WEBVTT - Simon Schama 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:03.880 Welcome to Ruthie's Table for a production of iHeartRadio and 0:00:03.920 --> 0:00:08.560 Adamized Studios. 0:00:09.480 --> 0:00:12.200 Last night, I was with my good friends Josh Berger 0:00:12.280 --> 0:00:15.720 and Alexander Krapenzano. I said I needed to go and 0:00:15.720 --> 0:00:19.680 write the introduction for Simon Sharma, today's guest, knowing he 0:00:19.720 --> 0:00:22.360 had taught them both at Harvard twenty years ago. As 0:00:22.440 --> 0:00:25.400 good friends do, they did my work for me. 0:00:26.200 --> 0:00:30.520 Simon Shama I never missed his class, and the other 0:00:30.560 --> 0:00:32.839 thing that I would never want to miss was I 0:00:32.880 --> 0:00:35.880 wanted to see what waistcoat and what glasses he would wear, 0:00:35.920 --> 0:00:39.560 because he was not only brilliant and articulate and taught 0:00:39.560 --> 0:00:43.600 me about architecture and about art and politics in Europe, 0:00:44.040 --> 0:00:46.240 but he also taught me how to look good. 0:00:50.640 --> 0:00:53.559 I would simply say that Simon was and is an 0:00:53.600 --> 0:00:57.320 extraordinary storyteller. So we would all sit in his class, 0:00:57.320 --> 0:01:00.640 and I took British Empire with him, and we would 0:01:00.680 --> 0:01:03.400 be riveted the way that we would be riveted watching 0:01:03.680 --> 0:01:06.520 a thriller a suspense movie, because we would just be 0:01:06.680 --> 0:01:08.000 hanging on every word. 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:13.240 Art and politics in Europe. From sixteen sixty to eighteen twenty, 0:01:13.640 --> 0:01:17.480 he was the best professor at Harvard, and I was 0:01:17.560 --> 0:01:21.240 gutted when he went to Columbia. 0:01:21.440 --> 0:01:24.520 Simon is our most renowned historian. His books on the 0:01:24.520 --> 0:01:28.200 French Revolution, the Dutch Masters, or most recently, Foreign Bodies, 0:01:28.520 --> 0:01:31.679 an Exploration of Pandemics, and the Health of Nations have 0:01:31.880 --> 0:01:35.640 changed the way we think. His television series Civilization, The 0:01:35.680 --> 0:01:38.039 Story of the Jews, and the Power of Art have 0:01:38.160 --> 0:01:41.560 reached millions. I know all this about Simon, but I 0:01:41.720 --> 0:01:45.120 know something else. He is a fantastic cook. There is 0:01:45.200 --> 0:01:47.840 much to admire and respect and being off of Simon, 0:01:47.960 --> 0:01:50.880 all of which I do. But quite simply, he's my 0:01:50.960 --> 0:01:51.600 great friend. 0:01:52.760 --> 0:01:55.200 Thank you, Ruthie Well. I film my work on this 0:01:55.240 --> 0:01:56.000 Earth is done? 0:01:56.200 --> 0:02:02.160 Yeah, because I were there. I guess when was that? 0:02:02.280 --> 0:02:04.440 Was it twenty years ago? I think Joshua was longer 0:02:04.480 --> 0:02:06.040 than that because I've been at the Union. 0:02:06.480 --> 0:02:09.040 I think it more like probably more like thirty, because 0:02:09.080 --> 0:02:13.679 I moved from Harvard to Columbia in ninety three. But 0:02:13.720 --> 0:02:15.799 they're very kind, and I don't. 0:02:15.680 --> 0:02:17.919 Think they're kind because it's something I've heard over and 0:02:17.960 --> 0:02:20.839 over again. Okay, praise is embarrassing you, So why don't 0:02:20.880 --> 0:02:24.200 we go straight to the food and talk about your cooking? 0:02:24.280 --> 0:02:26.519 You just made a recipe in the kitchen of the 0:02:26.600 --> 0:02:29.560 River Cafe, or you helped watched. I'm not sure which 0:02:29.680 --> 0:02:31.919 verb would you like to read the recipe for? 0:02:32.440 --> 0:02:37.440 Yeah, this is Taliarini with broad beans and pancetta, and 0:02:38.200 --> 0:02:40.680 you chose to. I think principally because of the broad beans. 0:02:41.680 --> 0:02:44.799 One of my nicknames, one of my two nicknames at 0:02:44.840 --> 0:02:48.440 school when I was about twelve, was Beanie. And because 0:02:48.480 --> 0:02:52.639 I was, I was obsessively. I was obsessively enjoyed all 0:02:52.800 --> 0:02:56.519 forms of beans. I really really still do, but I 0:02:56.520 --> 0:02:59.000 think I enjoyed broad beans the most. 0:02:59.120 --> 0:03:01.320 I love the way they have and I love the 0:03:01.360 --> 0:03:03.720 way the color is different, that you get that pale 0:03:03.800 --> 0:03:05.720 green color and then you. 0:03:05.840 --> 0:03:07.400 And it's a tope color. 0:03:07.480 --> 0:03:11.000 Yeah yeah, yeah, Okay, so read your read this recipe. 0:03:11.080 --> 0:03:13.919 Here's here's the recipe. Should I read the ingredients first 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:14.440 as well? 0:03:14.480 --> 0:03:14.880 Okay? 0:03:15.120 --> 0:03:20.320 So fifty grams butter, four tbs tablespoons olive oil, one 0:03:20.400 --> 0:03:26.320 small trapea onion, finely sliced, two garlic cloves, finally sliced, 0:03:26.880 --> 0:03:31.640 one hundred grams of pancetta match stick cut into match sticks. 0:03:31.639 --> 0:03:35.520 Four hundred grams very healthy of broad beans, one hundred 0:03:35.600 --> 0:03:39.560 milli liters of dry white wine, two hundred and fifty 0:03:39.600 --> 0:03:44.720 grams of fine pasta taliarini, a small bunch of mint 0:03:45.560 --> 0:03:48.880 and a small bunch of basil, both torn I think, 0:03:49.560 --> 0:03:54.240 and fifty grams of peccorino. And yes, what was going 0:03:54.280 --> 0:03:56.280 on in the kitchen, very beautiful light. It helped a 0:03:56.280 --> 0:03:59.920 bit with you just do a very simple, lovely braik 0:04:00.160 --> 0:04:03.520 is of the onion and the garlic. For about fighting 0:04:03.520 --> 0:04:07.480 the butter and oil together, which is never be afraid 0:04:07.480 --> 0:04:12.559 of doing that until soft, and then the panchetta matchsticks 0:04:12.560 --> 0:04:15.680 go in, so everything is braizening together. You don't want 0:04:15.720 --> 0:04:19.400 and I was talking to jess whom I was cooking, 0:04:20.040 --> 0:04:21.880 you don't This is not a recipe where you want 0:04:21.880 --> 0:04:26.000 the panchetta to crisp up. So you you really wanted 0:04:26.279 --> 0:04:27.400 gentle braize. 0:04:28.120 --> 0:04:28.240 Hi. 0:04:28.360 --> 0:04:30.839 I'm Jessica Philbey, and I work at the River Cafe 0:04:31.400 --> 0:04:35.400 and we're here today making broadbean and panchetta sauce with 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:40.599 Simon Sharman. He started with a little bit of choppia 0:04:40.640 --> 0:04:44.200 onion in the base, which I just kind of melted down, 0:04:44.440 --> 0:04:45.960 and then I put the panchetter. 0:04:45.640 --> 0:04:50.280 In until that already an idiot, I haven't had my coffee. 0:04:50.240 --> 0:04:54.120 It's so it's a tiny bit of good panta and then. 0:04:54.000 --> 0:04:55.039 A little bit of garlic. 0:04:55.320 --> 0:04:57.120 Okay, we never used too much garlic. 0:04:57.360 --> 0:04:59.240 Okay, we don't have to overpower anything. 0:04:59.520 --> 0:05:02.440 Right, everything is brazing exactly. 0:05:04.000 --> 0:05:07.480 So you're not fantastic, so you're not wanting the pants 0:05:07.560 --> 0:05:10.280 to eat Crispye, I get it, I get it. 0:05:10.560 --> 0:05:11.640 Yeah, I get it. 0:05:12.320 --> 0:05:15.200 And I'm going to add a little at the. 0:05:15.200 --> 0:05:16.000 End, and. 0:05:18.000 --> 0:05:21.800 Okay, okay, and then comes the magic moment of adding 0:05:21.880 --> 0:05:25.359 the broad beans in their skins and stir to coat 0:05:25.680 --> 0:05:30.720 you fling the wine in, and then the gentle brazing 0:05:30.760 --> 0:05:35.960 heat goes down even lower and everything marries together. You're 0:05:36.240 --> 0:05:40.679 you're non stop stirring, but but only for about five 0:05:40.720 --> 0:05:44.080 minutes or so, again making sure the beans don't just 0:05:44.240 --> 0:05:49.120 completely mush up. And then you can actually be used 0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:54.159 a free standing mixer. Processor recipe here says of course 0:05:54.240 --> 0:05:57.200 pure but actually what we did was sort of bash 0:05:57.360 --> 0:06:02.080 the beans really going to wait, yeah, oh yeah, so 0:06:02.839 --> 0:06:16.479 right a stands next, right, And then we were just 0:06:16.520 --> 0:06:20.560 making the sauce. So the talierini has to obviously talierini, 0:06:20.680 --> 0:06:23.800 like all very fine pasta. You're cooking it and then 0:06:23.880 --> 0:06:25.839 almost I don't know, what do you think? You know, 0:06:25.960 --> 0:06:29.440 a minute, two minutes you're really basically chanking out almost 0:06:29.440 --> 0:06:31.719 as soon as the water has come to a boil. 0:06:32.520 --> 0:06:35.440 Make sure you keep a little half a cup of 0:06:35.480 --> 0:06:38.640 the pasta water. It's going to carry on cooking when 0:06:38.680 --> 0:06:46.839 you're adding it to the sauce. Okay, yes, you add 0:06:46.839 --> 0:06:48.000 the pasta to the source, not. 0:06:47.960 --> 0:06:51.040 The way around. Always it's supposed to cook in this 0:06:51.160 --> 0:06:52.000 source exactly. 0:06:53.120 --> 0:06:56.520 People to do that, because then that whole idea. Also also, 0:06:56.560 --> 0:07:00.680 I don't drain pasta. I always you have if you 0:07:00.720 --> 0:07:03.200 have a colander next to you and you just lift, 0:07:03.279 --> 0:07:06.160 especially if you just lift it out over the pot, 0:07:06.600 --> 0:07:08.640 put it into the colender with a pair of tongs, 0:07:08.680 --> 0:07:10.840 and then put it into the sauce next to it. 0:07:10.920 --> 0:07:12.720 You don't have to do that thing of carrying it 0:07:12.760 --> 0:07:15.760 over to the sink, draining the pasta, putting it back 0:07:15.760 --> 0:07:17.440 in the pan. But you're just and also then you 0:07:17.520 --> 0:07:20.240 get a bit of the water from the pasta into 0:07:20.280 --> 0:07:22.720 the sauce, which kind of you know, which I always said, 0:07:22.760 --> 0:07:28.480 I always loved the Marcella Hazan when she says toss, toss, toss, 0:07:28.720 --> 0:07:31.600 and then toss again. And I think that also is 0:07:31.640 --> 0:07:33.840 that kind of you know that you can't almost you 0:07:33.880 --> 0:07:35.480 can't toss pasta enough. 0:07:35.640 --> 0:07:37.520 No, absolutely right. 0:07:37.880 --> 0:07:40.679 I'm interested that you chose a recipe, that the recipe 0:07:40.720 --> 0:07:42.840 has pancetta in it, and that brings us to our 0:07:42.880 --> 0:07:45.680 next kind of starting at the very beginning of the 0:07:45.680 --> 0:07:48.320 Shama household. So because you did grow up in a 0:07:48.360 --> 0:07:52.360 kosher home and so was panchetta. But we did an 0:07:52.400 --> 0:07:54.240 interview with Otto Lenki the other day and he was 0:07:54.280 --> 0:07:56.280 telling us that in Tel Aviv there was a man 0:07:56.280 --> 0:07:59.200 who sold pork under the counter like and prohibition. 0:07:59.480 --> 0:08:04.680 But did you have it's called it's called bassar la 0:08:04.720 --> 0:08:09.880 vonne in which means literally white flesh. Actually that's the 0:08:09.920 --> 0:08:13.040 Hebrew for white flesh. So it's no longer very secretive. No, 0:08:13.040 --> 0:08:15.760 it was very kosher, strictly kosher. 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:18.320 Tell me about your family, Well. 0:08:18.520 --> 0:08:20.880 They were both great storytellers, my mother and father. I 0:08:20.960 --> 0:08:24.880 had a sister who was She died hence I was 0:08:24.920 --> 0:08:28.440 about twelve years ago now thirteen years older than me, 0:08:29.160 --> 0:08:33.600 and I wasn't meant to happen. Particularly my mother started 0:08:34.000 --> 0:08:37.200 she had a job as secretary to have an aircraft 0:08:37.240 --> 0:08:41.120 corporation executives during the war, and then she was so brilliant, 0:08:41.200 --> 0:08:46.080 ferociously organizationally brilliant, she became PA personal assistant, as a basil, 0:08:46.160 --> 0:08:47.960 you know, the head of the whole thing, within about 0:08:48.000 --> 0:08:48.680 six months. 0:08:49.120 --> 0:08:50.360 So come the end of the war. 0:08:50.400 --> 0:08:52.800 I was born in early nineteen forty five, the war 0:08:52.880 --> 0:08:56.520 was going on. I was a massive inconvenience and would 0:08:56.559 --> 0:08:59.200 not have happened, I think, had it not been for 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:01.280 the fact that when my parents were living, which was 0:09:01.400 --> 0:09:06.560 near to the Haveland HQ in Nebworth, and Havlan was 0:09:06.600 --> 0:09:09.920 in Welling Garden City in Hertfordshire, and their next door 0:09:09.960 --> 0:09:13.920 neighbor was an obstetrician, a rather fancy society obstetrician. I 0:09:14.040 --> 0:09:16.440 only know this to be true because he confirmed it 0:09:16.640 --> 0:09:19.440 wrote me a lovely letter when I became a young 0:09:19.520 --> 0:09:22.040 don at Cambridge, saying, well, you not only would not 0:09:22.080 --> 0:09:23.520 have been a dom, but you wouldn't have been any 0:09:23.800 --> 0:09:25.600 You wouldn't have been around at all had it not 0:09:25.679 --> 0:09:28.240 for my persuading your mother that was a good idea 0:09:28.320 --> 0:09:31.600 have this baby. So he told her, he said, well, 0:09:31.640 --> 0:09:33.880 if you decide you should have this baby, and you 0:09:33.880 --> 0:09:36.640 can have this baby in Morova. In my very fancy 0:09:37.000 --> 0:09:40.200 clinic in Maryland and Wilbury Street, And what he did 0:09:40.200 --> 0:09:43.760 not realize was that Wilburg Street would be the receiver 0:09:43.960 --> 0:09:46.520 of one of the last V two rocket raids. But 0:09:46.640 --> 0:09:49.840 it didn't hit the clinic. It missed me and the clinic, 0:09:50.400 --> 0:09:54.360 so I was not supposed to happen. Courtesy of both 0:09:54.400 --> 0:09:59.320 my mother and Adolf Hitler, you know, nonetheless, actually I 0:09:59.480 --> 0:10:00.280 made it through. 0:10:00.400 --> 0:10:01.120 No, not together. 0:10:01.200 --> 0:10:04.480 They weren't in cahoots, so we were fairly stric My 0:10:04.520 --> 0:10:07.880 father was what did he do well? He wanted to 0:10:07.880 --> 0:10:10.320 be in the theater. He was a very theatrical personality. 0:10:10.360 --> 0:10:14.360 He'll be shocked to discover, yes, but it was very 0:10:14.400 --> 0:10:17.600 sad he left school at fourteen. Like a lot of 0:10:17.679 --> 0:10:20.040 Hackney grammar and a lot of those kids. He was 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:25.320 largely but magnificently self educated. I mean we had not all. 0:10:25.360 --> 0:10:28.120 It's a mistake. Actually, I'm going to be really disloyal now. 0:10:28.160 --> 0:10:30.720 But if you're part of the German Jewish community that 0:10:30.800 --> 0:10:33.360 had come around time with the Nuremberg Laws or later, 0:10:33.760 --> 0:10:35.839 your house was full of books. If you're part of 0:10:35.880 --> 0:10:39.400 an older ashkar Nazi community, not quite so much. My 0:10:39.480 --> 0:10:43.120 father was very unusual in having not only all of Dickens, 0:10:43.120 --> 0:10:46.080 all of Shakespeare, all of George Eliot. But he had 0:10:46.160 --> 0:10:50.640 things like you know, Manzoni's in translation The Betrothed. He 0:10:50.720 --> 0:10:54.640 had all of Honorary Balzac's comedy men. So and he 0:10:54.679 --> 0:10:58.240 would read out loud on Sunday afternoons. So he wanted 0:10:58.280 --> 0:10:58.680 to be in the. 0:10:58.720 --> 0:11:01.360 Theater generation and came from another well. 0:11:01.360 --> 0:11:03.920 My father was born in nineteen hundred and one. His 0:11:04.160 --> 0:11:09.760 father was born in Botshan in Romania, and my father's 0:11:10.320 --> 0:11:15.920 grandfather was born in Ismea in Ottoman, Turkey. So my father, however, 0:11:16.160 --> 0:11:19.840 his you know, we went to the theater a lot. 0:11:20.240 --> 0:11:24.199 He produced charity shows which ranged because he had lots 0:11:24.200 --> 0:11:28.120 of lots of Thespian friends, actors and producers, Ralph Richardson, 0:11:28.160 --> 0:11:31.680 for example, to her own Guthrie. And he produced from 0:11:32.360 --> 0:11:35.720 you know, productions of Macbeth to Oklahoma at the Golden 0:11:35.760 --> 0:11:36.480 Green Hypotome. 0:11:36.559 --> 0:11:39.040 So yeah, he did. 0:11:39.200 --> 0:11:42.199 He did so when I was about eight or nine, 0:11:42.320 --> 0:11:44.120 I think, So that was really lovely. 0:11:44.240 --> 0:11:44.880 Did he cook? 0:11:45.559 --> 0:11:49.040 No, my mother was an arduous. 0:11:49.320 --> 0:11:53.400 I feel guilty as all Jurwish sons do about slagging 0:11:53.400 --> 0:11:56.400 off my mom as a cook. She was an enthusiast, 0:11:56.440 --> 0:11:58.520 and there was something she could do. She was from 0:11:58.559 --> 0:12:03.360 a different Jewish tradition. She was from Lithuania, pure Ashkenazi, 0:12:03.520 --> 0:12:07.360 so they were soups she was good at. There was 0:12:07.360 --> 0:12:10.440 one called Garden of Eden soup, which was based on 0:12:10.679 --> 0:12:15.240 lambstock and lambones and ballei, which was a kind of 0:12:15.280 --> 0:12:18.600 deep classic Lithuania, which was actually very good in the 0:12:18.600 --> 0:12:21.840 middle of winter, and sometimes white beans as well, butter 0:12:21.880 --> 0:12:26.240 beans or small white beans. She went into the kitchen 0:12:26.640 --> 0:12:28.640 because she actually what happened to her after the war, 0:12:28.679 --> 0:12:33.000 she had to abandon her job. I was there now, 0:12:33.559 --> 0:12:36.400 and she did not really want to be back as 0:12:36.559 --> 0:12:40.720 what was then called housewife. Really, one scary moment I 0:12:40.760 --> 0:12:43.680 will never forget is when my mother she had these 0:12:43.760 --> 0:12:46.959 old mincers, you know that you attached you still some 0:12:47.040 --> 0:12:50.360 restaurants still have them, actually, so you clamped them onto 0:12:50.400 --> 0:12:53.400 a table, right exactly, so you've got a coarse mince. 0:12:54.040 --> 0:12:58.960 And when she was mincing up some beef, she managed 0:12:59.000 --> 0:13:02.560 to mince the end of one of her fingers, and 0:13:02.760 --> 0:13:05.000 so she bled a bit into it. I looked at 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:07.360 this with I must have been like nine or something, 0:13:07.840 --> 0:13:10.520 with horror, and I remember her poking around with the 0:13:10.520 --> 0:13:13.560 thought trying to find She did wrap her finger in 0:13:13.600 --> 0:13:17.000 a bandage, but carried on cooking, and she never really 0:13:17.000 --> 0:13:20.800 found a better finger, and she did produce these clops, 0:13:20.840 --> 0:13:23.120 you know, the equivalent to a kind of kosher hamburger. 0:13:23.400 --> 0:13:26.200 And I looked on with absolute horror. And my mother 0:13:26.440 --> 0:13:30.440 said she was good when she made jokes, which wasn't 0:13:30.679 --> 0:13:33.560 that often. They were very funny, and she said, don't 0:13:33.600 --> 0:13:36.480 tell your father, after all, it's perfectly kosher. 0:13:37.440 --> 0:13:41.440 So I was looking see if. 0:13:41.320 --> 0:13:45.360 My dad suddenly, you know, was chewing suspiciously. 0:13:45.640 --> 0:13:48.680 Really, it's quite interesting that women who don't have an 0:13:48.720 --> 0:13:51.000 interest in cooking, you know, that they don't have to, 0:13:51.200 --> 0:13:54.280 you know that Actually, if there was so many other things, 0:13:54.320 --> 0:13:59.360 she might have been interested that in perhaps. But what's interesting, 0:13:59.360 --> 0:14:01.840 I suppose, is but what did you actually then eat? 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:05.079 The meal? Times and pleasure for someone who loves food 0:14:05.160 --> 0:14:08.120 so much, right, did you sit down to dinner and 0:14:08.240 --> 0:14:10.800 just wish that it tasted better? Or did you not? 0:14:11.120 --> 0:14:13.920 Yeah, my mother, there was what my sister and I 0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:18.120 called a Friday night Memorial chicken, which was inevitably over roasted, 0:14:18.640 --> 0:14:24.000 and in deference to my father's love affair with garlic, 0:14:24.040 --> 0:14:27.000 which my mother did not share. There'd be one lonely 0:14:27.160 --> 0:14:31.040 clove rattling around there somewhere, so it was always dried 0:14:31.080 --> 0:14:36.800 out that we really wished. Chicken suit made from scratch 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:39.040 was actually okay. 0:14:39.440 --> 0:14:41.880 You sit down to dinner every night as a family. 0:14:42.000 --> 0:14:44.480 You did, And so she would prepare dinner, your father 0:14:44.480 --> 0:14:46.640 would come home, and you and your sister, when she 0:14:46.720 --> 0:14:47.720 was well, love. 0:14:47.600 --> 0:14:49.480 To contract the one thing I went to before we 0:14:49.720 --> 0:14:50.920 leave the family kitchen. 0:14:50.920 --> 0:14:53.160 Now let's not the family kitch. We can say the 0:14:53.160 --> 0:14:53.560 one thing. 0:14:53.480 --> 0:14:57.040 My mother did very well, which was and it's interesting 0:14:57.160 --> 0:15:04.840 in English cooking because famously fried, not poached, gefilterfish, that's 0:15:04.880 --> 0:15:10.600 a rather horrible graying thing, kosher form of keneld brochet. 0:15:10.680 --> 0:15:10.880 Here. 0:15:13.160 --> 0:15:16.560 The first time that Jewish cooking appears that I know 0:15:16.720 --> 0:15:22.360 of in print is Eliza Acton's book Cookery Book, which 0:15:22.400 --> 0:15:24.480 is I think is eighteen forty five, and there's a 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:29.320 little add on chapter in the second edition on Jewish cooking, 0:15:29.360 --> 0:15:36.480 which is then slightly fancy Safardi, Balkan and Turkish cooking 0:15:37.040 --> 0:15:40.560 kind of fried fish patties instead as we'd say codcakes 0:15:40.640 --> 0:15:43.880 or something like that, which she describes as being eaten 0:15:44.080 --> 0:15:48.120 cold sometimes in the morning, even for breakfast, which we did. 0:15:48.520 --> 0:15:52.120 My mother did that very very well. Actually, did they 0:15:52.120 --> 0:15:55.640 going to take you to restaurants? Yes, this is the 0:15:55.760 --> 0:15:59.080 arbitrary in us of being kosher. If you're really strictly, 0:15:59.120 --> 0:16:02.880 strictly super cooked, you would never go to anything except 0:16:02.920 --> 0:16:07.640 coacial restaurants that my parents had redefined the torah and 0:16:07.720 --> 0:16:11.720 the rules of casual would say, it's fine, providing you 0:16:11.840 --> 0:16:15.960 don't have bacon or don't have meat, which is absurd, 0:16:16.080 --> 0:16:20.520 of course. So we went to places like in again 0:16:20.600 --> 0:16:25.560 the fifties, the Trocadero, which was so grand and then 0:16:25.680 --> 0:16:31.280 owned by our mutual wonderful friend Nigella's family. The Salmon's 0:16:31.960 --> 0:16:35.880 and that was magnificent. I remember seeing and not quite 0:16:35.920 --> 0:16:38.680 believing the miracle of peanuts sitting in what I thought 0:16:38.720 --> 0:16:41.280 was the silver bowl. It was a really stainless steel 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:44.560 and then you went down The Savoy Grille was another place. 0:16:45.200 --> 0:16:47.360 But these for special occasions. 0:16:48.760 --> 0:16:51.960 We're going, yes, yes, yes, the latter we certainly would 0:16:51.960 --> 0:16:55.480 go special occasions, Scott's and Simpsons, I think, you know. 0:16:55.480 --> 0:16:58.680 And the place was sort of just steaming, though quite grand. 0:16:58.760 --> 0:17:02.600 Yes, when my dad was travagunts in that way. If you. 0:17:02.840 --> 0:17:06.840 He was very much like Max Biali Stock and the 0:17:06.880 --> 0:17:15.240 producers flaunted baby so yes so clash and turines and 0:17:15.840 --> 0:17:20.240 the ceremoniousness of eating fish particularly. We were a great 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:22.560 dover sole family fish. 0:17:22.600 --> 0:17:26.919 So eating out and eating at home and eating well 0:17:27.720 --> 0:17:30.439 it was a priority. Yeah kind of idea that. 0:17:30.720 --> 0:17:35.440 Yeah, yes, the family was food. There's no doubt. Whatever 0:17:35.480 --> 0:17:40.199 one thought of the food, it was crucial. And we've 0:17:40.760 --> 0:17:43.199 my wife and I have always I mean not I 0:17:43.200 --> 0:17:46.199 don't want to pat ourselves on the back ingrediously, but 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:50.240 we we we taught our children how to cook from 0:17:50.280 --> 0:17:52.960 the time they were quite young, the very good cooks, 0:17:52.960 --> 0:17:55.080 both of them, and it was all There were no 0:17:55.280 --> 0:17:58.000 TV dinners. I mean, we sat I sound so snobby 0:17:58.040 --> 0:18:01.240 and grand here, and of course they'd go off, you know, 0:18:01.240 --> 0:18:03.560 if they had an extra late class at school, they 0:18:03.600 --> 0:18:05.720 would go off and have a pizza, a hamburg or something. 0:18:06.000 --> 0:18:11.560 But overwhelmingly, really that family dinner was crucial because you talked. 0:18:11.680 --> 0:18:16.400 And you know, even when they were tight lipped teenagers, 0:18:16.400 --> 0:18:17.320 still your talk. 0:18:17.560 --> 0:18:32.919 So when you left this home of you know, a food, 0:18:32.960 --> 0:18:35.879 of sitting down at the table of your mother cooking, 0:18:35.920 --> 0:18:38.360 your father with this great character, and you went. Did 0:18:38.359 --> 0:18:40.520 you go straight to university when you went? 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:43.040 Well, I had the second gap year, I had most 0:18:43.080 --> 0:18:46.280 of a gap year, and I was actually briefly on 0:18:46.359 --> 0:18:49.080 a kind of slightly broken down cruise ship that went 0:18:49.119 --> 0:18:52.720 from Marseille to either Alexandria and Haifa, and I would 0:18:52.760 --> 0:18:56.920 poke around the kitchens there and sometimes actually even yeah exactly, 0:18:57.040 --> 0:19:00.320 and just was, you know, massively in awe of these 0:19:00.359 --> 0:19:03.480 gigantic tururines, some stuff that would be served out to 0:19:03.560 --> 0:19:05.760 all classes of passengers. 0:19:05.840 --> 0:19:07.920 And then working on Kibootz, you were. 0:19:07.920 --> 0:19:12.639 Very close to too close sometimes too you know, the 0:19:12.640 --> 0:19:15.439 way the way food happened. I worked in the chicken 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:19.000 shed on Kibbutz, the so called lull, which was they 0:19:19.000 --> 0:19:22.040 weren't bastery chickens, but they were they were sure not 0:19:22.160 --> 0:19:26.080 free rereach inside, and my job was to load them 0:19:26.240 --> 0:19:30.520 onto the trucks going to the slaughter house, which was 0:19:30.560 --> 0:19:33.080 not fun. In case you didn't know, and I expect 0:19:33.160 --> 0:19:36.080 you did, the way to stop a chicken panicking is 0:19:36.119 --> 0:19:39.800 to turn it upside down. Yeah, exactly, hold it with 0:19:39.840 --> 0:19:41.480 the legs. Say that wasn't great. 0:19:41.520 --> 0:19:43.520 Did you seek out when you were in that year 0:19:43.560 --> 0:19:46.440 abroad and apart from me on the kobbootz. Would you 0:19:46.960 --> 0:19:50.000 seek out the food of wherever you were, something that 0:19:50.119 --> 0:19:51.640 was food. 0:19:51.840 --> 0:19:53.440 I loved Arab food. 0:19:53.640 --> 0:19:57.120 Actually, I had a distant relative was a mining engineer 0:19:57.200 --> 0:20:01.240 in the Negev Desert, and he rattled around in an 0:20:01.280 --> 0:20:07.719 old jeep. He was an incredibly romantic, rather raffish Bohemian figure. 0:20:07.840 --> 0:20:11.439 Well Bohemian isn't quite right, but certainly he belonged to 0:20:11.840 --> 0:20:15.520 a colorful generation. So he was a very romagic ficure 0:20:15.560 --> 0:20:18.000 of me. And he was he spoke Arabic very well. 0:20:18.400 --> 0:20:23.520 And we ate a lot of Arab mets actually in Wonderful. 0:20:23.880 --> 0:20:26.400 And the year then was ninety sixty two sixty three, 0:20:26.480 --> 0:20:30.280 so that was actually, you know, I don't know, maybe 0:20:30.320 --> 0:20:36.600 it's you know, the tragic and poisonous enmity that now exists. 0:20:37.240 --> 0:20:40.040 We didn't necessarily, I mean, maybe we're kidding ourselves, but 0:20:40.080 --> 0:20:43.480 we didn't feel I mean, there were so many, so 0:20:43.520 --> 0:20:46.320 many Arab prints of it, so many Bedwin friends actually, 0:20:46.760 --> 0:20:51.320 so that was something so long before Wonderful, your Tam 0:20:51.480 --> 0:20:55.240 came along and all our friends. Now you know, I 0:20:55.359 --> 0:20:59.680 knew that what was called Israeli food was basically Arab mostly, 0:21:00.160 --> 0:21:02.240 or you were stuck with my mother's kitchen, you know. 0:21:02.400 --> 0:21:03.320 So that's the way. 0:21:03.800 --> 0:21:06.240 It's a revelation, isn't it now that you know people 0:21:06.280 --> 0:21:08.919 talk about you know, because I grew up Jewish in 0:21:09.040 --> 0:21:13.520 Upstate New York and my parents' family were Ellis Island 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:17.439 immigrants who came and brought the food that they had eaten, 0:21:17.520 --> 0:21:21.600 and food was very basic. I'd say. My grandmother actually 0:21:21.640 --> 0:21:24.920 was like a Hungarian pastry maker. She rolled out the dough, 0:21:25.160 --> 0:21:28.000 she traveled with her rolling pin. But I always tell 0:21:28.040 --> 0:21:30.600 the story, but she came to see her first grandson 0:21:31.119 --> 0:21:33.760 in Woodstock, where we lived on the countryside, and my 0:21:33.760 --> 0:21:36.120 mother said, do you want to see your first grandchild? 0:21:36.200 --> 0:21:38.280 And she said, no, let's eat first, you know. And 0:21:38.359 --> 0:21:41.040 that was that was the kind of the view of 0:21:41.160 --> 0:21:44.000 food in our family. But when you went but also 0:21:44.000 --> 0:21:44.960 Britain was coming around. 0:21:45.000 --> 0:21:46.960 You know, all of the famous story and all of 0:21:47.040 --> 0:21:50.440 Jewish history can be wrapped into three short sentences. They 0:21:50.520 --> 0:21:52.440 tried to kill us, they failed, Let's eat. 0:21:56.480 --> 0:21:59.040 We are now in Cambridge, right? Is that was a Cambridge? 0:21:59.119 --> 0:21:59.320 Yeah? 0:21:59.840 --> 0:22:02.399 That was that really hardcore? Was that sixty? 0:22:02.440 --> 0:22:03.600 Well? I was still Yeah. 0:22:03.920 --> 0:22:06.359 I arrived at christ Culture camebish in ninety sixty three, 0:22:07.000 --> 0:22:09.119 and I was still Kosher, and it was really bizarre 0:22:09.160 --> 0:22:10.080 because I'd stopped. 0:22:09.800 --> 0:22:10.800 Believing in God. 0:22:10.960 --> 0:22:14.560 Really basically, I was certainly at least an agnostic, but 0:22:14.880 --> 0:22:18.280 somehow I didn't want to. My mother would send food, 0:22:18.440 --> 0:22:21.639 including cold chickens sometimes, and I didn't want to offend us. 0:22:21.640 --> 0:22:25.800 That was totally irrational. And I had a great professor 0:22:26.600 --> 0:22:30.560 who we used to have a kind of a supper seminar, 0:22:30.960 --> 0:22:36.320 and who had produced gorgeous, kind of oozy grouse and 0:22:36.400 --> 0:22:39.080 things that everybody else and I would get a kind 0:22:39.119 --> 0:22:44.040 of bouncy rubber cheese from the college. And finally one 0:22:44.080 --> 0:22:48.680