Off Menu with Ed Gamble and James Acaster - Ep 246: Karan Gokani
Episode Date: May 1, 2024Co-founder of Hoppers restaurants Karan Gokani has a table booked this week, and he’s bringing along Edward Stephenson Jamison Gamble as his dining companion.‘Hoppers: The Cookbook’ is... out now, published by Quadrille Publishing. Buy it here. Go to Hoppers restaurants in London. Visit hopperslondon.com to book a table. Follow Hoppers on Instagram and TikTok @hopperslondon Follow Karan on Instagram @karancooks Recorded and edited by Ben Williams for Plosive.Artwork by Paul Gilbey (photography and design).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.
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Hello, it's Ed Gamble here from the Off Menu podcast that you're currently listening to.
I am on tour now. The show is called Hot Diggity Dog. Make sure you go and get yourself a ticket.
I'm probably coming to a town near you if you live in the UK and Ireland and Ireland, Dublin and Belfast.
Do go to EdGamble.co.uk, buy yourself a ticket and I'll see you for an evening of Hot Diggity Dog.
Hot Diggity Dog!
Thank you, James.
Welcome to the Off Menu Podcast, taking the hopper of conversation cracking in the egg of humor and you got yourself a hopper with an egg podcast. That is Ed Gamble. My name is James A. Kester. Together we own a
dream restaurant and every week we invite in a guest we ask them their favorite ever start a main
course dessert side dish and drink not in that order and this week our guest is Karen Gokhani.
our guest is Karen Gokhani. Chef, owner of Hoppers. Entrepreneur. Hoppers is a fantastic mini chain, what do you call it? A mini chain. There's three restaurants in London. Yes. They are fantastic
restaurants that we are huge fans of cooking Sri Lankan cuisine. I think it was you recommended
it to me for the first time as it is with anywhere that I eat. Ed recommended it to me. But then you, it normally happens that I've been somewhere once, I recommend it to
you. And then within a two month period, you go there more times than I've ever been there.
Yeah, definitely. Because you'll go with your girlfriend, you'll go with some friends, your
parents are in town, you take them there. Some other family are in town, you take them
there. And then you're like, Ed, if you had this on the menu, I've not been there for three
months. Maybe.
Cause you've been trying other restaurants. I've recommended them to you,
but I don't listen for that three month period. I've got my new favourite place.
They know my name now.
Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Lost count.
The amount of times I've been to Harper's, many a special meal,
very excited to talk to Cohen about, I mean,
I'll try and get him talking about some of my favorite dishes. That's my plan going into this.
That's your plan, going in. I mean, I don't think you're going to have to trick him into
that. I'm going to trick him. It is his restaurant. He's going to get tricked. He will think it's
his idea. Yes. Right. We'll see. I mean, it was his idea. The restaurant was his idea.
He'll think it's his idea to talk about the dishes. Right. Okay. Yeah. I'm excited to
talk to him. There's also a Hoppers cookbook out now, James. Yeah. I mean,
obviously any, any aspiring chefs, anyone who just wants to make some more interesting,
vary up their menu at home. Any current chefs. Yeah. Any current chefs, actually. Yes. Any
retired chefs who want to get back in the game? Yeah. You can all
get the Hoppers cookbook, the Covens written. It looks beautiful as well. Recipes, memories
and inspiration from Sri Lankan homes, streets and beyond. Lovely. I've got a copy at home
actually. I've been flicking through it. It looks fantastic. Don't really have any time
to cook any of it, but you know what? I'm reading it. You know what else people should
read? They should read Ed Gamble, Glutton, the multicore
life of a very greedy boy.
Thank you so much, James. Yes, that's my book.
Out now.
That is out now.
Now we love Cullen Gokhani.
We do.
But if he says the secret ingredient, an ingredient which we deem to be unacceptable, we will
be forced to kick him out of the dream restaurant, which is a shame.
Yes.
Because he has a restaurant and he could get us back.
Yeah. He could kick us out of our dream restaurant, which is a shame. Yes. Cause he has a restaurant and he could get us back. Yeah. He could kick us out of our dream restaurant,
which is Hoppers.
Yeah. So let's hope we don't have to do this.
But this week, the secret ingredient is
Bovril. Bovril.
I mean, it doesn't, it doesn't feel like he's gonna pick it.
I swear to God we've already had it,
but we did a live show recently and someone shouted out
Bovril and then it turned out we'd never had it.
And we thought that's too good.
We have to have it on a proper studio episode. I don't like it man Bovril. No. It's what's it
playing at? Yeah well it just reminds me. It's trying to be like Marmite? Yeah it's like liquid
Marmite drink, hot drink. Oh, ugh. And some stinky old man will drink it at a football game. Yes.
That's my only memory of it. Stinky old footy fans. Yeah. They sit there drinking
it and you're like, what a Saturday. Yeah. You know, have a tea or coffee. Have a tea
or coffee mate. Don't drink that bottle around other people in a crowded stand. You're trying
to watch the footy. Yeah. We always think that when we go to the footy, don't we? Yeah.
When me, you go to the footy and we just want to watch the football. We want to watch them
kick the old footy about. And then we just next to some stinky bottle drink. Yeah disgusting disgusting
So if current picks that he's obviously out on his ear out of the podcast out of the dream restaurant out of the footy stand
This is the off-menu menu interesting. You're doing that or not anymore. Can you interrupt me? This isbranded menu of Curran Go Karni.
Welcome, Curran, to the Dream Restaurant. Absolutely. I've been waiting to come and dine here.
Welcome, Curran Go Karni, to the Dream Restaurant.
We've been expecting you for some time.
Thank you.
It's odd a restaurant to get two welcomes immediately.
Yeah, yeah.
It's good hospitality.
We need some of that right now.
Yeah.
We keep saying the welcome is the most important thing.
The farewell is equally important.
You often don't get those.
Yeah, that's true.
That's true, actually.
Normally, they're, you know, five minutes.
I don't think badly of it, but if you're in a restaurant and, you know,
you finish the transaction if you're in a restaurant and you know, you finished
the transaction and you're leaving.
And sometimes I might see like the server who I was dealing with talking to another
table and then I feel oddly jealous.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That is true.
Yeah.
And for that reason, I say there's no harm stopping to talk to that table, look up for
a second, say goodbye, because now you've done two good things.
You've stopped you from being jealous. But the guys he's talking to know that he'll do the same for them, hopefully.
Yeah.
So you kind of want to parties with one gesture.
What's the best farewell you've had at a restaurant?
It's probably one I gave to someone.
I've run down the street, like just thanking someone who was a complete arse.
Yeah.
I've run down, so they said, you know, they were difficult on the table years ago. And I said, this is my culture, it's not theirs. And eventually, you know, I think the observer who was pissed off at them sort of did say bye to them.
They just walked past and then I chased them down the street. I was like, listen, I just wanted to say a big thank you for coming in. Hope to see you again.
And they're just shocked. Yeah. And I think it's a nice one to turn the other cheek.
Maybe that should change their minds in future. Cause they probably walked out of there going like, Oh, I've been rude again.
I've been rude again. I probably, I can't go back to that restaurant.
I burnt my bridges again. And then you, you chase them down the street.
I'd imagine when they first see you chasing them down the street, you think,
he's coming to tell me off it.
down the street, you think, oh no, he's coming to tell me off here. Yeah.
Yeah.
I'm going to get beaten up again by another restaurant.
Payment didn't go through yet again.
Yeah.
No, I think that's what hospitality is about.
Because you know, you catch people on the wrong day sometimes.
Sure.
And you've got to give them the benefit of doubt.
You know, there's this whole thing about the guest is always right in hospitality.
People go a bit crazy about that.
I said, look, give them the benefit of the doubt.
Listen to them before you make a judgment and allow them that little bit of grace because they could be having a bad day and that's
why they've probably stepped in.
Yeah.
It could be one person who's booked a table, the other person's not really keen on eating
and if we could convert both, we've done something really nice.
Otherwise, it just gets boring bussing tables.
Yeah.
And also you've probably, you know, if you confront someone like that, it's probably
not going to go very well. But if you chase them down the street and say, Hey, just wanted
to say thank you for coming. Hope we see you again. If they think that was odd. Yeah. And
then they're like, why do we think it's odd? Oh, cause we didn't deserve it. Yeah. Then
they might, that might make them reflect a bit more, rather than just going like, you
guys are a bunch of dickheads.
It's a much better way to make your point, I think.
That's good. We've never talked about the farewell before.
Yeah, I never go back in the lamp at the end of the episode.
You've really got to nail the end of this episode, James.
I should go back in the lamp. Yeah, we've really got to do that. I actually don't know
your history of where you started out, like what your got to do that. I actually don't know your history of where
you started out, like what your first restaurant was that you worked at.
Do you want to give it a wild shot? You want to just guess?
Where you learned these things and got the farewell, I mean, McDonald's?
Actually, I'm a huge fan of what they do. Yeah.
I'm not going to lie and say no, there are lots of restauranteurs or chefs who will come
in and be like, oh, I don't need to McD's, but I love it. I do eat it once
in a while. There's a reason you go to McDonald's. The Filet-O-Fish burger change is very minutely
across the globe. And I think that's an amazing feat to have created a product that that's
consistent. And this is another sort of way going into all hospitality podcasts. So farewell
was one. The other thing is consistency. Sometimes
it's not about the food. It's not about the services, about the consistency you get from
that experience. And I think we all go to McDonald's or we go to fast food restaurants for that,
the same colors, you know what it's going to feel like, you know what it's going to smell like.
And there was a book by the founder of McDonald's called grinding it out. And it was fantastic.
They made it into a movie as well. I love that book. And I read that when I was a lawyer and you know, it really inspired me not to do McDonald's, maybe one
day a fast food chain, but you know, Hoppers is very different. Another great inspiration was Danny
Meyer. And I think I've learned a lot of this from him. It's probably one of the greatest. Have you
guys heard of him? No. Probably one of the greatest restauranteurs across the pond. Yeah. New York.
He has a restaurant called Union Square Cafe.
He's got Gramercy Tavern.
He's got the whole load of great hospitality.
I have been to both of those restaurants.
Across New York, but he's also got Shake Shack.
Oh wow.
Yeah.
And one of the highlights of my career has been doing burgers with Shake Shack.
So we've done a Hoppers burger with Shake Shack in New York.
Oh my God.
I never wanted to eat something immediately so much.
It was a really good burger.
I'd love a Hoppers burger from Shake Shack.
Can you shimmy?
Hopefully this brings it back.
I've been trying every angle, but this podcast is going to...
What was it?
We basically, every time I do a collab, the idea should really be,
it's not me stepping into your kitchen on your tours,
but it's how is there this meeting of mind, meeting of food?
And it was the same with Shake Shack.
Mark Rosati, who is the culinary director of Shake Shack,
the entire team, we're all really good friends
and we've gone back a long time.
And when it came to finally doing this burger,
we said, look, I'll use your burger.
You've put all this effort into creating,
I'm not gonna do a new patty.
So we used their bread, lovely rolls, loved their bread,
their patty, their cheese,
but then we added layers onto that.
So we did this lovely sort of slow cooked beef in, I'm sure you've tried our bone marrow curry at
Hopkins. Yes, absolutely. So that was an inspiration. So we got all the bone marrow into the curry,
folded it through, cooked, slow cooked it, added some meat to it, pulled that meat and we had that
sloppy meat on top. A bit like a sloppy Joe on top of their burger. We then had pickled red onions for color, as well as that, you know, to cut the fat.
A green coriander mayo.
So it's a really visually beautiful burger.
You can check it out on Instagram.
We've got like a really nice build of it.
And then finally a green chili.
So half a green chili.
And then anyone we didn't like,
we just put a whole green chili.
We went as much.
It was really fun because it fit into it.
Yeah, just wanted to say, thank you very much for coming.
Enjoy your afternoon.
That sounds so delicious.
So yeah, so Danny's who I've learnt, he's got a book called Setting the Table,
which has been a Bible.
I read it every year.
They get the team to read it.
He's got videos on YouTube.
The man is a genius.
And the way he sort of explains concepts,
there's a more recent book by Will Cudera,
EMP called Unreasonable Hospitality, which is great.
It's kind of extension because Will worked with Danny
for a long time.
So those are great books to read
and understand these concepts.
And I think they're natural.
You've either got hospitality within you or you don't.
And I think maybe I had that.
I used to be a lawyer.
And then I jumped ship, moved back to India for a year,
dabbled a little bit there, came back.
My wife and her brothers had set up a great group
of restaurants by then, smaller group then, much bigger now.
Joined them, came up with this idea of Hopper's
tiny little 40 seat restaurant in Soho.
And there were queues around the block.
It was just really fun.
I still love Soho.
I still say it's our flagship restaurant,
although our most recent King's Cross, our third site is about four times the size of Soho. I still say it's a flagship restaurant, although our most recent King's Cross, our third site, is about four times the size of Soho.
Yeah, yeah. I felt very lucky. The first time I went to Hoppers, I just got there. So I was there before it opened that day.
Hoppers Soho?
I've done that before.
In Soho, yeah, yeah.
I was probably on the door.
Really?
I swear to you, I was there on the door for the first two and a half years.
Oh, somebody did chase me down the street.
Made most of my friends there.
But yeah, I felt very lucky to get a table there and it was so good. We should talk about the book because there's a Hopper's cookbook, which is out now, which
is incredible.
It's the debut cookbook.
It's the debut cookbook.
My debut cookbook, Hopper's debut cookbook.
It was, you know, a year in the making.
And in many ways it's like, you know, I treated it like our fourth restaurant,
but at an international scale.
So Hoppers Soho was first, Hoppers Marliborne,
which is in the corner of James and Whitmore,
just beyond Selfridges.
That was number two in 2017 and then King's Cross was 20.
And then everyone knows what happened
for the best part of a year and a half.
I'd ride from about 10 to three o'clock
for about six months.
It was good. there was no distractions,
nowhere to go out and eat.
No restaurant to run then, I mean, off and on.
And it was an amazing project,
but I think design wasn't a very, very important part of it
because again, what I'm doing here is not,
I'm not just looking back and trying to write a book
for fans of Hoppers or people who've been to Hoppers
and wanna cook the dishes at home,
because that's a given, they will come and buy the book. I want to write the book for people who've
never heard of hoppers. How do we create that little sense of hoppers in their homes, wherever
in the world they are? You know, there's a little ribbon, which is the border of the floor tile
that kind of borders you in Soho. And it was the first, one of the first elements we chose
when my brother-in-law and I were in Sri Lanka,
we were researching the restaurant and the design.
We saw a lovely floor in someone's home,
took a picture, sent it to our designer here.
She then sent it to Italy to copy.
And we had these beautiful floor tiles,
probably spent more on those tiles
than anything else in that restaurant.
And this border borders that tiny little,
you know, whatever, 500, 600 square foot room.
And I just wanted that same border
to follow you through the book.
So it's on the cover, it's on the back page
and it's on this ribbon.
I had to fight with the, it wasn't a very hard fight.
They were going to quadrille my publisher
and you know, they allowed me to do it.
So those little touches, I feel kind of,
if you've read the book and you've never been to Hoppers
and then that entices you to come in,
when you walk in, you're like, oh my God, this is like the book in 3, 4, 5D.
I think it's so important with cookbooks especially to get the aesthetic right and make them look beautiful in the formatting and all of that sort of stuff because I mean I can only speak for myself.
I'm not doing every recipe in a cookbook. I'm not cooking cover to cover.
Yeah.
But I like to read them like novels.
Yeah.
So I will sit there and enjoy them
and go through them. So it's so important that it looks lovely on a shelf even. So yeah, it looks
absolutely amazing. They're the nicest books that I own. How they look in cookbooks. They look much
nicer than anything else. Apart from Ed's book. The magical life of a very greedy boy. Thank you James.
Apart from Ed's book. The magical life of a very greedy boy.
Thank you James.
Let's start your dream menu then.
We always start with still or sparkling water.
Still to hydrate, sparkling to celebrate.
But I'll tell you why, because sparkling water just makes me want to pee.
It's a long meeting.
If it's an interview, I'm not going to drink sparkling water.
Or if it's a podcast.
More than still water.
Sparkling water makes you want to pee.
There's just something in it. I don't know why. I do love it.
And you know, I've recently stopped drinking, which will probably answer the second question.
But that's even more reason to sort of, you know, when you want to,
when someone's having a drink on the table and you kind of miss it once in a while.
Yeah. But sparkling water.
But then you have to immediately go to the toilet.
Not immediately. Oh, hang on.
Or after a bottle or two. Sorry, I spiked because I wanted to
talk more about the pee, but then I missed the bitters. Yeah, that's why. A little bit
of a good wedge of citrus, get a little bit of bitters in there and it's a bit of a drink.
And you know, you're not having them. It's not a sweet drink. It's not pop. It's just
nice fizz on your terms. Yeah. Fizz on your terms. Yeah. Good drink, right? Yeah. Start
bottling. Yeah. Fizz on your terms. So you wouldn. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
So you wouldn't have that for your dream meal or you would now that you know, the secrets
out and you don't mind me getting up and going off to the Lou. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Because that sounds great. The bitters. Yeah. Yeah. I think. Yeah. Definitely. And also
it's your dream. It's your dream meal. So you can get up and go to the Lou as much as
you like. Yeah. Yeah. Or can the genie remove? I can remove the urge to pee. Okay. If you like, my genie powers. Okay.
Unless you like going to the toilet in a restaurant, in which case you can carry on. You always
check the toilet in a restaurant. It says a lot about the restaurant. Yeah. I think
so. Good point. Actually. Yeah. It's nice to see the, if they ran out of budget, they're
actually cleaning the part, cleaning the toilets. Yeah. Well, when you're like, you know, designing a new restaurant and you're, it comes to the
toilets, what things are very important to you for the toilet?
The most important thing, music.
And I've screwed up a few times.
Yeah.
Having music in the toilets.
Yeah.
And especially if you're going unisex, which is also something we've done.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
You've got to have a, what's the best toilet music?
Good question.
I don't know.
I'm trying to figure it out. Just anything loud.
Yeah.
Anything with a lot of beats dropping.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of songs that have got plops in them.
Yeah, exactly. I was going to say that.
Yeah.
POP LOPS OR BED! POP LOPS OR BED!
Good thing is I've heard this podcast enough to know that that's not a, you know, that's
not directed to me because of the colour of my skin.
POP LOPS OR BED! Karen Kukali! POP LOPS OR BED! to know that that's not a you know that's not directed to me because of the colour of my skin.
I'll tell you what, obviously it depends on what I'm going to be eating later but this is the dream meal. You know my palate will be completely cleansed. I do love Papadums. Yeah. But I call
them Puppets. Yeah. That's what the name is. And I also like them roasted. I only like one particular kind.
Yes. It's the one made with the black lentils, the urad dal with black pepper.
And you roast that, which gives it a completely different flavor from frying it.
It's got a lot more depth. It's got that spice. And then with that, the best thing you can ever do
is if you ever get these from a restaurant, and even if you get the fried stuff, the coriander
chutney they normally send, ask for some yogurt, mix it through.
And you've got this lovely yoghurt-y coriander chutney
to dip into.
But then bread any day as well.
I'm a lawyer, I'm gonna caveat everything.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And that's good.
You can argue both sides.
That's good, a hack.
Bungy butter, good sourdough bread.
You know bungy butter?
No.
Fen Farms.
Oh, so good.
What's it called?
Bungy butter. Bungy butter. No. Fen Farms. Oh, so good. What's it called? Bungie Butter. Yeah. They
call Fen Farms out in Sussex. You get it at good sort of good good cheese shops. Yeah. Comes in a
little it's almost like a like a brie one of those wooden boxes. That's sort of the little wooden
boxes I'm guessing. And it's incredible butter. Really, really good. Oh, no. You've got. You've got to try it. But then, but that's if you were having bread, I'm having
poppadoms with a chutney yogurt. The chutney yogurt is such a good hack.
I'm going to do that next time. I'm having a car. Yeah. And you know what?
It's quite forgiving because sometimes you've got a chutney that might be too acidic or
sometimes it's a bit salty or it's just not got the flavor. The yogurt, really good Greek yogurt
just blends it nicely together.
And gives you this, you know, and then you can add a little bit of sugar or salt.
You've made me want you to have both.
That's exactly what I was going for.
He's got you.
So because also I just want to order Bungie butter because it's fun to say.
We go for a walk after this.
We're not recording anymore.
We're going to pick someone.
Yeah. I got some Bungie butter on the way to the airport, then fly to Sri Lanka.
Yeah. And then we've got all of our dreams.
Let's start your menu proper, your dream starter.
So a trick I always have at restaurants, again, you can see I've thought this through.
Yeah. I like the whole Bungie Butter and Pop It vibe.
This is great. I go with someone I like and I have a good rapport with and I make sure I order their
meal as well so I get to taste both.
I'm going to do the same thing here.
Lovely.
So two starters.
This is so funny that we've established that you used to be a lawyer and now you're a restaurateur
and you're absolutely attacking this in the way a lawyer would.
Oh, if I was ever like, I mean, there's no life in which I'm a lawyer, but if I was and I was against you
in court, you would make mince meat out of me.
You would absolutely destroy me.
There is a world where I was a lawyer, but a very bad one.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I'd be like Uncle Jack in Always Sunny.
That's as good a lawyer as I would be.
I'd be Lionel Hutz.
Yes. And Kevin would destroy both of us.
Who's the other friend? Who's the friend you're bringing with you?
Yes. I thought it's Ed.
Yeah. By the way, you're the genie. Yeah.
Yeah. Oh, great.
We've hung out in a festival.
We've eaten together.
We hung out at a pub in the park.
Yeah. Ed, you're eating a pizza.
I'm eating a pizza.
We can eat a mini pizza because it's a starter.
No, we don't need to have a mini pizza.
Yeah. Okay.
I'm at the meal. Come on. That's pie. I'm at the meal now. Fine. Co it's a starter. We don't need a mini pizza. Okay.
Come on, that's pie.
I'm at the meal now.
Cohen's ordering for you.
Yeah, yeah.
So don't make me keep your opinions to yourself.
That's not my starter on the edge.
Yeah.
What's my pizza?
What's my pizza?
I think just simple margarita.
Good chilies on the side, dried chilies on the side, chili oil on the side.
And you just dip in.
You don't even sprinkle it over. It's just simple. I love that.
Yeah. There's so much.
It's like good bread.
There's just few ingredients and there's so much effort.
And this is the chef, or the cooking me talking.
Yeah. And I'm obsessed with pizza.
If you follow my Instagram account, there's Indian, Indian, Indian,
Sri Lankan, Sri Lankan, Hoppers and then pizza.
Everyone's like, what the hell? There's no connection.
If you rate the account, I said, this is just me.
This is what I do.
And hopefully I'll get some pizza lovers.
I'll get some Sri Lankan lovers and that's it.
Whereabouts is your favorite pizza?
I mean, in the world or in London?
I cook a lot of it at home.
In London, my go-to place is Modza.
Have you been?
No.
It's Nancy Silverton's restaurant.
So she's from LA.
Great, very well-renowned, sort of legendary pizza chef.
She's got a restaurant called Modza, M-O-double-Z-eddy at the tree house hotel, it's sort of right next to the BBC studios.
Oh nice, yeah.
Can I talk about that?
So off sort of Regent Street, I love it.
Someone was telling me about that, actually.
That is like so renowned in LA, like it's like the place to go to, but it doesn't seem to have
had that in London.
No, I think they've had a construction site in front of their building for a long time. Right. Okay. And look, it's different people have
different sort of preferences. I think hers is a very LA style pizza. It's a really cool crust.
The crust is quite sort of, she's got semolina on it and almost overdone to an extent. But I love
it. It's just really, and again, a simple pizza there is great on the counter watching the guys
make it in front of you. But then equally there's, I want to try this crisp pizza I haven't been to it yet
sort of East London I think. Crisp pizza? Crisp pizza I see it all over Instagram.
Hear people talking about it. Now this might be a silly question. Yeah it's going to be.
What's my real start? Are the crisps on top of the pizza or is the base made of crisps?
Now crisp doesn't necessarily just relate to potato crisps.
Could be a good one though.
Yeah, you know, crisp is also just the general word
for a texture.
Well, why is it on Instagram?
If it doesn't sound very exciting.
Well, everything's on Instagram, isn't it?
So it's just crisp, it's just crispy.
Crispy pizza, I think they missed the why.
But yeah, I mean, there's great pizza.
Even Pilgrims does a good pizza. You know, I like the story of the guys that, you know,
I was following them ever since I was a lawyer. They've done so well. It's still a relevant brand.
It's amazing. Amazing what they've done. So I'm having, I've got a pizza. I've nicked a slicer too.
Yes. But my start, if it's a mini pizza, if it's a mini pizza, if it's a mini pizza. That's what's happening. If it's a mini pizza, how are you nicking a slice or two?
There's not very much left for me. I'm glad you chose the big one. Yeah.
Thank you. Full main size pizza sliced up. Yeah. Sliced up. See, I don't get why people
don't slice pizzas sometimes. Sometimes they arrive. Sometimes they arrive.
I order them sometimes and they arrive and they've not been sliced.
I get so annoyed. Yeah. Luckily I've got one of those big curved blades to do that.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I don't carry it with me, but I've got one at home.
It's difficult to carry with me.
It's a sailor song when you're kissing up.
That's a good...
The only thing more annoying than that is when it's sliced, but it's not really sliced.
Yeah.
They've kind of gone through the top and you think it's sliced and you've got to pull it
and all the cheese just comes off and won't slice it.
Yeah, yeah.
What's that about?
Yeah, I don't know what they're thinking.
No.
Yeah. I know that during COVID or, I don't know what they're thinking. No.
Yeah.
I know that during COVID or during the lockdowns, they were like, we can't be slicing up their
pizza.
We got to be careful here.
So I was like, okay, fair enough.
But now they've continued it.
Yeah.
I'm like, guys, you know, yeah, I'm going to want to slice this up.
And now I've got to do it myself.
Yeah.
Like, that's a sad day.
And you just reminded me of a global pandemic. I'm sorry.
So what's your starter?
Duck pancakes. I love them. It's one of those you can never get enough.
It's like this dish we ate growing up called Pani Puri.
This is not my third starter. I mean, it could be, but you have these little crisps.
Have you tried it?
Yes.
In Indian restaurants, you get these little crisps and then you fill them in with some potato,
spiced potato and chickpeas and stuff. And then you get these little crisps and then you fill them in with some potato,
spice potato and chickpeas and stuff. And then you get this green minty water. It's delicious.
Like with tamarind and stuff. And you pour that in. The point is when you finish the crisps,
you have the other two left. So you ask for more crisps, the little crispy balloons.
Then you finish the water and you ask for more and you can never stop. It's this sort of constantly
sort of this vicious circle. And I find it's the same with duck pancakes until the duck is finished. But then I start
eating it with the vegetables and chilli oil and sauce and stuff. Yeah, of course. Yeah.
But I love that. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'll be very tempted to put the pancakes to one
side for a second and put all the duck and everything on the pizza and any that. I'll
be tempted to. I've had to
Frankenfood. Shout out to Bella Italia. I once had a hoisin
duck pizza at the time. I loved it. Looking back, it was crazy.
Yeah. Instead of tomato sauce base, it was hoisin sauce,
too much duck, cheese and spring onion. Absolutely insane.
Yeah. Yeah. In a good way? No. No, just mad.
I wouldn't want the cheese.
Yeah, well the cheese was...
Yeah, we don't need that.
It has to have cheese to be the pizza, right?
Maybe.
That's another thing where you get like the white pizzas,
you get pizza without cheese and all that stuff.
That's the worst thing.
You order that pizza, it just sounds so good.
And then, you know, that's why I started going for margarita.
Yeah.
You know what it's going to be. but you know, you go with four friends,
they're not going to share with you.
And then you get that you're the only person who gets that white pizza.
It's like, oh.
Are you, how do you build your pancakes?
What order are you putting the things on?
On ratio.
Um, hoisin sauce, chili oil, and you build it in your hand.
That's a nice way of doing it.
You pick it up, you can stretch over. A little bit of hoisin sauce,
chilli oil, something we always love, my wife and I, is chopped fresh red chillies with soy sauce. So you sort of pour soy sauce over it, kind of, this just does something to the soy sauce and to
the chilli. Then duck, a little sliver too of spring onion, cucumber for crunch, and then those
little red chillies. Yeah. Great. I love that you're adding all this chilli stuff as well.
That's great. Normally I just end up having the duck, the veg and the hoisin sauce, which is great,
but with chili oil as well. I go hoisin sauce first, spread it out on the pancake, duck,
vegetables on top. Yeah. You to me seem like a drizzler, James. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You go last, hoisin last.
No, no.
No, no.
Come on, don't put me in that category.
Because these people who go hoisin last
are using up all the fucking hoisin.
Pancake last.
Because they've got no way of regulating
how much they're putting on.
You need to put enough on to get the flavor of it,
but you're not putting dollops on.
These people are fucking dolloping and drizzling.
It gets on my nerves.
I'll tell you what's worse than that.
It's people who are using up all the duck.
When they just pile that pancake high with duckers, they just get their little shred
of duck, it's a nice balance, and then we can have more.
Yeah.
Did you say pancake last, James?
Yes.
Pancake last.
In your hand.
Duck in your hand.
Yeah, in my hand.
I just grab everything in my hand, and then I get a pancake, slap it on the top, and then
pancake first into my mouth. Yeah.
Dream main course. Main courses, I guess.
Main course is for you and for Edward Gamble.
So here I've got it kind of built into the course itself.
So I'm not necessarily going to have to choose to,
but very happy to always greedy when it comes to ordering.
In close second, it could be a biryani.
Yes.
What a lovely biryani.
Lovely.
Yeah.
At Pabindapark from Hoppers?
Yes.
Yeah.
Very, very good.
That was our, yeah.
So that was one kind of biryani.
So we kind of toss it all together.
We call it a tawa biryani or pan biryani,
where the sauce is mixed with the rice,
and it's really delicious.
Perfect for volume like that.
But then the dum biryani which is where you got the meat, you got layers of rice and meat
and the rice almost sort of steams through in that lovely aroma and then it's garnished on top
and it's usually under a little seal which could be pastry, which could be roti, which could just be a lid.
I love that stuff.
I think it's the ideal sort of dinner party menu.
It's the ideal sort of one pot meal
coming out of that region of the world.
Just a little raita on the side is perfect.
But the other sort of equivalent of that,
which would be my first choice,
is something called lump rice.
Now you'll have to buy the book to find out what that is.
You'll tell us?
It is, I will tell you. But to cook it maybe. So we've got the whole recipe broken down in the book to find out what that is. You want to tell us? It is, I will tell you.
But to cook it maybe.
So we've got the whole recipe broken down in the book.
It's a Sri Lankan dish, have to be Sri Lankan here.
It's spelled
L-A-M-P-R-A-I-S
and it's a Dutch burger dish.
So it was, you know, like you had the Anglo-Indians,
you had the Dutch colonized Sri Lanka
for a while and the children were known as the burgers
B-U-R-G-H-E-R-S. There's an H there. Nothing to do with the McDonald's burgers we were
talking about earlier. But it's an incredible dish. It's in banana leaf. You've got this
short grain rice. So first you cook a meat. It's usually mixed meat, three kinds of meat.
We're really going all in here. This is like a full feast in one parcel. Three kinds of
meat, lots of lovely
spices. You stew them and then you collect the stock. It's almost like think Hainanese
chicken rice. You get the stock, you boil the rice in that stock. Really aromatic rice.
And you put these two together. So it becomes a dryish curry by the time you sort of dry
it out and that stock is used to cook the rice. Then you've got lovely aubergine pickle,
like a moju or pahi. So it's this
pickled aubergine with onions and stuff. Then tend to have two or three
other little dishes in there. You have a little fried egg on top, you have a
cutlet and then you wrap the whole thing banana leaf. And I used to have
friends at university, still have friends who bring parcels and parcels of
these from Sri Lanka frozen. And they keep in the freezer and they're very very protective of them so you've
got to be a really good friend for that one of them to share it with you.
So they do these tiny parcels, hoppers we occasionally for specials do larger parcels
but imagine that that little parcel is then steamed or baked so now on top of
all the flavor you also get that lovely flavor from the banana leaf
into all these things and then you just open it up. It does, it's not much to look at. So we, it took a while for us to actually bring it on the menu because it just looks like someone's had this
doggy bag where they were given, you know, very stingily given just one box and they had to clear
the whole table, everything left over into one box and they swung it on the way home. It's like one
of those really bad takeaway orders that you get, you know, someone swung the whole thing. It just, everything's
mixed into everything, but it looks a bit like that sometimes. And it's hard to make
it look visually pleasing, but the flavors are insane.
And is that going to be on Ed's plate or your plate?
Yes. I reckon I'll take this one. Ed's having a biryani.
Okay. We'll share. If he wants one, if he wants one.
Yeah. I was going to ask, we hadn't quite
established with it because obviously you're going to have some of mine because that's
why you've established this. But am I going to have any of yours? Only if you have that
duck pancake the other way around. I guess. I'll eat the duck pancake like James. I get
to decide how Ed eats your food. Yes. There you go. Okay. Yeah. So how am I eating the
biryani? Well, you've got the biryani.
I guess I'd like you eat it one grain at a time.
Oh no. That's, that's something. You've got a banana leaf to play with.
Oh yeah. You can use, you can use that.
You have to lick the banana leaf clean at the end. Yeah. Yeah.
But you have to eat one grain of rice at a time and then just lick everything
else off the banana leaf.
I think that genuinely sounds like torture to me. That's awful.
That's given the idea of eating,
having an amazing like flavoursome meal and I'm hungry and I've got to eat one grain of rice at
a time. Yeah. That's like when you were a kid and they were saying chew everything 32 times. Did you
guys have that? Yeah. There's always these things like chew your food 32 times. I'm in the opposite
position. My eldest son who hates eating for some reason, it's really upsetting. He's a five year
old and you know,
I just finished battles at breakfast with him
and you give him a bite and he's got this really good way
of hiding food in his cheek.
Like a hamster.
Like a hamster.
And you know, it just fills up and there it is,
I've caught him with a slice of pizza there
about an hour and a half later.
Like he's gone off to play something,
he's gone to a class and he's come back
and he's like, he's been eating then.
The teacher's like, oh, was he chewing gum? I said, no, it's like what's in his mouth? And he's like,
oh I've got pizza, it's now become too dry, can I spit it out? I said you should just ask me earlier.
But it's a bit like him, like I tell him eat fast, as we always grew up saying 32 bites and that was
really frustrating. Yeah, you've got to chew everything so many times. I was told that as
well. There was no chance I was listening to that. Four or five times at most. Just enough to make
sure it sort of doesn't kill you on the way out.
Just to get it down, yeah.
Yeah.
Also, I can't be counting and eating like that.
No.
Fall asleep.
Yeah.
Forget it, man.
Just changes flavor after like five, six bites, it tastes of nothing, does it?
Yeah.
Yeah, no thank you.
No, you can have as many bites as you like in the drink restaurant. Yeah. No, thank you. No, you can have as many bites as you like in the drink restaurant.
Yeah. Okay. Except him.
Ed has to, he's got a great surprise set of time.
I have to eat grain by grain. Yeah. After slamming a pancake into my face with all the filling on my hand.
Yeah. Pancake first. I think that's fair.
Pancake last. Huh? Pancake last.
Pancake goes on last and goes in your mouth first.
Right. Okay.
So important. Yes. Thank you.
Actually, maybe the banalif. Do you want me to wear it like blue? Yeah. I maybe the banana leaf. Do you want me to wear it like blue?
Yeah, I was going to say.
Do you want me to wear it like blue?
Yes.
Yes.
Can I leave the restaurant?
Your dream side dish.
In being honest to that, me and I think I just have a simple pot of yoghurt, which is
really nice to balance out.
So I stick to that if I'm having something.
Does Ed get the yoghurt as well?
Yeah, we're sharing everything.
Except the banana leaf.
Well, disappointed to hear I get the yoghurt because God knows how I'm going to have to
eat it, James.
Oh yeah, for a straw.
Yeah, okay.
Ed's got to use a straw for the yoghurt.
One of those big fat boba straws, bubble tea straws.
Yeah, yeah.
It needs to be nice and thick.
Yes, it's two feet long.
Oh, perfect.
Yeah.
Lots of lung power here.
Oh no, this is turning into my nightmare meal.
Oh, sorry Ed.
I don't make the rules.
You do, you literally do.
That's what you're doing right now.
I'll tell you what.
I mean, if there was something else, I'd just go simple French fries.
Oh yeah.
Simple French fries.
It's really nice.
No truffle oil, none of that crap on top.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Just salted.
Veggies sometimes, but just good French fries are great.
Where from?
Where's the best French fries, do you reckon?
Is it a fast food chain?
There's something about that smell of McDonald's French fries, but I'll tell you what, Shake
Shack.
Yeah, I was going to say.
They do the best french fries.
If you want to get back into Shake Shack.
Those crinkle cut ones.
Crinkle cut, perfect with cheese on top.
I was just having some of them the other day.
So when we did the burger with them, we did chili cheese french fries.
I'll take that.
I'll take that as my...
I can't believe we missed this collab, man.
We'll bring it back.
It was in New York, right? It was in New York.
No, there was one here as well. There was one here.
You're breaking my heart, man. You're breaking my heart.
We'll bring it back. Yeah.
Hopefully the guys are listening. Yeah. Bring it back, Shake Shack.
Jeff, look at Dream, like collab. Like, so somebody you haven't collaborated with before,
who you would love to just like, yeah, team up on.
We've done some interesting ones. We're doing, you know I've done uh some really cool stuff we did a burger we did
an ice cream with salt and straw do you know those guys yeah so they're like Ben and Jerry's of the
west coast Tyler's one of the coolest most fun guys I've met so we did a bone marrow ice cream
the bone marrow bar wow he turned into an ice cream, which was incredible. That was earlier this year. I've done stuff with Tom.
I shouldn't have asked you, actually.
I'm going to cry.
But I think I'd love to do something with a musician.
I think, again, that bringing that whole experience together doesn't need to be because we're
artists, we're doing different things.
I don't really understand visual art or not really into sort of painting and that kind
of stuff, but I love music.
I don't know much about it.
I can't play an instrument to save my life, but I love rock and roll.
Who's your dream musician to do a collab with?
Bruce Springsteen.
Yes.
Have to be the boss.
Yeah.
The boss.
Make Jagger's out in the market again. He's doing new albums and stuff, but I think Bruce
Springsteen.
I think Springsteen would be the coolest one to do a Hoppers collab.
I think so.
He's listening as well.
Yeah, I'm sure he is.
Please make it happen. Come on, Bruce. I'm trying to think of like...
I know you are. I can see in your eyes you're trying to think of what the dish would be
called. Yeah. Trying to think of like his song titles and a pun that would involve food.
Yeah. I can't do it. It's stressing me out. It's stressing me out here.
It'll drop by the end of the episode. We'll know what it is.
We'll finish with that.
Ben's got one.
Benito's got one.
It's gonna be bad.
Prawn in the USA.
Prawn in the USA.
We'll just do a festival then.
We'll do a festival.
It's good.
I'm having a nightmare of an episode myself, Ed.
I'm learning about all these nice foods that have been and gone that I wish I could try.
I want the bone marrow ice cream so much.
And now Benito's beat you at a jack.
And now Benito's just beat much. I just had my ass
handed to me in a pun war by Bonito. It's so good. I'm now just thinking about that ice
cream and how much I want that. It was nuts. Totally nuts. But it was. I love like weird
flavored ice creams that you like, especially like they've got a bit of salty, savory thing going on with them.
Yeah.
Oh man.
Yeah.
And texture.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And they just do it so well.
Yeah.
It's almost like that was like being in Billy Wonka's Chocolate Factory where he's like all these different flavors.
He's telling you all about them.
The guy is a complete ice cream nerd.
Yeah.
But one of the nicest, nicest guys I've
ever collaborated with. And again, it was the same thing. It's like, let's do what you
guys do really well and let's add a layer of our stuff on top of that. So he kind of,
you know, our rotis, which you've had, but these flaky parathas, which you make in house.
And when he had those, we started talking about it. We both came to the conclusion that
actually doing this out in Portland, Oregon,
which is a phenomenal place by the way,
we could just come and make these there,
but he's like, no, let's just use something local.
And then we came upon flattening croissants
because it's effectively the same thing.
It's got the same amount of oil in there
as croissants have butter.
It's that lovely flaky texture.
So we flattened croissants, candied them,
and then ran them through this lovely sort of spiced ice cream
and then needed a through this lovely sort of spiced ice cream and then he
did a bone marrow fudge. So we did a coconut base, spices into it and that was the soft
serve, not the soft serve, the sort of base of the ice cream. We had these candied pieces
of croissant and then we had this lovely bone marrow rich bone marrow fudge. So he just
melted bone marrow in and made this fudge sauce. Oh my God. It's amazing. James has lost it. He's gone. Where'd you get off cut? I'll tell you
what, he's saved the stuff to me. He's a genie. You could have that for your dessert. No,
that is truly torture. Because then I'm having to imagine something I've not had and there's
absolutely no chance of me having. I think, yeah, we were back on like, I mean, we've
mentioned the banquet scene
in the film Hook many times over the years and Bangerang, but then it really
is like being at that meal, but being unable to imagine the food and just
like eating the ice cream and imagining everything that Kevin just described.
But so did they do that anymore in Portland?
It was literally one weekend only.
What does you, you monster.
We made it.
We did a video.
We, we just had fun doing it. And we went off to the biggest bookstore in all of USA, biggest independent bookstore. It was a whole block called Powells of Portland.
And we did a little talk, two of us, and then we had free ice cream, giving it away to anyone who came. There's one way to bribe people.
You know what? It's nice to know that I finally got an answer to if I had a time machine, where would I go?
I go, yep. March this year, please. Massive bookstore, please. Yeah. My free ice cream
and keep going around the block in a different disguise. Keep using the time machine, right?
Yeah. Just keep using the time machine. Yeah. I go back to the end first of the talk.
Yeah. And then I go back one minute each time until I get to the beginning of the talk.
Yeah. I always get the ice cream every time.
Yeah. We haven't asked him how he'd eat the ice cream though.
Oh yeah. Yeah. That's a good point.
Well, different every time, right? Yeah.
Well, yeah. Yeah. So give us the top three.
I mean, were you serving it in cones or were you?
No, we're doing cups. You were doing cups.
Well, I guess we can serve it to you in a cone if you like. I changed my cup every time to like a different, I also use the time
machine to bounce around time and get famous cups like King Arthur's cup. Oh, hang on. Well,
you'd bring your own cup, would you? I'd get the Ark of the Covenant probably and have the
ice cream and the Ark of the Covenant. The Ark of the Covenant wasn't a cup then. Wasn't that a cup?
Massive. I thought it was a cup. No, you're thinking the Holy Grail. You're thinking of the Covenant wasn't a cup man. It's massive. I thought it was a cup.
No, you're thinking of the Holy Grail.
You're thinking of the other Indiana Jones film.
Yes, yes.
The Ark of the Covenant was that massive thing that they opened it and all the Nazis faces
melt.
Yes, sorry.
Oh, no, I would have it out of that.
I mean, if they give it out free ice cream.
It would melt the ice cream.
But you're a genie.
It would prevent it melting.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I would have it in a load of things from Indiana Jones, the crystal
skull. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They ate the monkey brains at one point out of the monkey
skull. So I'd have the monkey skull as well. I'd have the ice cream in there. Yeah. I just
do that because I just like you guys to start thinking like a lot of people turning up today
like Indiana Jones.
Yeah. And then whatever that last one was about, you can have it in that.
Yeah. The dial of, I don't know, flea bag.
Now dream drink is very exciting because one of my dream drinks is a hoppers drink,
which is I don't think it's on the menu anymore.
We'll bring it back. That's easy enough to do.
You'll bring it back?
Yeah, that's easy. I don't need salt and straw or Shake Shack.
But I'm about to burst into tears because I can't remember this fucking name.
Describe it.
It's got...
Do you know the name, Benito?
You know it, because you know what I'm talking about, because I've talked about it before.
Rosé Smash.
Rosé Smash.
The Rosé Smash. Do you remember it from Hoppers?
Yeah.
Had the kind of, um,
That was a while ago.
Yeah, man.
I loved it so much.
Like every time I went there, I get it.
Sometimes I go in just cause I fancy the rosé smash.
Okay.
Think about it all the time.
Still.
We'll do version 2.0 for you.
Fancy the rosé smash.
Yeah.
Fancy the rosé smash.
I was like, you're banging someone at a picnic.
Fancy a quick rosé smash. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. the day. We'll work with the team. Yeah, we'll bring back What was the Rosé Smash? I never had the Rosé Smash. Yeah, no, the thing that it had in it
I think was that yeah, but it was a Rosé. It was like it was like a slushie. Yeah
It was like that was like a Rosé Vermouth was it or a Rosé?
It was like a it was it Rosé Vermouth Benito's nodding his head according to the menu
Yeah, so that that was like it had this flavor that I just never found in any other drink. It must have come from the Rose Over Moof. Yeah.
That like, I can't even describe it to you because it was just like, I hadn't had it
anywhere else. And it was very addictive because of that.
I'll tell you, this is the thing we do with Hoppers because we've reached a point where
we've got the three restaurants and very often people come there expecting the food to be, just
to have certain dishes. They've become so famous. And for a little while we tinkered
with the menu, changed things around and we realized we're just pissing people off.
So they come for classics. It's like McDonald's doing sandwiches one day and deciding we're
not doing burgers or doing a wrap one day and stuff. And then we said, okay, fine, let's
rein that creativity in. Let's do a dish or two on the specials. Let's keep the menu very
focused. Let's get better at doing what we're doing. Let's do a dish or two on the specials. Let's keep the menu very focused.
Let's get better at doing what we're doing.
Let's do these collaborations outside, which is, you know, where we express our creativity,
have some fun.
But what we've started doing a lot of is getting very creative on the drink side.
And we've got Martin, Angeles and the team, and they're doing a phenomenal, phenomenal
job and you've got to come back. I mean, I think we will definitely match
and raise you on that sort of, on that rosy smash.
Because the drinks are the best they've ever been.
And you know, King's Cross has the biggest bar
for that reason.
We wanted to show people that look,
you can actually have a nice overall great time.
Hoppers Soho, most people used to come in smashed
because that'd make them wait two and a half hours.
So we really missed a trick there.
The guys next door were doing more sales on drinks
and potentially snacks than we were doing on food
because they'd be waiting two and a half hours.
And when we opened Marlborough, it was a different area.
People kind of come there for the food is more functional.
Now they're drinking a lot more,
but King's Cross is a great area.
No one waits.
If you tell someone to go off and wait for an hour
for a table to just leave and eat somewhere else. So we kind
of created, we've built this whole beautiful bar when you walk in and the
idea is you wait there, you have a few great drinks, you make friends with the
team, then you have your dinner and you kind of want to come back there before
you get your train back home. So drinks have become a big part of what we
do and obviously we'll be food-, but I'm very, very excited about what's in store, what we've been doing and some lovely drinks out there.
Oh, I knew. So yeah, I mean we'll bring the Rosé Smash back, but we'll make you try about 15 more as well.
Oh. And then roll you out. If I must. Yeah.
But your dream drink, what had happened first? Yeah, what am I having for my drink?
I'll let you choose your drink here.
I'm not going to.
So like I said, I think three months ago, I just decided one day I want to stop drinking.
Not because I wasn't alcoholic or any of that sort of stuff.
But it just gives you, you know, it's just been a really refreshing time.
It's fun. I don't know when this, by the time this airs, I might be drinking again.
So I don't want to harp too much about it. But I've enjoyed this sort of little phase of not drinking.
It's also meant I have tasted a lot of non-alcoholic beer, something I frowned upon earlier.
It's definitely a market that's picking up a lot. Yeah. I had one at a festival. Was it? No, it wasn't Bob in the Park.
It was at the Rock Oyster Festival in Cornwall. This guy's called Impossible Brew.
And they almost, they have something in their beer
which says it even gives you a buzz.
I didn't feel it, but you know, it was interesting.
And then these guys called Brew Low, they do a beer.
But it also makes you realize that a lot of drinking
is about the social setting and a ritual.
Yeah, for sure.
A bit like coffee.
You know, people go on about, oh my God, it takes a lot to,
you get addicted to these things.
But I think you can break that ritual if you just decide. And you just, you look at everything surrounding that ritual.
So, might be friends who only want you to drink or won't hang out with you if you don't drink.
And I feel the shift that little bit. Yeah. But I've loved it. And, you know, I guess it'll be the sparkling water with a touch of bitters in it.
Maybe a non-alcoholic beer. But I'll tell you what, I don it'll be the sparkling water with a touch of bitters in it, maybe a non-alcoholic beer.
But I'll tell you what, I don't not drink it all. So I do have sips from the other person, which doesn't count.
So you're probably having a Negroni.
No, I'm having a Rosé Smash.
Okay.
With a Negroni.
Which I can have a sip of it. I love a bloody Negroni.
Yeah, you can have a...
I love a Negroni.
I'd like a Rosé Smash.
Yeah.
And you can have a sip, Curran, but James can't. What the fuck? I just fucking
told you about it. I thought he sold it to you. Yeah. Well, I'll enjoy it very much.
Head gamble. Well, I'm getting the 2.0. Oh yeah. The smash king. That's good. You should
do a collab with James. Yeah, let's do it. But it has to be on a cocktail called the
smash king and it has to have a mashed potato in it.
No, it doesn't have to have a mashed potato in it.
I'm the Mash King, close to make great mashed potatoes.
Okay.
You see, so we can do a cocktail called the Smash King, but don't put potatoes in it.
I'm sure we can work.
Yeah, exactly. I trust Curran and his team.
Yeah, actually that's exciting.
Yeah, I'm sure you and your team can come up with a cocktail with mashed potato in it.
Wow.
It is great. Wow. Well, yeah, this is exciting.
What's your recipe for the best mashed potatoes?
It was obviously the potatoes and cream, full fat cream, salt and pepper, butter, cheese, orange cheese.
Oh, orange cheese.
Yeah, well, just like orange color.
Sounds horrible.
And then I mash it up.
Don't start mashing until it looks beautiful and there's no lumps.
And then send that out and everyone would say, you're the mash king.
Send it out?
Have you worked in a restaurant before?
I did.
I worked at a pub kitchen.
Mmm.
Doing the best mash.
Doing the best mash.
Time travel.
I'd love to come and eat that.
Yeah.
I would love to.
Hey, you can borrow my time machine if you want to try my mashed potato at the Star in Gettinton.
I'll come along with the burger, with the ice cream, with the rosé smash and all I
want is mashed potatoes in return. Absolutely. That's the collab. The Star in Gettinton.
Yeah, the Star in Gettinton. You should also get the nachos. If you're going back to that
time, you should get the layered nachos with all the chili in it. That was a great dish at
the start and get into when I was there. Very good. People love it.
That's where the orange cheese came from, didn't it?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The orange cheese knocking about.
That's it. There's some nachos in the potatoes as well. Actually a good one.
Oh, that would be nice.
Scoop up.
Bit of texture.
Yeah, yeah.
Scoop up mashed potatoes with nachos.
Oh, that'd be great.
You guys are coming up with great stuff.
Yeah.
This would be a whole range.
We're farming an old cylinder here.
So you have a sip of the Negroni.
Yes.
I love a Negroni.
Negroni is a good stuff.
I didn't used to like them because whenever I had one, the way it sort of connects with
your mouth and the feeling it gave me was the same feeling I have when I'm just about
to vomit.
Do you know what I mean? Like the back of the throat starts to moisten because it's that bitter that hits right at the back of the throat.
And that's what you get when you're about to be sick and your mouth starts producing saliva.
So every time I'd have a sip of Negroni and be like, oh no, I think I'm about to be sick.
But then I taught myself to enjoy that, which means now I love Negroni's and I love being sick.
Do you know what? I like it when Ed occasionally picks up the torch of the boring stories from it.
Oh, that's more exciting than the diet coke story.
What are you talking about? It's not mine. The diet coke story is fascinating. It's a story of science.
story is fascinating, it's a story of science. We arrive at your dream dessert, we've already talked about ice cream and it was fantastic, it's one of my favourite conversations I've ever had.
Boomer afudge. Can we continue that? Because the dessert's definitely going to be ice cream,
I just love ice cream. It has to be a massive, massive sundae. Yes. Right? With all kinds of
textures, has to be chocolate in there.
Yeah. And lots of hot fried sauce. None of that stuff that sort of crystallizes. None of that sort
of quick freeze stuff. Yeah. I don't like it. No, no. Just for me it's like gooey textures. Yeah.
Ben and Jerry's on the couch. Yeah. Guilty pleasure. But I think this is like this takes
Ben and Jerry's to the next level. This dream dessert. Like tons of ice cream. Oh. So would it
be Ben and Jerry's ice cream? Cookies. It dessert, like tons of ice cream. Brownies, cookies.
It would, but you're a genie,
you'll make something much better than that.
So yeah, so all kinds of flavors, peanut butter.
I mean, Ben and Jerry's did this with,
did a flavor with Tony's recently,
the chocolate ice cream, it was amazing.
I think it's still available and it's fantastic.
It's great chocolate.
I can get it in a big Tesco near my house.
Yeah, yeah.
And they do amazing chocolate.
So great chocolate, great ice cream,
plus all the other add-ins.
I just think, I think clean ice cream doesn't do it for me.
You need the texture.
And it goes back to that whole thing of Pani Puri
and duck pancakes where it's like,
I'll sit on the couch, tub of ice cream.
In my head I say, okay, I think I can eat about,
it's midnight or past.
It's like, I should not eat more than a third of that, yeah, tub now. But
then you reach that line, yeah, that imaginary line, like actually there's a
little piece of brownie, it's like the tip of the iceberg, it's just looking at me, I need to
have that, yes, and you kind of dig in, it's like okay now I have the brownie, I need to
have a little bit of ice cream, yeah, just to balance it out, you have that ice cream
and then you're like, actually there's chocolate looking at me. And you just go down.
It's like, I've had a whole tub in us. And you know, I've been very ashamed of that.
Also, you kid yourself because you're like, I'll eat half of this.
So you think that's halfway down on the tub. But the tub's wide at the top.
So you've eaten three quarters of it by the time you get to what you think is halfway.
And then you're like, fuck it, I'll just eat the rest.
Or you just feel really shit the next day when you're eating that other half.
It's like, I should have just eaten that.
The smaller half yesterday.
Oh, I can't wait for another half of ice cream.
The half tub of ice cream.
Or you open the next one.
So you finish that and you open the next one.
That's another thing I've done.
So yeah, for me ice cream is definitely the thing, but textures, all kinds of stuff.
The main thing I do with the bedding jerry's is uh, cause the sides obviously melt first, the outside.
So I just get the spoon down there and I'm telling myself, I'm not really having much.
I'm just eating the sides. So I just, I just go right down to the bottom, scrape up, just
have the more melted bits. And then I go all the way around, so I go all the way around
and go, oh, this next layer is quite soft as well. I go around there. So like, yeah,
a lot of the time that's, that's my, and then I'm the same as you.
Like a beaver on a log.
Yes, like a beaver on a log. And then I see a little, a little chunk like you do and go,
gotta get that chunk.
Yeah. Yeah. And then you're left the next day with just chocolate ice cream.
Trying to even it all out.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
I tell you what, of all the ways he's told us how to eat things, this is probably the
truest.
Yes. Yes. That's how I, is that how I Yes, that's how I agree with you. Yeah. I do. I do outside first with the ice cream.
Because your hands warming that tub up. Yeah. Yeah. Hands warming the tub up.
Holding onto it with anticipation. Sweating. I was like, I want more. I want more.
I don't like it when it's too hard. I used to live with someone who was like,
who wanted it straight out the freezer that didn't let it melt.
But how would they? She was like, this is like scraping little bits. She's like, that's how I
like it. And I was like, what the? Are you high as a kite? You got, you got like softened these things.
I like soft ice cream. The trick there is putting in the microwave. Just like on the lowest power
for like five or 10 seconds. I don't have the patience to wait there. Yeah. And invariably it kind of melts weirdly,
but I think putting it in the microwave just melts it evenly across.
But you've got to find that,
but the worst thing is putting it in on the wrong setting
and now it's turned to milk.
Every time I put it in the microwave.
And you don't have the ice cream.
What I do if I have ice cream in, I'm eating dinner.
When I'm about to eat the main savory bit of dinner,
that's when I get the ice cream out.
Yeah.
So I'm happy with the savory food. And then by the time that's finished, we are ready
to go to ice cream town. That's great. In a buffet. That's all. I hit the desserts first.
Got a massive sweet tooth. Respect. Hit the desserts first. I just try them. So I know
how much of an appetite I need to save for it. Knowing fully well, I've got a separate
stomach as everyone says. So I'll first try it, justifying to myself, okay I'm just tasting it so I know how much to save up on.
Then I'll hit the buffet and then I'll go back
loading a plate full of dessert.
I just love dessert.
You know what you like at that point?
Yeah.
I've got a...
So my sofa that I sit on to watch television
has a radiator behind it, so that's where the ice cream goes.
I put the Ben and Jerry's on the radiator.
No wonder it's melting from around first. When I start and then I watch it, start to watch strictly and then I'll
reach behind. You just, you said my story about Negroni tasting like sick was boring
and you've somehow trumped me with an even more boring story. I think it's a beautiful
story what I've just told. A story about watching strictly on the sofa and putting your ice
cream on the radiator. If you look up happiness in the dictionary, Ed, and you'll find that story.
Holding up a sparkly paddle saying three.
Oh, they're not sparkly the paddles.
I love it. So you just basically a massive Sunday with loads of textures.
Texture, cookies, brownies for sure.
Nuts, toasted nuts. Yeah.
Cashew nuts.
They taste amazing.
Great.
You guys ever had like a chocolate, a sizzling brownie?
Yes.
We grew up having that.
There's a restaurant locally called Colaba where I live.
Great little Indian spot around the corner run by some amazing people.
They do like a sizzling chocolate brownie.
So it's like they bring a brownie on a sizzling platter,
then you dump hot fudge sauce on top.
It all sizzles and kind of burns at the bottom.
Vanilla ice cream. Yeah. It's like now melting. You don't need a radiator for it.
It's almost like the radiator actually. Next time get a brownie on the radiator. Yes. Put your hot fudge on,
I mean put your pen and Jerry's stub on top and then you've got the sizzling. I'll do whatever you say.
And then cashew nuts. And then cashew nuts,
salted cashew nuts. And that is, there's something about the nuts and salted nuts on ice cream.
I definitely, I know what I'm going to do tonight. I know I'm going to go home. I'm going to order
Hoppers on Deliveroo and then I'm going to get some ice cream and some salted cashew nuts from
the shop and I'm going to mix them together. Don't forget the brownie. Oh, I forget the brownie the brownie
Right and read your menu back to you now see how you feel about it
Sparkling water with bitters and a wedge of citrus. No wedge of citrus. Oh, yeah. Yes, it's a fruit line. Oh great fruit
Let's go for quite free. Yeah. Yeah now that down
Pops or bread you aren't Pop hard with black chutney, and lentils and yoghurt.
No. Black chutney, yoghurt. No, not black chutney. Black lentils and chutney. Black lentil and black pepper, yoghurt. No, pop hard. I forgot this as well.
No, you haven't messed that up. The pop hard itself is made of black lentil and black pepper. Black lentils and chutney. Yeah. Yoghurt. Oh my god.
Definitely a tongue twister.
The curry and the chutney is mixed with the yoghurt.
Papa that's made with black lentils.
Yes.
And you would like the chutney yoghurt with it.
Yes.
Yes.
Jesus Christ.
And you want bread with bungee butter.
Ed's having that.
I'm having a bite.
Yes.
Start, you got the duck pancakes with the chilli oil and the fresh chillies.
And Ed's got the margarita pizza.
Thank you. Yum. With chilli oil as and the fresh chillies. And Ed's got the margarita pizza. Thank you.
Mmm, yum.
With chilli oil as well.
And dried chilli.
And dried chilli.
Bakers.
Lump rice.
Yeah.
And biryani for Ed.
Thank you.
Yes.
Did we say what meat is in the biryani?
Did I miss that?
No, we didn't.
We did chicken or lamb.
But I like lamb.
Like a nice lamb shank biryani we do at the Hoppers.
Just a nice fall off the bone lamb shank biryani. We do it at Hoppers. Just nice fall off the bone lamb shank biryani
You have the marrow out afterwards. Yes. Yeah, I'm talking of falling off the bone. I'll be dressing as Baloo for that course
Is he fall off the boat?
So I could make it sound sexual
Talking of suck in the marrow. We go to the same picnic said
Side dish a simple pot of yogurt. Also the chili cheese French fries from Shake Shack
that you did as a collab. Drink a sip of Ed's Negroni. Dessert, a massive sundae. Chocolate
ice cream, peanut butter, cookies, brownies, nuts, salted cashews, loads of hot fudge sauce.
And it may or may not be Ben and Jerry's.
Basically, it's be like the genie version of that,
which Ed at some point did call Ben and Genie's.
We glossed over it, but I think it's worth shouting it out.
Benito and Genie's maybe.
Benito and Genie's.
Yeah, ice cream.
Thank you so much for coming to the Dream Restaurant, Curran.
Curran, that was so good.
Absolutely delicious.
It's been a long time since we've had a menu
that has made my mouth water that much
So thank you, but damn you look out for hoppers x the smash king. Yeah coming soon smash king
Well, there we are james a wonderful menu from current gokhani i'm covered in drool over here
Yeah, james is covered in drool. He's drooled all over himself,
all over his front and all over his crotch.
Should have worn a bib for that episode.
Should have worn a bib, especially when he started talking about that fucking
bone marrow fudge, man.
That bone marrow fudge, ice cream with the candied flattened croissants in it. Oh my god.
Oh my god.
Why is all the best stuff only available for limited times?
What are these people doing?
For one day in a bookshop? Are you fucking kidding me?
Ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Talk to one of the books, the Hobburs cookbook is out.
Yes, the Hobburs cookbook is out, but you can't get the ice cream when you go and buy it.
The book itself is enough reward.
And obviously go to Hobburs restaurants if you can.
Yeah, yeah, highly recommended.
There's three. There's one in Soho, one in Marylebone and one in King's Cross. enough reward and obviously go to Hoppers restaurants if you can. Yeah, yeah, highly recommended.
There's three, there's one in Soho, one in Marylebone and one in Kings Cross.
Yeah, and if you go to the one in Kings Cross, you can catch a train to Ketwin after.
Yeah, why not do that?
Yeah, that's St Pancras, but they're the same.
Yeah, and who knows, I mean, in fact, I think where Hoppers is, is probably close to St
Pancras and who knows one day the Rosé Smash might be back on the menu.
And if it is, raise a glass for me, will you? You gonna die? Yeah. Yeah. One day.
The Rosé Smash will only come back on the menu when James A. Caster is dead.
Oh no, don't say that! You'll never be able to have it again. That would be so
bad. Yeah. I hope I never die. I also have a book out called Glutton the
Multicourse Life of a Very Greedy Boy. It's available now in the hardcover, audiobook and ebook from wherever you get those things from.
Great.
Great.
I mean, we're still recording this on the day that I've been giving it.
Yes.
So I'm looking forward to it still.
Yes, thank you.
Hoppers London is the Instagram for Hoppers and Curran Cooks is Curran's personal Instagram where he puts up
loads of exciting food stuff. Yeah, he has promised pizza. He's promised pizza. He said it.
I should make pizza at home again. Yeah, you went for a big stage of that. Yeah. Making a lot of
pizza at home. Did I try your lamb anchovy pizza? I think I did. Yes, you did. That's good stuff.
I just want to do no work and just stay at
home and cook. Yeah we're hungry I mean just just for the listener we're hungry man like we haven't
really had a proper lunch. No. We just listened to Karen describe all this amazing food we're hungry.
Yeah we're hungry. That's the situation. We should go eat. We should go eat now. We should go and eat.
And he didn't say Bovril. We need to go and eat. Sorry, Benita's just stopped us when we were about to go eat.
He didn't say Bovril, obviously.
Yeah, we need to go eat, man.
A-bov-ril-us-ly.
Bovril-us-ly.
Bovril-us-ly, he didn't say Bovril.
What does your T-shirt say?
It doesn't say corn.
Aries.
What does it say Aries?
Because it's an Aries T-shirt.
It's a collab of corn and Aries.
It's the cover of the debut corn album, and instead of saying corn in the shadows, it says Aries t-shirt. It's a collab of Korn and Aries. It's the cover of the debut Korn
album and instead of saying Korn in the shadows it says Aries. I thought my, how hungry I
am was making me hallucinate. No. Thank you very much for listening. We will see you again
next week. I'm Lucy Beaumont.
And guess what?
I'm Sam Campbell.
If you enjoy, well, there's another podcast just coming out.
Oh, the podcast is out now.
Yeah.
If people have enjoyed off menu
will they enjoy Lucy and Sam's perfect brains? I don't I don't know. There's there's a bit of
crossover we talk about um maybe you know a couple of food issues. We talk about cutlery
and that's near food. We reckon it's out now. Not soon it's now. Is it on all the platforms? Oh it
absolutely is. If you like James and if you
love Head you might get a kick out of this but yeah again no pressure but yeah this one is coming
this one's out now. Lucy and Sam's perfect parents.