was really good, and I don't know if anyone else enjoyed it. We were like, we're going on a ride, and I don't know. But I don't know if anyone really got into it.

But I still, like, yeah, I still pull it out of the bag sometimes when it feels appropriate. Kevin! Thanks. Here's the thing, here's the question. You want this pie baked by an old Irish lady.

Any old Irish lady, because I guess it's just old Irish ladies' duty to make apple pies for anyone who wants them. What are you going to do to become an old Irish lady? Dress like Brenda Fricker as the pigeon lady. OK. And make pies for young children,

but people. And adopt orphans, probably. And give them my pies. Do you make a pie now? Have you started, like, training up to be an old Irish lady, or is there just something about being an old Irish lady as soon as you hit a certain age, you're going to be like,

I know, I've got to make a pie and I know exactly how. Well, I think what's going to happen to me is I'm not going to be an old Irish lady, but I think I look like a child until I'm 70, and then I'll look like an old woman. I'll never look like an adult. It's never going to happen. I'll just be real, all of a sudden.

But I do like baking, but then, you know, I've done Bake Off, which is very stressful, which I thought would be really fun, and it's incredibly stressful, isn't it? Yeah, horrible. But you did quite well on it, didn't you? And obviously, you can do James A. Caster.

I didn't really do it. Well, I started off because I got really arrogant on it, and then I made this sponge. It came out of the oven looking like a perfect sponge for my museum of, like, this is what a sponge should look like. And then I forgot it was meant to be a Swiss roll, so I didn't roll it. And then I was like, oh, my God.

And then if you ever tried to roll a cool sponge, it just breaks into loads of bits, and it looks really sad. And then those cameraman, they're trained for when you're going to screw up, and they just turn to you, and then you're like, but no, no. Is that a thing? Like, when you see all the cameraman turn in your peripheral vision,

that's how you know you fucked up. Yeah, completely. Or like, they're trying to shoot in the oven, and they're like, can you move for a second? And they're shooting your cake that's slowly sinking, and you're like, this is so shameful. Yeah, the whole experience was very stressful. I made a Liza Minnelli tribute cake, and then they cut out my best joke.

I was really sad about it, where they were like, my technical didn't go great, and I was like, but you know, for the last one, maybe this time I'll be lucky, and I'm going to turn it into a song from Calgary starring Liza Minnelli, which is what the cake was about, and they all went, and then didn't include it in the final episode.

I was like, wow, Liza's not going to be happy about that. And Paul Honeywood said it tasted musty, and I was really offended. And then people say it to me all the time about my musty cake, and I'm like, that's pretty rude. Does it follow you around, does it? You're a parent of some bakeoff? Sorry to hear that.

I can't wait to do bakeoff and win it, and rub it in James's stupid face. Well, the thing is, do you know the thing about bakeoff that people don't really talk about, is they make you wear the same clothes for two days? So everyone stinky stinks on the second day. James does that anyway. I stinky stank on the first day as well,

so I was fine. Didn't matter. He absolutely fricked it on the first day. Yeah, I turned up full fricker. Walked in the tent and everyone was like, right, stay away from him. Oh, no. I stinky stank on the first day.

Did? Absolutely stinky stank. Since we're showing photos in this episode, I'm going to show a photo now, and no one can Google this either, because it's not on the internet. When I was going into my hotel on the night after the first day of bakeoff,

I was on my way up to my room, I was really knackered, and this drunk man was standing in the corridor, and he was looking at a painting, and I was like, yeah, and then I just took a photo of him on my phone and walked away, and he was so drunk

that he didn't even realise what had happened. He was really proud of it. Oh, my God. There he is, just the man. Of course, he's in full dicky bow. He's so happy. Yeah, he's got his jacket in his hand. He's pissed.

Absolutely hammered. I just stood next to that. Oh, I love it. Oh, it's the beautiful moment. It was my phone background for quite a long time after that. Didn't mind it. Right, I'm going to read your menu back to you now. Yes, thank you.

See how you feel about it. It's a pretty strong menu. I know that you're excited about it. I don't think we've ever had anyone who could be as excited, because some of the stuff has been in your mind your whole life. Still water to start with. Pop it on with some bread,

some balsamic vinegar, starter, garlic crab claws in butter from Moran's. Moran's, oyster cottage, Galway, main course, the Robbie Williams Stoke-on-Trent Mystery Rep. Side dish, bangeran, drink,

basil margarita, dessert, hot apple tart with ice cream made by an old Irish woman. Yes, amazing. I would be so happy about that. I mean, I would say it's an amazing menu. The main course and the side, I don't really know what they are or what they taste like.

They're insane. I lasted there. I did get locked out and lost my mind slightly, so that could have had an effect on the sort of middle ones, and then I kind of got back into it, so that could have a lot to do with it. But look, what are we going to do? Our main thing from this episode is we need to find out

from Robbie Williams what was in the wrap they hate in Stoke-on-Trent in the 90s VHS. Take that. Because there's going to be quite a lot of editing in this episode, I think. I just want the listener to know this has been a technical disaster from beginning to end. We had a gap of about 20 minutes

where we had to sort Nicola's connection out again because she somehow pulled her microphone computer and headphones off the table and everything ran out of battery at exactly the same time. She locked herself out of flat. Let's not forget that moment. There was such a big delay on Nicola's connection at one point that James made a joke and she laughed at it

10 minutes later. But we very much enjoyed having you in the Dream Restaurant, Nicola. And it's good that you've actually used the Dream Restaurant for what it's for. You've asked to pull something from history, basically, that you couldn't get anywhere else. Yeah, I mean, look, we started doing redemption dinner parties. Undoubtedly, you're going to be inviting

on one of them because you've been an absolute disaster. So, um... Thanks, Nicola. Thank you so much. MUSIC Well, there we have it. A wonderful episode with Nicola Cochlan. We've started a mystery there as well, James, with the magical rap.

Yeah, a mystery that we know that our dedicated listeners will be able to go out and find. They'll be able to solve that mystery. And we really appreciate it. Thanks in advance. Thank you in advance to Beesdale and the gang. Yeah. Thanks to John's garlic sauce. Thank God.

She's had a lot of weird stuff, but she didn't say Papa John's garlic sauce. If you said Papa John's garlic sauce, we'd send Ribbon and Beesdale around to, I mean, chuck them out the restaurant, I guess. Yeah, a couple of street tuffs. They're the bouncers now. Yeah, I don't know if anyone knows this.

They've always been the bouncers. Every time, like Jade Adams, we had to kick her out the restaurant. It was Ribbon and Beesdale who had to do it. Ribbon and Beesdale came in, grabbed her by the scruff of the neck, chucked her out. Nicola's in loads of stuff. Go and watch Dairy Girls. Go and watch Bridgerton. She did the Taskmaster New Year's

Treat episode as well. One-off episode of Taskmaster, which is very, very good. She was great on that. You can go and check that out. Yeah, and she was a guest on your podcast, the Taskmaster podcast. If anyone wants to listen to that. Yes, if you're a fan of Taskmaster and you want to hear it deconstructed to the point, it's probably not fun anymore,

then check out the Taskmaster podcast. We did all of series 10 and we've gone back to the beginning. We're doing all the old episodes. Or you haven't done the best series yet. Not done 9 yet, no. But we'll get to that. First series, series 9. Full of dum-dums.

Series 7 is the best. No, it's full of absolute dum-dums. Thickles, wall-to-wall thickos. That's how that series is known. You can't fully deny that, actually. They're all great. That's what's good about the show, is it's all good stuff. So, go and listen to that. Keep listening to this.

Check out our social media at Off Menu Official on Instagram and Twitter and offmenupodcast.co.uk on the internet. Yes. Oh, and my other podcast, Perfect Sounds about the music of 2016. We talk about it so much, it becomes interested.

Ah! You reconstruct it. Yes, the opposite of the Taskmaster podcast. I've been on that, haven't I, James? You have. You're on the bonus episode where we talk about Jeff Rosenstock's worry album. We're trying to get Ed on for another special

bonus episode as well. Fingers crossed. He's a tough guy to book. Yeah, I'm pretty busy at the moment. What with this? Exactly. Thank you very much for listening to the Off Menu podcast. We will see you again soon in the Dream Restaurant. Don't be a stranger. If you enjoyed this podcast,

can I interest you in a totally different podcast that's not about food and doesn't have James A. Caster or Ed Gamble, but I would say is quite fun. No, thank you. Oh, okay. Not to worry. If you change your mind at a later date,

it's called Nobody Panic. Right. It's called The Outstanding The Outstanding The Outstanding The Outstanding It's called Nobody Panic. Right. It's hosted by me, Tessa Coates, and my friend, Stevie Martin. Which is weirdly me.

And we tackle all kinds of how-tos from big things to small things. How to stop saying sorry, how to poo, how to break up with someone, how to quit your job, how to relax, how to have a conversation, how to deal with unrequited love. A smorgasbord of thing. Absolutely.

We have a nice time. People seem to like it. If you like, you can come and see what this is about. All that fos. What's it called? Nobody Panic. You can find it on all of the podcast apps that you would imagine it would be on. Please have a listen. Hello, it's me, Amy Gledhill. 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 into your podcast experience to tell you about a new podcast that we're doing. It's called Northern News. It's about all the news 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 news 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 Gledhill'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.