The Unmade Podcast - Special: A Tommyball Cookbook

Episode Date: July 17, 2025

Tommyball legend Tim Hein is back with a cookbook called “Gourmet Greatness: From my Tongue to your Plate”. Today he prepares a classic dish from the book, Hein Cleopatra.Highly recommend watching the YouTube version of this episode for related video and photos - https://youtu.be/H3hsuZBDJ1YAlso, a new marble run video for patrons - https://www.patreon.com/posts/134284758Support us on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/unmadeFMJoin the discussion of this episode on our subreddit - https://www.reddit.com/r/Unmade_Podcast/Catch the podcast on YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@unmadepodcastUSEFUL LINKSCatch previous Tommyball episodes here - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLY2OYgTm-83N5RqQzbvMib0ddnmERh2My

Hey, it's a special episode today. Tommy Ball Tim is back. Now, if you want to see some pictures and video as he talks us through today's episode, and I think you might, you can go and watch this episode on YouTube and there'll be pictures accompanying the audio, but you don't have to. The audio should work too. And as a special bonus to unmade podcasts, patrons, there is also a marble run bonus video this week as well. I will upload that to Patreon. Go and check it out patreon.com slash unmade FM and find out

whether or not you've won some prizes and go and find out who else has. But anyway enough of that let's get on with it. Welcome back to Tommy Ball Central, everyone. We are joined by one of our favorite guests here. It is none other than the disgraced Tommy Ball legend, Tim Hine. Tim, thanks for having us. We're actually here in your city centre home, which is really something quite special. Well welcome. Welcome to my bordeaux.

Well, thank you for having us. This is one of the world's famed bachelor pads, if your books are to be believed. Oh yes, yes. Ground Zero right here. Just, Oh, well, I could tell some stories. In fact, okay. Yeah. No, fair enough. No, no, we're on. All right. So the reason we're here is to promote your new cookbook, your, your, your

third cookbook, what's this one called? Well, it's so exciting. I mean, third time, lucky really, but I'm really so pleased to be announcing the Tommy Ball Tim cookbook. It's called Gourmet Greatness from My Tongue to Your Plate. And what I really hope is that people are able to have a whole new world of cooking unlocked, which really is an away into my world. Really to see what my taste buds have been enjoying all this time. What my tongues wrapped itself around can now be on your plate.

Do you consider yourself something of a cook and throughout your glory days, your playing days, were you cooking your own meals before games? Well, mum did it for quite a while, but I was able to watch her. And so after she kicked me out, I really took it up myself. And I like to think that I've become quite handy. I've got my own style. And as you'll see, I've got my own recipes and some fantastic meals. But a lot of the time, yes, I insisted on really taking care of business because when you're an athlete like I am you you're a machine and you have to make sure the machine works properly you have to put you know garbage in garbage out and so I wanted to be in charge of that garbage I wanted to put in the best possible garbage. Brilliant so and I understand

you're going to be cooking something for us today, a recipe from the book. What is the recipe you've chosen? Well, today you're going to be exposed to, I mean, this is really one of the most fantastic dishes that that that features in the cookbook. Today we've got Hein Cleopatra. Hein Cleopatra. I'm Cleopatra. Yes, indeed. Yes. This is something of a signature dish.

Uh, I, I, I eat this all the time. I've always eaten it and, and, and all the Tommy ball, Tim fans out there will, uh, may even have heard of it, but I'm going to make it for you today. And I'm going to explain it in a way that you can make it at home. Like I said, it's from my tongue to your plate. I see we've got some ingredients here out on the bench. Can you just quickly run us through what some of these key ingredients are? Uh, we have some, um, some sausages.

We have some garlic, uh, some eggs and, uh, and an, and an aubergine. Oh, right. And aubergine that's an unusual ingredient. Oh, I put an aubergine in most of my dishes from breakfast till dinner. I mean, aubergines go with everything. It's really fantastic. It's a food close to your heart, is it? Oh, it's become a bit of a signature ingredient really.

In fact, often I'll sign off a text message to different people with an aubergine because they know that I'm handy in the kitchen and it's become something of a signature ingredient for not just my dishes but my whole life. How do people react when you sign off these messages with aubergines? For some reason they seem quite shocked. I mean I've been doing it quite a bit. Sometimes I'll put several of them but no, they, yeah, sometimes those, those yeah something strange happens with those accounts some of them get blocked anyway yeah I think this we've also got Parmesan cheese here and we're gonna be scraping a bit of Parmesan cheese on top of everything else this Heinclay a Patrick this does stuff for you and I I would have this certainly on game day and several other times during the week I know we seem to have a couple of other tinned products here as well

yes yes no all vital ingredients and so forth this is a really healthy and and several other times during the week. I know we seem to have a couple of other tinned products here as well. Yes, yes, no, all vital ingredients and so forth. This is a really healthy and beautiful meal. What have we got here? Spam. Right. Always your best friend in the kitchen, Spam. I like to keep it close at hand.

I mean, meat in a can, what could be better than that? So handy. Yes, and baked beans. And I see these are a brand. I see these are Heinz baked beans, but no relation. I'm sure well, I mean it's it's one of those things where they came up with it and And I sort of got in contact or my lawyers did and said well, you know, there's there's clearly a connection here Maybe there could be some kind of relationship and well formally they denied any connection and any financial compensation unofficially i think we have an understanding the understanding is that they produce the product and i purchase it and use it at home. Oh no that's a very cozy agreement so and we're here in your kitchen this is this is where you do most of your cooking here or. So, and we're here in your kitchen. This is, this is where you do most of your cooking here or?

Oh yes. This is where this is really something like an art studio really, where I'm able to work over on this bench over here is where I make toast. Um, yes. Over here, the sink, this is where I get a glass of water. The dishwasher there is where the dishes are washed. Nice. Um, as you can see, some things are drying there on the rack.

Hmm. A few knives over here too. Yes. Not against the magnet thing on the wall. Nice, nice. Yeah. So you've got some spoons, some soap there for hand washing. Oh, yes.

Yes. Uh, we've got the coffee machine over here. Yeah. It's pretty big. I know. It's, it's massive. Oh, well, really quite close. My hat. I have, I have quite a few coffees during the day.

Right. Magnificent machine. Fridge, stove, all the, all the essentials. Yeah. Okay. All right. Well, where are we? Should we start?

Should we start get things under underway? What, where does the, how do we start making the Hein Cleopatra? Oh, well, well, the first thing you've got to do is is get yourself a frying pan. Let's get over now that's this in the dishwasher because I used it this morning it hasn't been washed yet but it'll be fine. Take it out again. A lot of grease and oil already on it. What's all part of the high and Cleopatra see the Cleopatra's got some surprise. Tastes in it and whatever I've had for breakfast is generally...

Oh it doesn't seem to be working. I don't know what's happened with the gas. Oh thank goodness. All right. I thought I paid it. Now we'll get some... Get a knife. Come over here with a knife and I will. We've got some butter there. Generous. How much butter would you describe that as?

Is that like a tablespoon or is there a name for that quantity? Well, I've just sort of picked it off with a knife. It's generally as much as you can fit on a knife. Like an eyeball. Yes. The size of an eyeball. That's right. Butter is melting in the frying pan adding to the already copious amount of fat and butter from this morning's breakfast presumably. Well you can't make clear Patrick quickly. Right. Yeah. All right now I'm coming over here to get a chopping board.

Nice wooden chopping board. Nice wooden chopping board. It's a lumber there. Whittle that down from one tree. Do you like, do you have a preference for using like natural products like wood versus plastics and things like that? I don't like natural products. No, no. Um, that's not actually real wood. Okay, good.

No, it's wood. It's a laminate. I could get it. What's your, why don't you like natural products? No, no, that's not actually real wood. Okay, good. No, it's wood. It's a laminate. I could get it. What's your, why don't you like natural products? Oh, look, I think we look at what happens in nature. It's, it can get out of control. Suspicious. Suspicious. Insects, bugs, animals. You don't know who's been on it. I prefer things that, that are made of plastic, manufactured. Fantastic. Of course, anyone who's read my lives will be very familiar with your, uh, how you feel about insects. Yes. Well that, uh, yes.

I mean, that's still quite itchy, but it's, uh, the butter they're bubbling away. Yeah. Oh, fantastic. Now, what are we going to put in that? Ah well you don't know. I do know, I do know, I do know. First thing you want to put in that is um some uh span. Span. All right let's open up. This can be done in several ways as long as it's done properly. This can be done in several ways as long as it's done properly. That is a big hunk of processed ham. Oh it's fantastic.

It's great. I mean look at that, the same shape as the can. Just as nature intended. And now what do we do with the uh, with the spam? We cut it up. Yeah. It's always tempting to steal off a little bit yourself but you make it into a nice clean thin slices. Not too thin. How would you describe that thickness? What's your recommendation? You know the cardboard that IKEA products come in. Yeah. Yeah, about that. Okay. I'm gonna do two of these. Okay. Two slices. You stab that with...

Okay, that was a... We've got two. So you put two bits of ham in with the butter. Yep. Just let that sit. Okay. That does a lot of work on its own. So forth. Second thing is we get a couple of sausages. Right. I'm cutting up a couple of sausages. I'm going to use three sausages. So what you need is you need one more sausage than there are pieces of spam. Right. Yeah. Okay. Vital important. You'll find out why later on. hear that crackling that's a goodness yeah all that goes into the Cleopatra I have to ask why is it called Cleopatra well do you know who Cleopatra is what yes of course oh not everyone I mean I just found out reason I. Cleopatra was an incredible English princess. And she was one of the most incredible of all time. An amazing queen. And so it's

named in her honor. Apparently she loves spam. Really? She was quite the spam. And that's where it comes from. Okay. So there we go. Okay. Makes sense. Cooking away there in the pan.

Do you need to turn them over at any point or do you just leave them one side cooking or? No, you just cook one side. Right. All right. Now we turn to, oh no, we've got to put some garlic in. Yep. Right.

So you've got the clove there. Got a clove of garlic there, which is I'm going to sort of rip the extra stuff off. See that shell stuff on the outside? Don't throw that away. No, no, we use that later on as decoration. Like sort of the skin. I like to think that a bit like playing Tommy Ball, there are the skills of the game and the craft, but it's not unimportant how good you look so visual representation in cooking is very very important so I always leave these little garlic bits they look very pretty later

on. What's your attitude to doing this cooking you you famously during your playing days made a lot of comments about feeling that men shouldn't be in the kitchen it wasn't really their role in society how you cop made a lot of comments about feeling that men shouldn't be in the kitchen. It wasn't really their role in society. You copped a lot of criticism for that over the years and here you are now with your third cookbook. Well not cleaning up, I mean surely. I mean I'm making a mess. That's the men's prerogative. Making a mess. Oh look what's that? I'm not sure what this is called but you put garlic in it and you press it. Oh, and so you're sort of pressing the garlic. Yeah.

Onto the spam. Onto the spam in the pan. Yeah. Yeah. It's sort of now falling out onto the sort of the it's oozing out of the presser into the pan and cooking away. What you don't want it to do is let it touch the sausages. Must not touch the sausages. That's okay.

Yeah. What you don't want it to do is let it touch the sausages. Must not touch the sausages. Okay, right. Yeah, very dangerous. Alright, now we turn now to my good friend, the aubergine. Signature food. This is an eggplant for some people. Do you call it an aubergine or an eggplant? I call it an aubergine, yep. As Cleopatra herself would have.

Apparently. I have absolutely no idea what this is going to look like inside. I don't even know. I didn't know that's what it was going to look like. It's very avocado-esque. Are you sure this is an aubergine? I don't know. And so what are you doing now? You've cut it sort of once lengthways and now what do you do with the inside there?

Ah, um, it's quite evolved. You slice along like that. In a, it's a bit like, a bit like a, a Tommy ball. Sort of, you seem to be cutting into sort of a long thin pieces, not quite ribbons, but. Mmm. Almost like if it was watermelon. It's always hard when you're working with aubergine not to be eating it as you go isn't it? Are you tempted? I'm uh I'm managing to resist so far. Oh stronger man than I. A number of these long pieces now going into the frying pan. Oh those sausages are well done. Yes though, what you want done, you want them a bit, you want them very well done. Have you got the exhaust fan on there? No I thought that might

ruin the recording but I'm happy to. I don't want to set off any fire alarms. Now that spam, that spam needs to be turned over. Look at that. That is well done. Look at that. Thank you, thank you, thank you very much. Not exactly what I meant, but all right. I am taking some pictures and I'll post these pictures onto our website if you want to have a look at this process to see just how black that meat is becoming. Right. What next? This is where the parmesan goes on. Right. I know. Earlier than I would have thought. A lot of people think the parmesan first later on, but I just think, no, you've got to get it in there early. Like the garlic, you wouldn't put garlic on at the end. You put the garlic on early because you want it to seep into the meat. Same with the parmesan.

Okay. So Tim's now grabbing a grater. I have to say you've got a pretty well equipped kitchen. Thank you. And he's grating the parmesan directly into the pan onto the eggplant. Yep onto the... Again you don't want it to touch the sausages. The aubergine. Oh yeah. Same thing. So it's all frying up there in the pan now. Alright now's about the time you sort of put the toast in okay

You can do it Ren ever some people do a bit later in I'll give you that option How do you like your toast done? Oh like a toast? Number three dark what number do you go for on the dial number three three? Oh, yeah Okay, toast is toasting for three. Pan is frying. Look at the colours. Look at the colours there. You've got brown and green.

Hmm. I remember a lot of black as well, I think. Oh yeah, yeah, no, a little bit of black. Yep. That's all part of it. What else we got here? The eggs and the beans. Yep.

Some people like it. Look, what I like to do in the cookbook is I explained how you can bring your own personality in, so where there's an option to do something different, you may want to experiment and do it yourself. Um, for instance, eggs cooked, not cooked, entirely up to you. Bring your own personality. All right. And what personality are you bringing? How to you bring your own personality All right, and what personality are you bringing? How do you do your eggs? Oh, I cook them. They're disgusting if it's You're gonna put them in the same pan

No, well, we'll do these in a different pan in a moment because there's a little not quite enough room there But in the meantime, we're gonna get the behinds beans baked beans and we're going to get the Heinz beans, baked beans, and we're going to cook them. Okay. I imagine there's a real sort of skill and art to cooking these baked beans. Oh, there is.

This is quite a complicated microwave. And yeah, the lids quite complicated too. Yeah, if you... The lid's quite complicated too. Oop, there's the toast. The beans have gone into a plastic Tupperware container. Yep. Alright, your beloved plastic. Yeah, this is the design of these Tupperwares.

It's something Jamie Olliver and I came up with. We were chatting one night, comparing recipes and so forth and he was asking me and I gave him a few little insights on Tupperware. I'm selling it now actually in houses. Incredible, incredible selling Tupperware. What you mean like you've got your own label or brand? No, no, no, no, I'm selling other Tupperware. What Tupperware parties? Well, it's not so much that I'm running them, it's more that I get two other people and they run them and then they get two people and run them and they run.

And we're all sort of in this sort of triangle selling kind of... Triangular selling, right? Yeah, Yeah. How's that working out for you? Well, it's not bad. I'm nearly at diamond. Oh, that's quite quite wide that toast. Thank you.

This is toast. I'm just coming over the microwave. Now, this is really this, this is the difficult bit. People think a lot of the difficult stuff is on the, on the stove. But when it comes to the microwave, you think, oh, well you just put it in, press the button, but it's not that easy. Sometimes you have to press go and all that afterwards. So the timer, see the clock's wrong.

Daylight saving. Now we give that 30 minutes. 30 minutes in the microwave? So the your your frying pan is looking very dark. Thank you. Yes, no it's a... I think it's... we're getting towards... Oh no, that's lovely. You see, you want that... you want that... that aubergine to go totally black. Right. Well, you've done that, alright. Thank you.

Yeah, no, it's all... it's all part of it. Fantastic. But I reckon now that spam is cooked. Okay. In fact, I think it was cooked when it came out of the can. Just quietly. I've heard it said that cooking has long been part of your seduction process. Well, yes, that's right.

I mean, I could tell you some stories. In fact, it was this one time, right? You can't do that. What? Oh yeah, no, sorry. Okay. All right. All right. I'll stick to the food.

I'll stick to the food. Yeah. There we go. So what's that black stuff left in the pan? That's the Cleopatra. So that's the, that's, that's, well, what we're going to do is we're going to add that on later. That kind of chard remains gets sprinkled on as some kind of garnish. Oh yes yes yes no it's a very very uh very good. Now we've got an egg.

All right now again you don't want to throw that shell away because that's all part of the presentation right or part of the presentation or one of the options. We're opting for fried eggs here are we? Yeah they'll fry away there, in amongst the Cleopatra. Oh look it's coming together, this is really quite incredible. How important is presentation to you in this night with the food? Well I'm a good looking guy so I like good looking food.

Yeah and I mean you know it's important it's all it's all part of it people say if you close your eyes or once you chew it, it all becomes the same thing. But that, you know, I tried that and no one bought that cookbook. This one is, is where we're, you know, taking photos. All right. I feel like we're getting close to the end here. Oh yes. Certainly we're moving.

Moving closer to you can see some of the presentations starting to come together. Now this is one of the surprise ingredient that not a lot of people will be expecting. The toast, I know it's harder to get in other parts of the world, Vegemite. Vegemite on the toast? Oh yeah. Alright. Okay. Now, there's a lot of debate in some parts of England I know about whether the Vegemite goes on first and then the butter, or the butter and then Vegemite.

Depending if you're from Cornwall or Devon or one of those sort of places. I'm a traditionalist so the Vegemite goes on first. Vegemite goes on first. Vegemite first, then the butter, right. That is a generous helping of Vegemite. Thank you. I'm very generous. Now we come back to the butter and you add that on afterwards.

So it's just a thin layer of butter over the top of the Vegemite. There we go. Okay. Cut that there. Is it sort of cut into two triangular pieces I noticed? Oh yeah. No, that's how mum did it. How are those eggs going?

They seem to be emanating a good amount of smoke. Oh yeah. No, don't touch them. They're not quite ready. Now we've got here the beans. Oh, they look hot. That's quite singed my hand to be honest. Oh gosh. Careful. Now the important thing with the baked beans, right, is you want to choose the best nine. Nine beans. Nine beans. Yep. Yeah. And, uh, that's, that's actually, I mean, that's one of those things where I give some guidance in the book, but it can't really be taught.

You've just got to pick the best nine beans and put them on the plate. Okay. Is it by sight or touch or, uh, Oh, it's a feel thing. I feel, yeah, I think it's instinct. It's a bit like choosing A feel. Yeah. I think it's instinct. It's a bit like choosing players for a team. Yeah.

Tommy Ball, you sort of want to go with those who you just feel. So you look at this one here. Oh yeah. It's a lovely bean. Oh yeah. That one goes in. Number one. This one here.

It's number two. This one here, we've got number three. Number four. Number five. Number six, number seven, right? Number nine. There we go. You've placed them in kind of a crescent formation around the third of the plate. I notice. No, no, it's in a curve curve. Right. Okay. I see. All right. How those eggs looking now we've done two eggs here. Right, okay. Let's see, alright, how are those eggs looking? Now we've done two eggs here, however I always do two to pick the best one.

We only need one egg. Okay. Yeah. But I always make a spare just to be sure. Two eggs are better than one, I've heard them say. Oh well. Now what you don't want to do is miss that charcoal because that stuff is fantastic. All right, got the egg flip there.

Which one do you, now this is a bit of a test for you. Which one do you think is the superior egg? Well, I think that egg closer to the wall is superior. It's prettier, it's got a nicer yolk. It's more presentable. Well done. Thank you. You chose wisely. Nice.

Alright. Now Tim's transferring the egg onto the plate, putting it atop the sausages. Yeah, it sits on top of the sausages. That's why you didn't want the parmesan on top of the sausages before, because you don't want to mix the parmesan with the egg. Of course, yeah. Kind of psychopath you think would do that. Alright. Now we've get these charcoal remains. The little bits of the Cleopatra. The Cleopatra.

Yeah they go. I mean they are it's just hard usually there's kids around give me the Cleopatra give me I want the Cleopatra you know give me the and the... and I was like, no, no, you've got to wait. It's like... So the Cleopatra is those basically burnt bits of parmesan and other detritus that have been in the frying pan too long. That's right. Plus the remit from breakfast this morning. That's why you want to let it sit for a while in the dishwasher. Look at that. That's quite the...

Let me just point out the Cleopatra. Okay, there it is. It was in the photos there so people can see the Cleopatra as if they could miss it. All right, there we go. Now that is pretty much, I mean that's one version but that is a classic, that is a classic Heine Cleopatra. You've seen it made right in front of you. A lot of people think you order them in but no, look, now you too can make them. You said that we had to keep the skin of the garlic and the eggshells. Oh yeah, no, that's right.

Actually, that's right. Yeah, no, you, you do. We'll choose which is a nice one. Piece of a, a piece of garlic skin here being used as garnish. I say it's just, it's, it's not, I mean, sometimes it's been used. That's where you'll sit the Cleopatra. So I've just put it on the plate there, but you can see you actually, if you put the clear patra inside the garlic shell, it's just, it's just a bit, it's one of those, you know, if you've got a lady coming around, just want to class it up a little bit.

It's just one of those optional extras you can, you can do. It's just, I mean, you know, it's not all presentation. If it was all cooking was all presentation, you'd be starving, you'd be hungry. But however, just adding that little bit of one percenters, that's all. Let me take some lovely pictures and are other recipes in the book like this or is this typical of what people can expect to find in the book? There are variations on this, yes. I mean this one you've got Thank you for having us for people. What's the name of that book again? Gourmet Greatness from my tongue to your plate.

Well, thank you for having us here at your home, in your kitchen, showing us your cooking skills. People can check out the book. It's available at a limited number of bookstores. We'll put some links below if we can find someone who's selling it, but it promises to be quite the read. The Tommy Ball League and its authorised representatives neither endorse nor recommend any of the colouring methods, uh, quite the read.