Episode Transcript
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0:00
Bon Appetit is known for giving their readers
0:03
the recipes that they want to make and
0:05
cooking advice that works. And
0:07
their podcast, Dinner SOS, is
0:09
no different. Put
0:11
on your apron and join host Chris
0:13
Morocco and a guest from the Bon
0:15
Appetit Test Kitchen as they solve your
0:18
toughest cooking questions. From
0:20
prepping for a picnic of 25 to
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perfecting your mac and cheese recipe, Chris
0:25
and another expert give suggestions to callers
0:27
that you will also be able to
0:30
add to your recipe rotation. Some
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people consider cooking to be torture,
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but with Dinner SOS, cooking becomes
0:37
the ultimate labor of love, making
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it the perfect podcast for chefs
0:41
of all skill levels looking for
0:43
inspiration. Get your weekly
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dose of Bon Appetit's Dinner SOS, available
0:48
now wherever you get your podcasts.
0:56
Hi, it's Claudia. Are you a
0:58
parent listening to this podcast? Are you looking for
1:00
new ways to improve your relationship with your kids?
1:03
Then I think you'll love the Project Parenthood
1:05
podcast. Project
1:08
Parenthood is hosted by Dr.
1:10
Naneeka Kaur, a licensed child
1:12
psychologist who specializes in gentle
1:14
parenting techniques. Each
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family issues like fostering conflict
1:21
management skills, encouraging healthy
1:23
body image, and getting
1:25
past parental perfectionism. Oh, I get
1:27
that. Bonus, she also
1:30
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1:32
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ready for more peace, cooperation, and
1:38
connection in your family, it's time
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to listen to Project Parenthood, available
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wherever you get your podcasts. Good
1:49
morning, Claudia. I
1:51
share calling from Italy, Piazza
1:54
Santa, where I live. Um,
1:57
food memories. My
2:00
foodie's story began back when I was a kid in
2:02
the 1960s. The story I wanted
2:05
to share was one where I
2:07
went to visit my grandmother for her birthday.
2:09
Hello, this is Tanner from Los Angeles.
2:11
My name is Ellie. I'm a big
2:13
fan of the podcast and happy to
2:15
share one of my favorite memories as
2:18
it pertains to food. Here
2:21
on If This Food Could Talk, we
2:23
work to bring you food history that
2:25
comes alive. From the U.S.
2:28
Navy's obsession with ice cream to
2:30
fermentation practices that date back thousands
2:32
of years. But we also
2:34
know that food history isn't always in
2:36
the distant past. It's ever-present
2:38
in the small and intimate moments of
2:40
our lives. In other
2:43
words, food history is personal
2:45
history. That's why we
2:47
asked for your food stories. And
2:49
boy, did you deliver from your
2:51
best meals to your worst. Your
2:54
memories range from hilarious
2:56
to nostalgic to delicious.
2:59
Breakfast, tomato sauce, whipped
3:02
thyme, and a little bit of
3:04
sugar. My mom was the worst cook on earth.
3:07
The first thing we would always do is make
3:09
a lot of popcorn and put a ton of
3:11
M&Ms in it. I could feel the enchiladas
3:13
like burning like down my
3:15
throat. They still
3:19
come to me and ask me about
3:21
roasted duck curry. Everything
3:25
We Eat has a story to tell.
3:28
Welcome to If This Food Could
3:30
Talk, a history show for everyone
3:32
who eats. I'm Claudia Hanna. Today,
3:35
we turn the mic on you. We'll
3:38
hear from grandmothers, celebrity chefs,
3:40
world travelers, and to start
3:43
a special surprise, my own
3:45
mom, coming right up after the
3:47
break. Hey,
3:50
everybody, it's Claudia. I love cooking,
3:53
entertaining, and teaching people how to cook.
3:55
The one thing I've learned over the past two years is
3:57
that the food is a very important part of the food.
4:00
the years is that cooking can be
4:02
so much fun. But do
4:04
you know what's not fun? Going to
4:06
the grocery store, chopping vegetables,
4:09
preparing the proteins. It
4:11
all takes time. And that is not the fun
4:13
part of food. The fun part is
4:16
eating, sharing, and connecting.
4:19
So it is holiday season and I
4:21
would love to share with you my
4:23
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T F F
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R E E. I just
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placed my order. Happy holidays,
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everybody. I hope it is delicious
5:33
and stress free. Hi,
5:41
it's Claudia. I want to tell you
5:43
about the Queens podcast, where childhood friends
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Katie and Nathan explore uncharted history with
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a side of spirits. Queens
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podcast takes their listeners on a journey
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through the incredible lives of women from
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different eras, from lesser known
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figures like Saida Alhara and
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Jean de Clisson. to iconic
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personalities like Marie Antoinette or
6:03
Cleopatra. Each queen is paired
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6:07
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juicy, and underrepresented stories
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from some seriously fascinating
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also about the empowering tales of women who left
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their mark. Tune in to
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Queen's podcast, available wherever you get
6:25
your podcasts. You
6:33
better not be crying already. No, I'm not. Oh
6:35
my God. My
6:37
mom, Camilia, is very proud of me
6:39
and the show. And as I thought
6:42
about all of my food memories and
6:44
where my deep love of cooking and
6:46
sharing meals comes from, it
6:48
all points to one place. It's my
6:50
mom. Okay, what's your name? Camilia
6:53
Hanna. Mom, where are you born? I born in Cairo, Egypt. I
6:56
born in Cairo, Egypt. The
6:58
food in Egypt deeply influenced my
7:00
mom and ultimately influenced me. But
7:02
it wasn't all just traditional Egyptian foods
7:04
like falafel or kebabs. Can
7:07
you describe to us what Cairo was
7:09
like growing up in the 50s and
7:11
60s? Very nice,
7:13
to be honest with you. Very
7:16
beautiful. Because we
7:18
used to have all the different cultures
7:20
in our country. You have
7:22
the French, you have the English, you have
7:24
the Greek, you have the Italian. You
7:28
have everybody in our country.
7:30
It sounds very cosmopolitan. It
7:32
was. Do you remember if
7:34
the food was any different? Oh yeah, of
7:36
course. We're
7:39
going to hear two food stories from my mom.
7:41
One right now about her childhood and
7:44
one a little later that was a staple
7:46
of mine. So
7:48
my mom came from a big family. She
7:51
was one of 11 children. I was number
7:53
seven. Lucky seven. To feed
7:55
and care for 11 children, my
7:57
grandmother, or tayta as we called her.
8:00
led the family with military precision. She
8:03
literally had set breakfast hours where the kids
8:05
could come to the kitchen and serve themselves.
8:08
And what dish do you make to feed 11 kids? A
8:11
simple, shareable meal that defined my mom's
8:13
childhood and now has a special place
8:16
in my home as well. Always,
8:18
always in the morning, every day
8:20
this gran belilla, what you call
8:22
it, belilla is wheat berry. Wheat
8:24
berry, yes. Mom should have it
8:27
for us. Big, big, big
8:29
pot. With
8:31
the milk and sugar in it. Okay,
8:34
and cinnamon. Okay, so Tater made the
8:36
breakfast. She cooked this meal only.
8:39
Only this one. Only this
8:41
one. All right, how did she make it?
8:44
Okay, she soaks it overnight. She put in
8:46
a stove with a little bit
8:49
of water for half an hour. Then
8:51
milk. Oh. Full
8:54
milk. Full fat. Full fat. She
8:57
used to have the milk man. He come to
8:59
us every early morning.
9:01
Early, early morning. By
9:03
six or even before. And
9:06
he come to us from the
9:08
cow, fresh and give it to you. You
9:11
know? And it's still warm.
9:13
And the flavor so different. Okay?
9:16
Then she sweet it with sugar
9:18
and honey and cinnamon. And
9:21
leave it on a stove for all of us.
9:23
And each one of us can go and
9:25
help himself. That's our breakfast.
9:29
Mom and her siblings grew up in an apartment in
9:31
Cairo. Their kitchen wasn't very big.
9:33
And I can just picture all of my
9:35
10 aunts and uncles, kids at the time,
9:38
of course, clamoring over a pot
9:40
of hot cereal for breakfast. Think
9:43
of belilla as oatmeal or cream
9:45
of wheat, but way chewier. The
9:47
berries don't break down in the milk. So you
9:49
kind of slurp, kind of chew, and it fills
9:52
your belly right up on a cold winter morning.
9:55
Mom mentioned all of the culinary influences in Cairo
9:57
in the 1950s. Great.
10:00
cuisine is one of the biggest. That's
10:02
why I loved getting this voice memo
10:04
from one of our former guests, Diane
10:06
Kouchelis. She tells us
10:09
a story about learning to make a
10:11
dish that embodies everything she loves about
10:13
Greek cooking. I'm Diane Kouchelis. I'm the
10:15
host of My Greek Table on public
10:17
television. A
10:20
dish that's important to me, one dish,
10:22
that's really hard. I love so
10:24
much about Greek cooking. But
10:26
I'd say I have a dish I return
10:28
to again and again for all sorts of
10:31
occasions. It's hortopita, or
10:33
greens pie. When
10:36
I was in my very early 20s, I moved
10:38
to Greece and I made this for
10:40
the first time. I made my own
10:42
phyllo pastry without ever having seen it
10:44
done or learned it from anyone. And
10:47
I know this might sound a little presumptuous,
10:49
but it's like I just knew how to
10:51
do it. It was in my bones. It
10:53
was in my DNA. And
10:55
I filled it with so many of the
10:58
greens I had discovered and then learned to
11:00
pick them wild myself on Ikaria, where I'm
11:02
from. And that showed me how
11:04
rich is the land and how little one
11:07
really needs if you trust nature and you
11:09
take the time to learn about it. And
11:12
then that hortopita became a kind of
11:14
family symbol. It became a way to
11:17
nourish my family and teach them to
11:19
eat something difficult for kids to embrace,
11:21
greens. I can
11:23
talk about everything that's the
11:26
essence of Greek cooking, seasonality,
11:28
comfort, complex herbal flavors, food
11:30
that is nutritious and delicious
11:33
and plant-based, but most of
11:35
all, love and patience
11:37
as the two most important ingredients
11:39
in any dish. You
11:45
can find Diane's greens pie recipe that
11:47
includes love and patience, along with any
11:49
other recipe that was shared with us
11:51
in the show notes for this episode
11:54
and at our website,
11:56
ifthisfoodcouldtalk.com. That includes this
11:58
next recipe. decadent sticky
12:01
toffee pudding. I try not to
12:03
tell people what's in this, well I don't think they'd eat it. This
12:06
is Kate from the UK. This
12:08
particular recipe has been passed down
12:10
in her family and has a
12:12
surprising royal history to it. Allegedly
12:14
it's the or was the Queen Mother
12:16
in the United Kingdom's favorite cake
12:18
recipe. Instead of hoarding this cake
12:21
for herself, the Queen Mother
12:23
used her position to turn this
12:25
dessert into a gesture of goodwill
12:27
and generosity oppressed Great Britain. One
12:33
stipulation on giving it out
12:35
was that six pence at
12:37
the time, which apparently is now about 2p,
12:39
so not very much, was given to charity
12:41
every time the recipe was passed on to
12:43
a new person. So there
12:45
was no problem handing it out but 2p
12:47
had to be given to any charity which
12:50
is rather a lovely way. So
12:53
the cake is what we
12:55
now call sticky toffee pudding and
12:57
has dates and walnuts in it and a
12:59
rather decadent top which
13:02
consists of brown sugar, cream
13:04
and butter. Even my kids
13:06
who don't like dates love our
13:08
sticky toffee pudding and with the
13:10
royal roots it's a firm favorite
13:13
in our family. Perhaps
13:16
this year you could give this recipe to
13:18
someone and donate a few dollars to a
13:20
charity in their honor. Now
13:24
we're going to continue to travel
13:26
with three short stories about dishes
13:28
discovered in countries far from home.
13:32
First, my friend Christina. On
13:35
a visit to Turkey, a friend told her
13:37
she had to try the kebabs at this
13:39
one spot in the city of Bertha.
13:42
It's a tiny hole-in-the-wall restaurant with
13:44
a neon green entry and it's
13:46
so popular that it rents seating
13:48
space in surrounding shops and the
13:50
sidewalks in front of those surrounding
13:52
shops. The dish we
13:54
ordered and ate was called
13:57
iskender kebab, many large pieces
13:59
of land. are very thinly
14:01
sliced and then they're placed
14:04
on top of freshly made warm
14:06
pita bread and served
14:08
with a very generous helping of thick
14:10
plain yogurt along with thick slices of
14:13
tomato and for some reason a long
14:15
green not hot pepper. My husband
14:18
and I carried our plates to a
14:20
table and chairs inside a chocolate shop
14:23
across the street from the restaurant because
14:25
the restaurant was full and
14:28
I gotta tell you in my memory
14:31
it's the best melt-in-my-mouth meal
14:33
of my life. Chair
14:38
calling from Italy. The best
14:41
I can remember is
14:43
at 17 going
14:46
to Rome and having
14:52
a pasta and
14:55
thinking this is the best thing I've ever had
14:57
in my life. I didn't know
15:00
the name of it. My friend ordered it
15:03
and later I found it was spaghetti
15:06
carbonara. What
15:09
a treat made in heaven. If
15:12
you've never had spaghetti carbonara
15:14
with fresh handmade pasta, local
15:16
bacon, eggs and aged parmesan,
15:18
it truly is a dish
15:21
straight from the Angels. Unlike
15:23
this next meal. Hi Claudia,
15:25
this is Alex. I'm sure you
15:27
have plenty of stories about the best meals
15:30
people have had but I'm gonna share the
15:32
worst meal I think I've ever had just
15:35
to vary it up a little bit. Just
15:38
gonna warn everybody I agree with
15:40
Alex. This one caught me off guard. I was
15:43
in Iceland about 15 years ago
15:45
and being given
15:48
a little bit of a culinary tour
15:51
of the food in Reykjavik
15:54
and we went to a place where they
15:56
had this cured shark meat
15:58
which I think is a national
16:00
delicacy there. And
16:03
it was served in chunks with little toothpicks
16:05
that you pick it up with and I
16:07
tasted it and it smelled a little bit
16:10
like urine. And
16:13
I asked, well how do you prepare this? And
16:16
they said, well the traditional way of doing it is
16:18
we catch the shark, we dig a
16:20
hole in the ground, we all stand around and
16:23
urinate on it, then we cover
16:25
it up and leave it there for a while
16:27
to cure. Then later
16:29
we come back and dig it up and hang it
16:31
in the air to dry. So it's kind of too
16:36
we like turkey. It
16:38
is one of the most god-awful things I've ever had and I
16:40
have to say that it's
16:42
one of the few things I would not
16:44
eat again. The good news is
16:47
that they have a national
16:49
schnapps in Iceland that translates
16:51
to something like black death.
16:54
So I was able to wash down the
16:56
shark with a glass of black death and
17:00
that sort of seemed fitting at the time. Our
17:08
next story, which is more appetizing,
17:10
is from Nathan. It's one
17:12
I can relate to as a parent and it's
17:15
also about someone who vowed
17:17
to never eat a particular
17:19
food again. What happened was my daughter
17:22
Violet was four years old and
17:25
we were sitting at dinner one time and
17:27
having chicken nuggets and this
17:29
was the time in every parent's life that
17:31
the conversation is always awkward for every parent.
17:34
She looked at her chicken nuggets
17:36
and realized that the chicken comes
17:39
from actual chickens. Like
17:41
oh my god this thing was alive and Violet
17:43
was very upset. She kind of looked at us
17:45
and started crying and said that chicken had a
17:47
mom and a dad which kind of took away
17:49
my appetite for it too quite frankly. Nathan
17:52
said Violet became a vegetarian right
17:54
there at age four years old and
17:57
has been one ever since, about a decade.
18:00
So when it came to Thanksgiving and Christmas, instead
18:02
of turkey or ham, the family
18:04
started something new. So
18:06
I went looking for a good vegetarian entree,
18:09
and I found a recipe online for something
18:11
that I thought would fit the bill. It
18:14
also has a really kind of terrible
18:16
name, but it's a nut loaf. So
18:18
it's kind of like meatloaf, but with
18:20
nuts. You saute
18:22
an onion and you add a bunch
18:24
of finely chopped mushrooms, a couple cups
18:26
of cashews and walnuts that are all
18:29
finely chopped, two cups of cooked brown
18:31
rice, a whole bunch of cheese.
18:34
I mean like a whole bunch of shredded cheese and some cottage
18:36
cheese and a bunch of eggs, and
18:38
then just teaspoon of whatever herbs and
18:40
spices you want. And
18:42
you end up with this really
18:44
dense, flavorful, really delicious nutty loaf.
18:50
So every year I pull out the nut loaf and
18:52
I say, behold, my nut loaf. We're
18:56
going to take a quick break, but when we
18:58
come back, we'll hear more of your food stories
19:01
and we'll hear the food story from
19:03
my childhood that I swear should be
19:05
made into a movie. Stay tuned.
19:13
This show is sponsored by BetterHelp. Do
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betterhelp.com/food talk today to get
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10% off your first month. That's betterhelp.com/food talk. If
20:18
you're into cooking and eating during the holidays, then you
20:20
probably have a handful of recipes that you break out
20:22
this time of year. Lots of us
20:24
have that one recipe that we send to friends because
20:26
we know it's going to work every
20:28
single time. The one recipe is about
20:31
building that library. This holiday season,
20:33
join me, Jesse Sparks, and the rest
20:35
of the One Recipe team as we
20:37
talk to chefs and gifted cooks from
20:39
all over the world about their one
20:41
and the story behind it. The
20:43
one recipe will be your go-to for holiday
20:46
cooking ideas. Follow the one recipe
20:48
wherever you get podcasts. Many
20:53
of you had memories of cooking
20:55
with your grandparents, the matriarchs and
20:57
patriarchs of families, passing down their
20:59
family secrets, scrawled on
21:01
note cards covered in buttery fingerprints, holiday
21:04
cookies, pies, Texas chili. But
21:06
where do these family recipes
21:08
really come from? Hello,
21:11
this is Tanner from Los Angeles.
21:14
So last year for the first time, I
21:16
was going to make Christmas
21:18
cookies with my grandmother. It's a tradition
21:20
that my grandmother has been doing for
21:23
as long as I've been around. She's
21:25
been doing this for at least 30
21:27
years. She always makes enough cookies for
21:29
me, my brother, my
21:31
parents, and my uncle. And she
21:34
distributes them. It's a lot of cookies and
21:36
it takes her days to make them all.
21:38
And one of these cookies has always been
21:42
my favorite. It's this little chocolate
21:45
ball, sort of moist, covered
21:48
in powdered sugar. And I
21:50
always thought of it with
21:52
this incredible family recipe. And
21:54
so last year, I
21:56
wanted to help my
21:59
grandmother. grandma make these cookies. She's
22:01
81 now. And
22:03
so I go over there thinking that
22:05
I'm gonna be getting some insight
22:07
into my grandma's old recipes. They
22:11
were gonna make this chocolate ball covered
22:13
in powdered sugar that she referred to
22:15
as Mexican wedding cakes. But
22:18
instead of a recipe known only to grandma, she
22:21
pulls out a little
22:23
piece of cardboard with
22:25
a recipe on the back of a
22:27
Lando Lake's butter box from like 1973.
22:32
So my grandma lied to me by
22:35
making cookies off of a Lando Lake's box.
22:40
It is pretty cool to
22:42
think that every recipe originated
22:44
somewhere, perhaps embellished along the
22:46
way or fused with other
22:48
traditions and ingredients. But
22:51
sometimes it is the simplest dishes that
22:53
stick with us. Like this
22:55
next dish for chef Martin Yan,
22:57
host of the public television show,
23:00
Yan Can Cook. There's
23:02
so many exquisite dishes that I
23:04
have the privilege to taste. They
23:07
are created by some of the absolutely
23:09
best chef in the world. But
23:12
if you ask me for my
23:15
all time absolute, absolute favorite the
23:18
one that stays in my mind, throughout
23:20
not just my career, but my
23:22
life, I will have to say the
23:25
simple home cooked Chinese sausage with
23:27
dry mushroom, steamed and a bed
23:29
of white rice in a clay
23:32
pot. It is humble, nothing
23:35
fancy, but embodies everything the
23:37
good food is supposed to make
23:39
us all feel. It
23:42
clay pot rice with a steamed
23:44
Chinese sausage in some mushroom. It
23:46
was that I look forward to when
23:48
I came home from school when I
23:51
was a little kid in
23:53
China. I was there waiting
23:55
in my mom's little kitchen, but
23:57
I could smell that irresistible.
24:00
a system of aroma before I set
24:02
food in our house. It
24:05
was home, it was comforting. It
24:07
was my mom, the one
24:09
person who first inspired me to step
24:12
into a kitchen. And
24:14
the rest, as they say, is
24:17
history. There's something
24:19
about the image of simple steamed rice in
24:21
a clay pot that is soothing, kind
24:24
of like mom's chicken noodle soup. Something
24:26
so comforting, it may just have
24:28
healing properties. For me, a healing
24:31
dish is a lemon and rice soup.
24:33
I learned from my mother-in-law in Cyprus.
24:36
But for this next listener, a homemade
24:38
stew was her ticket out of
24:40
the hospital. My
24:42
name is L.A. and this is my soup
24:44
story. When I was
24:46
19, I had major surgery. It
24:49
took a while to recover and ask
24:51
per hospital rules, they won't
24:53
release you until you can eat or
24:55
digest properly. And
24:58
in my case, that wasn't happening with the hospital food. So
25:01
a family friend brought me Dorotsebi, or
25:04
Dorowood, a traditional food that is
25:06
eaten in Eritrean Ethiopia, which
25:09
is essentially spicy chicken stew with
25:11
hard-boiled egg. The
25:13
nurses were adamant that I do not eat that. We
25:16
chose to not listen to them, and voila,
25:18
that did the trick. I was released
25:21
the next day. To this
25:23
day, our family friend brags that her
25:25
food is healing. We've
25:31
heard stories about family and friends, but
25:34
what about romantic love? For
25:36
Dave from Ruckersville, Virginia, cooking was a way
25:38
to try and get a girl to marry
25:40
him. But first, he had to
25:42
learn his way around the kitchen. My
25:45
mom was the worst cook on earth. I
25:48
knew I could do better. Dave
25:51
taught himself to cook by watching TV chefs.
25:54
And one day, he decided he wanted
25:56
to impress a special date with a
25:58
special dish. Keith Wellington.
26:01
I got out a bottle of
26:04
a Virginia Bordeaux blend. Wellington
26:08
comes out of the oven in
26:10
its puff pastry glory, perfect
26:13
in the center. The
26:15
puff pastry tightened perfectly
26:17
around the tenderloin and the
26:19
duck cells layer. I
26:22
sliced it up, plated
26:25
it perfectly. Asparagus
26:27
on the side. Hollandaise
26:31
in a little saucepan.
26:36
And the wine. The
26:38
Wellington was memorable. Did
26:41
she marry him? Well, not yet.
26:44
After eight or nine or ten or eleven
26:46
or twelve other meals, she
26:48
finally agreed to marry me. And
26:51
that's why I'm the luckiest guy in the world. Because
26:53
I get to make really great things for
26:56
her. Okay,
26:59
one more story before we get back to my mom. We
27:02
got several stories that honor those who are no longer
27:04
with us. You shared that every
27:06
time you make your grandmother's gnocchi, it's like she's
27:08
there in the room with you. And
27:11
we got this story from Roberta about
27:13
Squash Ogratan and her sister.
27:17
The recipe I'm sharing today is very
27:19
special to me and I will try not to cry too
27:21
much. My older sister passed
27:25
away with no warning in
27:28
January of 2022. Roberta's
27:31
sister, Ellie, worked at a Spanish
27:33
tapas restaurant. Roberta said that
27:35
she remembers the food there being delicious. Crispy
27:39
and fiery pepatas bravas. Rich
27:41
and creamy tortilla, spamula, always
27:43
enough pitchers of sangria to go around. But
27:47
the best thing we ever ate there was
27:49
the Squash Ogratan. It was
27:51
so good that my sister swiped the recipe off of
27:54
the chef's counter one day so that she could recreate
27:56
it at home. After
27:58
we made it together that year. we made it together
28:01
every Thanksgiving and Christmas that we lived in the
28:03
same city. It was
28:05
an instant classic in our family beloved
28:07
by all who tried it, marvelously
28:10
gooey and embodying everything cozy about
28:12
fall and winter food. So,
28:17
grab a Kleenex if you need to, I know
28:19
I do, and enjoy this wonderful
28:22
squash au gratu. You
28:24
can make substitutions on the squash or the
28:26
cheese variety if you absolutely must, but
28:29
Ellie and I always agreed that it was worth
28:31
the scavenger hunt to get the right squash and
28:33
the right cheese. We'd
28:39
like to thank our listeners, family, and
28:41
friends who sent in their memories. Now,
28:46
my family has lots of food stories,
28:48
but there was always one that my
28:50
family told over and over again that
28:53
makes me chuckle. The duck
28:55
story. Do you want to tell
28:57
the story about when Teta came
28:59
to visit in America? Why, but I said
29:02
we're gonna leave out names here so as not
29:04
to embarrass anyone or get anyone in trouble with
29:06
the law. But essentially, my Teta
29:08
came to visit my uncle in Queens,
29:10
New York decades ago. They
29:13
were walking in a park when my
29:15
uncle saw something. Yeah, he saw a
29:17
duck. I think it
29:19
was on the grass and
29:22
the water. Was there like a
29:24
lake or a pond? Teta, it
29:27
was a pond, of course. He
29:29
was admiring this duck, thinking, what
29:31
a beautiful animal. He loved
29:33
this duck so much that
29:36
he took it. He bent
29:38
down and he took it. He
29:41
just picked it up. Yes. And didn't like try to bite
29:43
him? I
29:45
think so, maybe. He loved it. He
29:48
took it. He
29:50
was in the country too. He
29:52
had no idea. No, he thought
29:54
it's something in the ground, walking.
29:57
Allegedly, he thought a duck would be
29:59
a great gift. gift for his young daughter. To
30:02
have it for his daughter to play with. You're
30:04
lying mom. No. You
30:06
took it as a pet? He took it just for fun. To her.
30:08
But the truth is he didn't just want a pet. He
30:11
actually wanted to do it to cook it, to
30:13
eat it. It's a duck. My
30:19
mom was there. Of course. You
30:21
know. So this
30:23
daughter is poor duck in the
30:25
bathroom or something. Yeah. In
30:27
his bathroom. At the time of home. And
30:31
my mom cleaned it for them. And
30:35
they cooked it. And
30:37
they said it is so good. I
30:41
found a duck. I got a duck from sleep. It's
30:43
free from... For
30:53
better or for worse, these are the
30:55
stories that have shaped us. They've given us
30:57
last through the years recipes to pass
30:59
down and have bonded us with our loved
31:01
ones. Like for me. My
31:04
mom loves cooking for others so much.
31:06
Do you have any idea how many
31:08
fridges she has? Three. Three
31:11
fridges. Yeah. Why do
31:13
you have three fridges? You
31:17
know what, Chloe? I know you ask me
31:19
this. For some reason,
31:21
food for me is love to
31:23
give. For
31:26
me. I know maybe other people
31:28
cannot see that. And
31:30
even if when I cook for my children
31:33
or my grandchildren or for my neighbor or
31:35
friends or whatever it is, I
31:37
want to tell them I love you. That's
31:40
in my heart. We
31:43
love you too. Thank you. I
31:45
love you so much. I love you too. I
31:51
want to share with you how to make
31:54
my grandmother's hot cereal called Belilla. It
31:56
is a great holiday breakfast that reminds
31:58
me of where I come from. I add cinnamon,
32:00
a sprinkle of nutmeg, some agave to sweeten
32:03
it, and a handful of fresh pomegranate to
32:05
give it a bright pop of color, some
32:07
vitamin C, and a little bit of a
32:10
crunch. I'll share the recipe with
32:12
you on our website. As
32:14
always, you can reach me
32:16
at ifthisfoodcouldtalk.com and on social
32:18
media at If This Food Could Talk,
32:20
all one word. I'd love for
32:22
you to share your food memories on social media with
32:24
us. Then pick some of your great
32:26
recipes and tag us. Tisla Mideig
32:29
friends, bless your hands this holiday
32:31
season. Take care.
32:45
Thank you for listening to If This Food Could Talk
32:47
with me, Claudia Hanna. If
32:50
you want to support us, you can follow If This
32:52
Food Could Talk on your favorite podcast listening app. And
32:54
while you're there, please leave us a review. That
32:56
really helps. You
32:58
could also get updates on bonus content
33:00
by following me and American Public Television
33:03
on Instagram, formerly
33:05
known as Twitter and Facebook. You
33:07
can find more information on all of our guests
33:09
this season on each episode show notes. Production
33:13
by Cariad Harmon, Tanner Robbins, Reva
33:15
Goldberg, Jacob Lewis, Claudia Hanna, Nate
33:17
Tobey, John Barth, and the team
33:20
at Great Feeling Studio. Editing
33:23
by Yasmin Khan, sound design by
33:25
Jacob Lewis and Jason Sheafly. Associate
33:28
producer, Kate Hayes. If
33:30
This Food Could Talk is based on an original concept
33:33
by Claudia Hanna. Executive producers
33:35
for APT Podcast Studios are Jim
33:37
Dunford, Cynthia Fenneman, and Sean Halford.
33:40
Art for this podcast was created by
33:42
Jay Nungesser. Special thanks
33:44
to Legal by Cody Brown. APT,
33:47
American Public Television, is the
33:49
leading syndicator of high quality,
33:51
top rated programming to American
33:53
public television stations. You
33:56
can learn more at aptonline.org. you
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