Ep 296: Self Esteem (Live in London)
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Surprise, bitches! Ba-ba-ba!

That's right. We are not stopping releasing these brilliant live episodes from the London Palladium Run. Yes. And this one was recorded on the 22nd of March, 2025. And our guest for the evening was... Rebelf Esti...

self-esteem. Rebecca Lucy Taylor. Rebecca Lucy Taylor, a.k.a. self-esteem. Yes, and I just said the evening, but this is not true, actually. This was an afternoon one. This was a matinee show, which was, what a delight. Yes, it truly was. A podcast in the afternoon at the Palladium. Yes, straight after lunch. Yes. Now, look, as always, there might be some callbacks to the first half that don't make sense, but it doesn't ruin it. Don't worry, it's going to be a laugh. Don't worry, we're cheeky boys, we get away with it. Excited, of

of course to chat I mean you know we've chatted to her already yeah we've already talked to her but we're excited to listen back to her I was excited and I still am it was a lovely chat but as always the audience helped us source a secret ingredient that if Rebecca said it she would be kicked out of the dream restaurant aka the London Palladium

And this week, the secret ingredient is a self-steamed bun. Now, a dad came up with this. We had a few dads come to the live shows, which we can't prevent from happening. We can't stop that. And this particular dad is like self-esteemed bun. Self-esteem. He's trying to say self-esteem. Yeah. He's trying to get a pun going on that.

And we all agreed that if it was a steamed bun that Rebecca herself had steamed, then we would count that as a self-steamed bun and she'd be kicked out. It's the sort of joke that I hate unless I've come up with it. Yeah, I hate it even if I've come up with it. And then, yeah, it meant,

Welcome to the Off Menu Podcast, drinking the puddle of conversation.

Queuing up four individual times for the six-inch subway of humour and never getting ill again. That is their gamble. My name is James A. Kessler. Together we own a dream restaurant. Every single week we invite in a guest and ask them to favour, ever start a main course dessert, side dish and drink. Not in that order. And this week our guest is... Self-esteem! CHEERING

The wonderful Rebecca Lucy Taylor is coming onto this stage to give us her dream menu. We know what the secret ingredient is. If she says it, she's out on her ear, James. Out of the London Palladium. Them's the rules. Is it out of the whole venue, is it? Yeah, out of the London Palladium. Kick, kick. Rebecca Lucy Taylor out onto the streets. Okay, that's going to be interesting if that happens. I hope it doesn't happen. I hope it doesn't happen, actually, because I think we've talked enough tonight, you and I. I think

I think we'd all like to hear the menu of Rebecca. So should we get on with it? Let's get on with it. This is the Off Menu Menu of Self-Esteem! Take a seat, Rebecca. Let's talk through the T-shirt first of all, because this is a surprise for us. I haven't seen this. It says, Off Men. You? Yeah. Yeah. Fantastic. Fantastic.

Do you mind if I sell this off my website? Please. Do you mind if I give you no money at all? Because you guys make a lot more than me. No, the set cost us quite a lot of money. Yeah, no, I...

I actually really respect that you've got a set. Thank you. Because when I've done live podcasts before, they haven't fucking bothered me shit. Well, we don't have many guests bothering making a T-shirt, so, you know. Well, there we go. So, I brought you something, though. Oh, thank you. So, I have a song called Big Man about men being good, right? Because everyone likes to think I think men are bad. Right.

And I don't. Some of them are great. Some of them go to the post office and pick up something that you've ordered. You know what I mean? But that's it, is it? No, no. So I have a song called Big Man that wasn't a hit. Quite a lot of caps left over. Got a lot of caps left over, literally. I quite literally dusted dust off them.

But I brought you the, like, metal, gothy one. Thank you. Thank you very much. And I brought you the sort of, like, children's TV presenter one. LAUGHTER Thank you. I like it. I do like the colours a lot. I thought you would. Yeah, thank you very much. Me and you have got a similar sort of twee history, I think. Do we? Twee history? I don't know for certain, but I just got a feeling you... Me and you liked the same shit. LAUGHTER

Bright Eyes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've got one Bright Eyes album, but I didn't listen. Did you masturbate a lot to Damien Rice's Oh, like I did? LAUGHTER I did listen to Damien Rice's Oh. I went to see Damien Rice at the Shepherds Bush Empire. You shouldn't have done that at the Shepherds Bush Empire, James. I've never masturbated. LAUGHTER

No, that tracks. I thought I'm generalising about you, but I was right. You were right. That's two artists that I listened to probably around the same time as well, those albums. A similar age. This is like the closest I'll come to visiting a fortune teller. So I guess something else. Do you use Aesop products? Yeah. Me too. Yeah.

Do you like to guess some things about me, Rebecca? You watch a lot of YouTube. Bang to rights. You want to guess anything on my algorithm? Like conspiracy theories. They're not conspiracy theories, they're realities. Anyway, hello. Hello. Everyone asks me, when are you doing this podcast?

A lot, and I thought I wasn't famous enough. And lo and behold, you were waiting for me to be the main event at the London Palladium on an afternoon. Yeah, absolutely. So that's fine. Damn right. You're way more famous than a lot of people. We've had people like Hugh Davis on this. Poor Hugh Davis gets it in the fucking neck every week now. This is the first time we've had an ice bucket on the stage with us. No, it's not. It is. Susie Buchanan must have had one. No. I think she drank all her Prosecco before she came on. My guy. This is the first.

Is it Prosecco? It's quite a nice Prosecco. I have been drinking it previous to arriving on the stage. Ah, fair enough. I wondered where you were. No, we were watching on the telly. You were doing jokes, Benito or something. Yeah. Thank you.

Yeah, we're doing our little jokes. You didn't hear the secret ingredient, did you? No, I genuinely didn't. I genuinely didn't because I had begun drinking the Prosecco, I've had quite a lot of wee-wees. And I was doing a wee-wee when you decided on what that was. How many wee-wees would you say per glass of Prosecco does it even out to? Oh, it becomes like 16, 17 minutes per glass.

Every 16 to 17 minutes you need one. Yeah, I wee a lot. Yeah, yeah. But that's good, right? Is that healthy? I don't know if it is. No. And I barely poo. Ah. It's a whole thing. Yeah. Anyway, my menu. We've not done the... I mean, the genie needs to make his entrance first of all. Oh, shit. Which is good, which is good because I was about to ask you how often you poo. So, James, if you want to just pop behind the lamp, that would be great. Thank you. You can't. This isn't your YouTube in now, Eddie. You can't.

Type in all the questions that you love here find out the answer to how often do women poo search Did he go to RADA James hmm, no fucking well you I didn't even go to university I did a BTEC music course and then that was it music oh Yeah music look at where it's a landed me

Look at where it's landed me. Why do you think I went to RADA? I didn't think you did. I just wondered if you were a failed actor or not. Failed actor? You're talking to John the Mouse and Lars Pinfield. Yeah, I'm Lars Pinfield, mate. Oh, sorry, do all failed actors end up in the Ghostbusters universe? LAUGHTER

I knew this would happen between us. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now, Rebecca, you're very welcome to rub the lamp or you can just... Oh, there you go. Or you can imagine rubbing the lamp if you'd rather not. I'm going to imagine it. Okay, imagine rubbing the lamp. We're imagining rubbing the lamp to the lights people. Oh, yeah, you're not making any money on this. Welcome, self-esteem, to the doing best one. We're going to give it some time. CHEERING

There it is. I kept my cap on. I did the jump and the cap stayed on. That's going to sell me four to five of those. It's a good quality cap. Good quality merch. I wouldn't trust an actual genie wearing a cap. Would you? If a genie popped out of the lamp and he was wearing a baseball cap. Yeah, I wouldn't. I'd think, oh, hipster genie, fuck off. Feel like he was on his day off or something, wouldn't it? Yeah, yeah. B&Q. Yeah, B&Q. Genie B&Q, what would he get?

What with the genie buying, being cute, I guess a lot of polish for the lamp. You want to keep the lamp spick and span. Dusters. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Are you much of a foodie, Rebecca? Yes, it's tough, though.

Well, look, I'm a millennial woman who grew up with, like, Heat magazine and whatnot, so everything that passes my lips comes with a degree of stress, which is so shit, not to make this serious, but genuinely, but I'm passionate. It's heaven. It's the best thing in the world, isn't it? And it's really sad for... I'll mention this a lot. Women... Fucking...

But, yeah, I'm stressed out by it, but it's heaven, so... That's how I feel about food. So, what... I mean, staring down, like, you're at the start of the episode, you've got to go for your dream menu. Is it stressful or heavenly? Both. Which is, you know, two things can be true at once, James. Never a truer word. Would you like to tell us about sparkling water? Sparkling, because I'm not a child. What?!

Nah, it's just exciting, isn't it, sparkling water? Are you sparkling? I like sparkling now and again, but I've never drunk still water and thought, I'm being very childish today. Pussy on! I've simply never thought that. Just straight down the hatch. No, it's quite exhilarating when it's really cold. Has anyone ever had Topo Chico?

Fuck me. Chico himself is here. It's Chico time. It's phenomenal. Like, you know, it's difficult being in the UK, but one of the reasons is they don't have Topo Chico. They have it in America and that's not worth going for, though.

I've never heard of topper. It's just a really good... Just a really sparkling water. It really, like, salts your mouth. And I really like it. Intense sparkles. You can feel it? Feel it. It's a shock. It's unpleasant, but also, like, pleasant. Two things can be true at once. It's like the music that Ed likes. System of a Down. Love System of a Down. Of course I do.

I didn't realise this about you, and we once did a Zoom podcast with cameras off. We did. And then I found out you were a metalhead, and I was like, I'd have approached that differently had I known. Had you known that I was a metalhead? I don't know why. What would you have done? You're just one of the last ones I left.

In media, in mainstream media. Anyway, whatever. Go on. So how would you have approached it? Are you approaching this podcast differently now that you know Ed is such a metalhead in worship? Well, I'm catering to it. I gave him the grey black cut. Yes. Yeah, so already you're getting off to a different start. I'm a Libra, I'm a giver, I'm an empath, you know? That's very nice of you. And do you feel better now, Ed, that you're... I feel very metal now. Yeah, do you feel seen? Now I've got my grey cap on. LAUGHTER

Do you want anything in this water, or is it just as it is, sparkling? Ice, loads of ice, and a wedge or two of lime. Thank you very much. Is that your favourite citrus fruit, if you had to rate the citrus fruits? Yes. Yeah, number one. I keep wanting to ask you if it's yours, and that's probably bad podcast etiquette.

I would put Lime pretty high up on mine, I think. Good. Lime is number one. Lime is number one all day long. I think so too. Would I sound like an awful prick if I brought Yuzu into the equation? You would, yeah. You know, if we carried on guessing things about you, we'd have got there eventually. LAUGHTER

I don't know. Most metalheads don't like Uzu. They're a very mainstream band. They liked him before they got... Yeah, trying to put on U2. That's good. Sounds a bit like YouTube as well. We could do something with that. Yeah. Oh, yeah, fuck, we could have done a callback to him watching YouTube. If only the audience weren't here, we could have vamped on YouTube, Uzu and U2. LAUGHTER

And also, I'm happy to make the catchphrase of this episode if only the audience weren't here. Pop-Dom's all bread! Pop-Dom's all bread, self-esteem! Pop-Dom's all bread! Made the jump. I did it. I made the jump. She jumped. That was very satisfying. She knew it was going to happen. She still jumped. It's horrible. Pop-A-Dom's obviously because all the bits. You get all the accoutrement. All the bits. The best bit of a curry is the onion salad for me. Yeah.

Someone just went, wrong. That's funny to go wrong. I'm cancelled. That's it. It's over. Just say wrong out loud. Wrong. Move on. You're wrong.

I love an onion salad loads. I love an onion. I could eat an onion like an apple. Oh. Get a grip. I respect that. Any sort of onion or is there a specific onion? White one. A nice brown. Goddamn fly on the stage. There is a fly on the stage. That fly was here last night as well. It was actually. We don't know. Julian Clarillus left his fly here. Just pet fly on the stage. The onion and the mango chutney of course. The nice yog yog. Yogurt. Um.

And then recently, in the last few years, I've developed, you know, a tolerance for the lime pickle, which is... Love it. Fucking sick. Love it so much. My best mate is in the house, Kelly Blanchett. Give us a woo. No, no. No, just Kelly.

No, Kelly. No, that was about five of you. That's... I am Spartacus. The bloke there is really enjoying doing it every time. Yeah, yeah. Anyway, well, you fuck that. She puts lime pickle on beans on toast. Oh, my God. I bet that's nice. So you can beat her up if you're that extra out there. But, no, I find it delicious. The thing is about, like, as you get older, your tongue dies, right? Huh? Have you not noticed?

I didn't know that. Your tongue dies. I think so, because of all the, you know, the ciggies and...

Like, you... Your tongue needs... Yeah, it's taking me back to my Damien Rice days. The ciggies and dicks make your tongue die. Well, don't you think? And the booze and the... Yeah. So now I need a jalapeno and everything. Yeah. You know what I mean, right? I do add hot sauce to most things, I'd say. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because our tongues are dying. Yeah. Because we were born in the 80s. And the ciggies and the dicks. Yeah, and the ciggies and the dicks. Yes. Where was I? Yeah.

Yeah, so your tongue dies as you get older. So things like lime pickles start to get really fucking nice. Because your tongue's dead and it couldn't handle it before. Yeah, and now it's like... Is your tongue one of the things that keeps growing when you're older as well? You know, like, is it your ears and your... You're asking the wrong person in this room. Is anyone a doctor? I don't think it's your tongue. I don't think you need to ask a doctor. I don't think old people have really long tongues. Do they? No.

But the ears grow, right? Yeah, your ears and your nose, I think. Ears and nose, but not your tongue. That would be great. Oh, your nose grown will be lovely. Yeah, once my nose is a grown-up size, my ears and my nose are absolutely tiny. Oh, yeah, your ears as well. If I ever need glasses, I'm fucked. They're not going to stay on my face. Hopefully you'll be old enough to, you know, you can just keep them in place with your tongue. Sorry, I've got to read this.

Really good stuff. You're ever so good, you two. You're ever so good. Because I hate comedians. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thank you for doing the podcast. But I don't mind you two at all. What comedians do you hate?

List a few. I've had sex with so many of them. Have you? Well, that would lead me to believe you love comedians. No, no, no. So, what is it next? My starter. I haven't heard much. I would have thought I'd have heard more gossip about that if you've been sleeping with loads of comedians. Am I not in the cool gossip circles? James, of course we're not in the cool gossip circles. People tell us when they sleep with pop stars. What?

People... For a long time, a lot of people were invested in my love life, and I've had more than one text message saying, you should go out with James Acaster. That's the answer to everyone's problems. There's only one of me to go around, unfortunately. I'm spoken for. No, I know. You know, I wasn't thrilled to get the text message, but...

More than once at a time in my life, people were like, because no one's funny. Do you know what I mean? And then people go, oh, do you know who's funny? And got like, you know, is breathing. Money. Money. Money and is breathing. How much does this set cost? I don't know.

Benito, put on the screen how much the set cost. While we're waiting for that, Mildred's have started doing a lime pickle slaw. And I wasn't... I was a big fan of Mildred's and they went chain and it got less good, but some bits are still good. This lime pickle slaw they've just introduced is outstanding, next level. I absolutely love it. And I just think I should shout it out while we're talking about lime pickle because I'm excited about it. I thought about saying a few things I like. Oh, my God. That is...

15k? Are you shitting me? You fucking shit, get rid of it now. We're not making any money on this shit. 15k. That's what it's like being... I'm fine. What were you just saying? Lime pickle slow? Shouting out stuff you want for free. Yeah, yeah. I like yard sale pizza.

Loads. It's not on my menu. No, shout them out. Let's shout the free stuff. Marks and Spencer's Food Hall. Really good. There's one open near where I'm living and it's truly become our plans. Yeah. That's what we're going to do today. Go to M&S Food Hall. What's your favourite thing in the M&S Food Hall? So, the orange cordial. Have you fucked with that? No, I've not fucked with the M&S orange cordial.

But it's so bad, I go through it really quickly. Yeah. How many wee-wee? So many wee-wees. You can't ask this every time. And I've got one of them big flasks to hydrate because I'm always trying to be more healthy than I am and I fill it with the orange cordials from M&S, which is counterintuitive. I think people have taken hydration too far these days.

Tell me more, because I'm fed up of it. It wasn't... It was never... I'd say last ten years, people are like, you've got to hydrate, you've got to have a massive flask with you all the time. Ten years ago, people were drinking less water and they weren't walking around like big crisps or anything, were they? My mum's never drank water and she's still alive, so... My parents look awful. What age were you? What? Did you say your parents divorced? No. Oh. I said they look awful.

But you thought I said divorce and you were laughing your head off. LAUGHTER That would have been... If you just said my parents are divorced, that would have been funny. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No way, for no reason. That is funny. And they won't let me be on Taskmaster for a full season. Yeah. They're not divorced. There's still time. They could get divorced. It'd be funny. LAUGHTER

They need to live their truth. They've been together for a long time. They've got three kids. You know, we've all been moved out of the house for ages now and they're still together. It'd be very funny if they sat us all down and announced they're getting divorced. Yeah. I'd laugh. Where are you in the three? Top. We're not talking in terms of bank balance. Oldest. Oldest of the three. I wouldn't have thought that, would you? LAUGHTER

You definitely have middle to youngest energy. Yeah, middle, yeah, yeah. Yeah, well, if you met us all as well, you would still think that. Yeah. You wouldn't go, he's the oldest one. You would be like, oh, that's like the youngest one or the middle one or a child from a different marriage who grew up as an only child and doesn't really know those other two. Or a kid who they exclusively raised in the garden. A garden kid. LAUGHTER

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Dream starter. Obviously, there's loads of options. But I thought I would tell you about a sandwich from a shop in Sheffield called Brigazzi's. Very Sheffield surname. And I thought I'd take this opportunity to tell you about female... Some women, not all women, but some women have menstrual cycles. Do you know anything about that, James? No, but I'm willing to learn. LAUGHTER

Well, that's what I thought I'd tell you about because you famously, you know, it's when women are like moody and their tummies hurt. But also what no one talks about is the insatiable hunger, right? Am I right? Am I right? It's like hell because you're also trained to not ever want, you know, you're meant to not eat. You know, the patriarch has told you you're not meant to really eat anything.

And then at the worst time of the month, every month, like, all you can think about is food. Yeah. And anyway, once upon a time, I was in that part of the month. You've both been really serious about this. It's very difficult to know what to chip in with, Rebecca, if I'm honest. I don't know how it would come across if throughout that I was going... That's funny! This is the problem with... Me sat here going, this is fucking disgusting! No!

Gross! Moray! No, you really... I feel like I'm going to be a real edgelord here. I'm going to really spice things up and you've both been dead respectful and nice and listened. But anyway, I was in the studio because I'm a musician. Don't know if you know about it or not. Big time. And I was very hungry because I was very much day 28 of my cycle. Is that what the zombie film is about? Yeah.

Is that what the zombie film is about? The zombie film 28 Days Later? Oh, I didn't even get that. Yeah. I thought, I was like, what, the substance? No, but if, you know, if someone wants to give me a load of money to make that movie, I will. 28 Days due on. It's, yeah, truly it's hell.

I was in the studio in Sheffield, Tesla Studios, shout out David Glover, my good friend. Oh, really? Do you actually know him? What a prick. He went to Bregazzi's, a bit of a walk, because I was in such a fucking foul mood, I didn't go.

And he came and I... When you go to an Italian sandwich shop and they say, what do you want, right? You're like, oh, that sexy bread and then pesto, chicken, tomato, basil, done, right? I assume. Like, I'm quite basic. And that's what I was expecting him to bring back. And he got back and said, I just said, whatever you think, mate, to the man behind the counter. And I was like... I do love David Glover with all my heart. Like, he's family to me. But I was like...

How dare you do this to me today? But it was a sandwich. I think it was an olive tapenade. Uh-huh. Tapenade. Tapenade, yeah. Tapenade. Tapenade. Aubergine, like a grilled to fuck aubergine slop. Chicken, some sort of salami, cheese, rocket, pesto on the top bit of the bread. Yeah.

And I took a bite and I'm not ashamed to say I shed tears. And I shed tears because I, this is not even, I'm not even trying to be funny. And I was like, oh, like you're alive. And isn't being alive nice? And part of being alive is that you get to eat this. And oh, I felt like the mad connection to like the earth during it.

Is it alright to have a sandwich as misstater? Yeah, hell yeah. Especially when it made you shed a tear. Yeah. I genuinely cried. Yeah. I don't think we've actually had, we've done a lot of episodes of this podcast, I don't think we've had someone say about eating something and it's been like, oh, I'm alive.

But I've had those moments. Oh, God, yeah. Where I've been eating something and you do think, weirdly, about your own mortality all of a sudden because this is so good that you feel lucky to be alive and it's good to stop and appreciate those moments. Goosebumps. Regularly when I eat something that I've not eaten before, I get full goosebumps. Like what? All over my body. Chicken nuggets. First meal I had in a restaurant after COVID was...

Went to the Quality Chop house and had to sit outside and there was like a truck and a digger nearby working on the road. It was a horrible setting and they brought out a steak and I took a bite of the steak and I was like, oh my fucking God. It's just the best moment of my life. I'm alive. What star sign are you? I think you should guess. What are you picking up from him that made you ask that question? I just suddenly realised I wanted to know. Okay, so you just weren't listening to me.

There we go. What star sign is that? What star sign is... You're talking bollocks. What star sign are you? Virgo? No, not Virgo. I'm out. Why did you guess Virgo? Because it's rockin'. Oh, yeah. Because it's rockin'. The bull. Is it the bull? No, it's Taurus. No, Taurus. No, I'm not a Taurus. I'm a Pisces.

A big wet fish. Whoa. Uh-oh. What does that mean? It just means you're going to be a vital part of the rest of my life. Oh, excellent. Great news. My mum, my dad, my brother, my ex-girlfriend, my ex-boyfriend, my producer, all fucking Pisces. All Pisces. All ruined my life. So welcome, friend. What are you going to do? What are you? What are you? I don't have a birthday.

No, I believe it. I believe it. Little garden boy. Grew over a period of time on a tree and then dropped off. There's no specific date that marks when I was born. He puts one pebble in a pile every year. I'm going to pour more Prosecco. You must. Yeah, go for it. The fly's back. Don't clap that. Yeah, always going to... Yeah, it was always going to happen. You've been far too gung-ho with that microphone. Yeah. Yeah.

Sorry, Charlie. The first two shows of this run, James' game was kneeing the microphone into the air and seeing if he could catch it. So he's already smashed the fuck out of that microphone. How much do the microphones cost, Benito? Can you put it on the screen? It's about 15k, isn't it? Welcome to being a pop star. Was it like focaccia bread, this sandwich? Yeah, but thin, you know? Square, like a sort of like...

slightly thicker than an iPhone size sort of, do you know what I mean? You know the one. Which generation iPhone? Current. Current, nice, okay. You've got the new one because you like tech. I don't have the new one. I watch all my videos on my laptop. I'm always blown away by people who watch YouTube on their phones. They're not picking up on any of the details of the QAnon. Your dream main course, I'm going to get it away from Ed's opinions. Your dream main course.

Well, after much deliberation, Christmas dinner. Someone over there wanted Christmas dinner. Anyone else said that? That guy. He stood up in the first half. What did Stephen Graham say? Stephen, I wasn't listening. All I could think was, I'm going to pummel him. How is this still your attitude, James? If I ever see that guy again, he's dead.

So because I'm like really anti-men and their aggression, when I listened to that podcast, yeah, I got really turned on. You weren't the only one. And some of us were in the room.

He's so fit. I can't believe you met him. Pocket rocket, man. Like, fuck me. He's sexy. I do like he came on to talk a little bit about his current Netflix show, which is all about the problem of male violence, and James went in going, I'm going to beat the fuck out of him. LAUGHTER

It was perfect. Really good podcasting. When they tell me, you know, not to tug my tail, but everyone's always like, you should do a podcast. Yeah. And I say, until it's as good as Stephen Graham on Off Menu, I'm not going to do one. You could get Stephen Graham. You could do a podcast with Stephen Graham. The two of you. Do you think? I reckon people would listen to that. How much did it cost to get him on it? Please, I put it on the screen. Get Stephen Graham on the podcast.

Christmas dinner. Yes, of course, right? I mean, it's a fantastic choice. We have had Richard Osman chose Christmas dinner, I believe. He's my celebrity friend. Is he? He's one of the people who suggested that I should go out with him. Didn't know he had said that. Not as smart as he seems, is he? He's good at formats, you know. Yeah, yeah. But he's a smart man. Genuinely, this is genuinely the truth. He's who I ask for help with.

In your love life? No, no adult things. Well, yeah. But just, you know, like, tacks and stuff. Fucking husband. He's a really lovely man and he's been really kind to me. Message in the middle of the night. Jesus Christ. Yeah. Self-esteem asking about tacks. I'm like, can I ask you something? Oh, God. But then it's always nice to give men an opportunity to tell women things, isn't it? You know what I mean? We're not allowed to these days. No, I know it. But that's what I mean. When I say ask for help, I know it's a gift. Yeah.

Richard Osman, Josie Long, Rhys Shearsmith and Nick Muhammad have all asked for Christmas dinners. Josie Long as well. Yes. You know when you're watching the... My current male lover is an actor. Yeah. And we watch the telly and he goes, Ah, Stephen. Like, or, Ah, Mark.

Because he knows them. Because he knows them. And I go, oh, Mark. And then really emasculate him every time. And I just did that then with Josie Long. Josie, my friend who I was once at a festival once with. We're going to need to talk through it, though, because this Christmas dinner, of course, I think is going to be very different to the rest of the Christmas dinners that people have suggested. Because I'm working class. Everyone's got their own version of Christmas dinner, right? They've all got their little twists. Yes, well, I think...

Janet and Andy, my parents. I've had Christmas Day there every single year. I've never gone anywhere else. Wow. Still. Which is now, like, I can't do anything else. If I did, it would be enormous. What would it take for you to have Christmas dinner somewhere else? What if your current male lover... Nah, man. Fuck him. I've got to go to Anston. I'm from a place called Anston in Rotherham. Mm-hm.

No whoops. Rare to get no whoops, I'll be honest with you. More people know your producer.

But no, we just have, you know, turkey every single year. It's M&S turkey. My mum goes, oh, it's quite moist this year. My mum thinks it's the turkey's fault whether or not it's moist. Yeah. And then we have sprouts. How are they being prepared? Just boiled. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Boil the fuck out of them fuckers. And then obviously I have to gobble like 15 Wendy's.

But there's no problem... 15 Windies. Windies? Like a many. You're not familiar with... Yeah, better than a many, though. Straight to the heart of the issue. Oh, wow. I thought, genuinely, that Windies are what you call Brussels sprouts. I thought you were saying you have 15 Windies.

Brussels sprouts. Yeah, I have about seven sprouts and 15 windies. 15 windies. What's the total, Benito? And then, long story long, my mum and dad, well, I had a nan and granddad who were the best, like, ever kind of, you know,

spent loads of time with him. My nan was amazing at cooking and baking. And every Christmas, and it's only at Christmas, would we have this thing that my family called gratin. I think they meant gratin. And it was this stuff of legend. You couldn't wait. Like, you literally couldn't wait for this gratin.

And as I got into my teens and stuff, and like late teens and 20s, we'd go and get really horribly pissed off on Christmas Eve at a pub called the Leeds Arms. And we were nowhere near Leeds. But you'd go and I don't know if anyone relates, but like you've left school...

But you go in and it's with everyone from school and you want to look fit, you know, and impressive. And it was, you know, a high-octane night. Do you know what I mean? Do you not go to the pub with your schoolmates? No, I used to do that. Christmas Eve, 100%. Used to do that. Went through a period of about five years of doing that. Get back about one in the morning on Christmas Day and eat half the food for the fridge that was for Christmas Day. Well, this is where I'm going with this story because I would eat the gratin cold, pre-ovened.

Cold grating. And the thing is, I don't know what you think, but I think I seem quite hedonistic and I do what I want, but I'm very well behaved. And that was one of the worst things I've ever done. Oh, so you've only done it once and they woke up in the morning and were like... It was just sheer disappointment. Anyway, anyway, anyway. Well, this is the thing. I thought it was mystical, very important thing. It's just like cheesy leeks. Yeah.

That's good, though. Yeah, with, like, breadcrumbs on top. Is it like a cheesy sauce, like a white sauce? Yeah. And you're eating that cold and... I did, yeah, pre-cooked. That's how pissed I was. Yeah, all right. Earlier, Ed showed full respect to a man in the audience who drinks the water from mozzarella pouches. So he can't look down on you for this. That's true. He's got to love this.

Does he? I was listening. He's a bad man. Is he alright? He wanted to eat endangered animals as well. Yeah, alright, nothing. Would you not drink the mozzarella water? No.

I haven't yet, but if I was, you know... If you were hammered and it was Christmas Eve. Another pandemic. Yeah. Might think about it. God, it's good to think, isn't it? Yeah, fingers crossed there'll be another pandemic. Oh, I fucking loved it! It was so good! I talked to a comedian for the whole of the pandemic. Did you? Like, sexy, like, all day, every day, propping the phone up, showering. I was with my mum and dad as well. Yeah. He was my world.

You can't keep dangling these things in front of us and then not giving a name. And then lockdown lifted and he was like, no, I don't want to meet. Full respect. That's all right, I'm fine. Legend. That's the way we're doing in this industry. It literally is. You're all so weak. Yeah. Shout out Hugh Dennis. LAUGHTER

I'm racking my brains for someone funnier to say. Gino De Campo. No, no. No, not Gino De Campo. Wait, who's the fella on Five Live? Adrian Childs. Adrian Childs, yeah. Adrian Childs is who I'm thinking of. Do you want to know something funny, though? Today, I have a new song. I have a song on my album called 69. I don't know if you're familiar with that. I've heard that, yes. Where I list sex positions and I sort of rate them and I say whether or not I want them.

And in the second verse I say, if you beg, I will peg, right? Only I don't love pegging. It just is a good rhyme. Yes. But I woke up today, did the usual, you know, ignore my current male lover, go on my phone. Eamon Holmes has liked your reel.

And I go, which reel? Yeah. Clickety-click. It's the reel I put out about three weeks ago where I say, if you beg, I will peg. Ooh. Eamon Holmes. Eamon Holmes. You dirty birdie. Pay my mortgage, don't you know what I mean? It's not. I love that for Eamon. Anyway, Christmas. I guess I have to ask you, I have to ask you, dream scientist now? LAUGHTER

There's more. I mean, look, we've not talked about roast potatoes. I'm not a big potato head. Okay. But I am going to contradict myself with my side. But I'm not the biggest potato head in the world. For me, it's gravy, the cheesy sauce, those tiny little sausages. This is all on the Christmas dinner. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The tiny little sausages. The turkey, the turkey. Stephen Graham. The turkey. The turkey.

with the cranberry sauce. My mum and dad always get, like, what do they call it? Stuffing, but it's like sausage meat. Oh, yeah, yeah. Is that right? Yeah, but that's the best sort of... I don't like the herby kind of, like... Right. But when it is just sausage meat, I agree. I just love it. And over the years, it's just become me, Janet and Andy at the table.

And we spend plenty of time together as it is, and then we just sit together again and eat this horribly huge meal. And then I immediately fall asleep, and Andy does the washing up, and it's lovely, you know. You said you wouldn't have guessed that I was the oldest. Are you an only child? No, I've got an older brother, but, you know. You've got an older brother? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I wouldn't have thought you were the youngest. We can talk about it off stage.

Yeah. If you want. Save all our conversations for after the podcast. Is this... Is it the Christmas dinner your dream menu because of how amazing the Christmas dinner is or the fact that you have it with Janet and Andy every year and what it represents? Two things can be true at once. That's true. It is... Because you made the turkey sound absolutely disgusting. No, no, it's always fine. That's the thing. My mum will be like...

oh, it's not good. Turkey is just a vehicle for the gravy and something else. Is there a mum in history, though, who's ever put a Christmas dinner down and gone, it's fucking brilliant this year? No, but you know when I think about having children? That's the kind of mum I'll be.

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So dream side dish for the... Because it's quite hard doing dream side dish for a Christmas dinner. There's so much in there. Well, what I don't get about off-menu is do you have to, you know, does it all have to make sense? No, not at all. Yeah, so I would get these chips, right? Yeah. From this place called Tamper in Sheffield. Yes. Yes! And it was the first place, you know, exposed brickwork, flat whites. Like, it was the first hipster place that came to us.

And recently I went there and had these fries that were just groundbreaking. And then the lovely waitress came over and I was like, what is on them? And she said, chicken salt. Oh, yes.

So the chicken salt fries from Tampa Sheffield is what I would have as my side dish. What is chicken salt? Because you hear about it a lot and you taste it and you think, that salt tastes like chicken. I think it must be... You know when you get a pedicure? I think they give chickens pedicures and then they put it on the salt, on the chips. It's grated chicken feet. And it's delicious. Yeah, it's not putting me off. I put a chip in and I'm like...

You know? LAUGHTER You, like, suck off the chip and then let the chip go in. Yeah. Oh, yeah. You know what? You fucking know what I mean, well and truly. You're from Northampton. Yeah, Northampton shit. Please. Is that a Northampton and Sheffield thing, sucking a chip off? Yeah, we have a competition every year. LAUGHTER

Northampton versus Sheffield, sucking off chips. Well, how do you think I met my best friend who has the lime pickle and her beans on toast? She's from Corby. Whoa! Corby is the... They are the rivals of...

They're here, are they? Well, she's here. Yeah, I kept her apart from you in my dressing room because I was worried about the tension. Yeah, there'll be a lot of tension. There's tension now. I'm now on high alert. Yeah, yeah. She's in the room. Didn't know there was a Corbarian in the room. Disgusting. Kelly, do you want to shout an insult to James Acaster? Sheep shagger. Sheep shagger.

They do call us that. Really? Corby people call Ketvin people sheep shaggers. But isn't that the normal sort of thing people say about Welsh people? Yeah, yeah, but somehow... My fellow sheep shaggers. See you later on. We won't find many around London. But I'll sort out a minibus for us all. We can go...

He's got money. He can put a bus on. I've got money. I can get a bus together for me and my fellow sheep shaggers. So why are people from Kettering sheep shaggers in the eyes of Corbera? I still don't understand. Maybe Kelly knows. Kelly! What makes him a sheep shagger?

They've got more what? They've got more grass. They've got more grass than us. Yeah, we do have more grass. More opportunity. Yeah, we're surrounded by fields. That's the thing. That's why there's so many privileged musicians, because they just had more opportunity. That's what it is. So we've got more opportunity, so that's why we can shag more sheep. That would suggest that if the people of Corby had more opportunity, they would be shagging more sheep. Yeah, if I had more opportunity, I'd have been Mumford and Sons. You know what I mean? I went to school with them.

I don't know. Same year? No, the year below me. Really? Yeah, yeah. Two of them, two of them. There's so much to talk about when we're not on this thing. Their new song is called... Why are we saying constantly...

We have so much to talk about. Yeah, it's a bad podcast. And you won't hear any of it. How do you do a live podcast? You constantly say, I'm going to say something else. Hoping that everyone just keeps it among themselves, you know. I didn't know Mumford & Sons shagged sheep.

Their new song is called Rushmere, which is the name of the pond which is opposite the school we went to. And they called it Rushmere because they were like, that's where, because everyone used to hang out around the pond, and that's where they met and were chatting about forming a band, and that took them on this wonderful journey through music. And Rushmere to me is where I tried poppers for the first time. These chips sound incredible. They were, they were, and they came to me in the time I needed them most.

Is that something you're going to tell us after the podcast? No, I was just hungover. Did they come with a dip or anything? Well, this is the thing. I'm a condiment head, right? Ketchup, mustard. Mustard before mayo. Mustard before mayo. I completely agree with you. And when you get, you know, I do, I don't, you know, the money I don't make in the music industry, I guess.

I don't know if I mentioned it. I spend on things like Deliveroo burgers. Like 40 quid, I'll just spunk on a burger and chips at 9.35 on a Wednesday. And when they come with the old, you know, Marlowe's burger sauce stuff, I fucking love all that. Yeah. I'm,

I completely agree. I mean, my fridge is like half condiments at the moment. What's your favourite? I've got a lot of hot sauces in there at the moment. But condiment-wise, I've got to say the Laugenmar crispy chilli oil is my go-to. Hang on. Is that... Kelly, is that what you gave me?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's amazing. It's so good. It's incredible. What is it? Well, it's just got loads of chillies in it. Some of them you can get peanuts in it. It's like Szechuan peppercorns as well, I think. And I can honestly, and I have done before, stand up in the kitchen and eat from that jar like it's a big yog. No.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I love it. You know, Kelly got me as a present once and we recently cracked in and it was quite stressful actually. Me and my current male lover were like, we've got to go steady with this. It's full on. And you can put it on anything. Oh my God. Oh, this is good podcasting.

Ice cream? You put it on ice cream? You could put it on ice cream, 100%. What's your favourite condiment? I mean, genuinely, I think lime pickle is up there at the minute. But the one that I've got the most of in the house because of all the takeaways is I order a lot of sushi on Deliveroo. Somebody's doing well. Yeah. I'm doing really well. Genuinely, it's really inspiring.

I might become a comedian because it looks easy. It is pretty easy. Very few overheads, normally, fucking Albanita. Yeah, when we're not, for no reason, ordering massive clouds in the poppadom. That's a poppadom, no one even recognizes that. LAUGHTER

What, those daisies? No, that massive thing there. People think it's the sun. What are the daisies, though? They're daisies. I don't think they are daisies, mate. Honeycomb? Oh, what, the lights? Yeah. They're just lights, I think. For what it's worth, I have more respect for you than I expected to have. Oh, lovely. Because of the set. For what it's worth, I have the same amount I anticipated for you. LAUGHTER

Loads based in fear. Loads and loads. Based in fear. If you didn't, you'd seem sexist. Yes. James, we've interviewed a few people. Do we think it's a good sign when they curl up into the fetal position? Only if they're pissed. LAUGHTER

not pissed yet. I'm like a massive thick blooded horse. It takes me ages. It's very expensive. Honestly, all drugs, all alcohol, even like Nurofen, I have to have six. Wow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Surely if you're a horse though, the ketamine gets into your system quite quickly. I only did ketamine once and it made me very hungry. LAUGHTER

Which I thought, again, back to, you know, I thought, I don't need that. Yeah. That again, thank you, Heat magazine. Yeah. I think it's a good sign that we've got comfy chairs that you feel you can sit like that. That we've provided you with a nice comfy chair. I think you're overanalyzing it. I need a piss really bad. Of course, every 16 minutes. Do you want to go for a piss if you like? Yeah, yeah, we'll fill while you go for a piss. You guys can vamp. Yeah, don't worry. I don't want you being uncomfortable. Yeah, yeah. It's out that way. Go for a piss. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, go for it. Kelly, do you want to come up and sit here? Kelly, do you want to come and have a quick chat? Kelly, just if you can fill in, please. There you go. Welcome, Kelly. Hello, Kelly. Kelly's here, everybody. Hello. Nice to meet you. Kelly's in the Dream restaurant. Thank you for coming. Lovely to meet you, Kelly. Take a seat. Grab the microphone.

Welcome to the Off Menu Podcast, Kelly. Hi, guys. You have a fish tattoo. This is a food podcast, of course. It's exciting to see an item of food on you. Already, are you a fish fan? Or what is the tattoo? Oh, can I guess your star sign? I'd love you to. Pisces? No. It's an anchovy. It's an anchovy. Well, that's what the tattoo has said. Great. I just chose it from a wall. Because it looked cool, not because you're a fish fan. Yeah, but I tell people I'm a fish fan. Yeah, you got it right.

You go, I love fish. It's not just because the tattooist tricked me. Yeah, I told a guy that it was an anchovy and he said to me, anchovies didn't exist. A man in a... He was a chef. Stay in the left for a bit. He said it was just a cut of another fish. That is absolute horseshit. Is that true? No, it can't be true. You get them whole. It can't be that other fish have a full fish coming off of them. LAUGHTER

I won't tell you what restaurant he works for. You should tell us. You should definitely tell us. Is it Gaslight in Bathurst? No, I'm too scared. You should tell us. I want to speak to this guy. I can tell you after the podcast. Oh, fuck it. Absolutely fantastic. Kelly, everybody. Yeah, well done, Kelly. Thank you, Kelly. Nailed it. Kelly, a natural. She's funnier than me. She's great. She's wonderful. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Good. Now seems like an appropriate time to ask Dream Drink.

Just because you've come back from the toilet. I'd love more. No. Well, okay, so not alcoholic. Okay. A full-fat Coca-Cola. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fully. Hits the spot? This is just like the best thing ever. The best joke on Peep Show is when Jeremy orders...

a 50-pound bottle of wine, and it's like, fuck. And then he sips it and goes, yeah, it's nice. I mean, it's not Coca-Cola, but that's exactly how I feel. It's just delicious, right? I'm not a fan of the full-fat Coca-Cola. To me, if it's from a can, it always tastes like the metal of the can, and I don't know why. Get a grip. But you love metal. I do love metal. But also, I think it's because I'm type 1 diabetic, and full-fat Coca-Cola is essentially like holding a grenade. Woo!

You got diabetes? Yeah. Yeah, I keep it under my hat a lot. I'm trying to think, we had a guest who also quoted that part of Peep Show, which I'm always glad when people do, because it really sticks in my head as well. It's a lovely... And I even think, I'm not sure about if I've got this right, that that episode is set in Kettering as well. There's an episode of Peep Show where they go to Kettering and we were all very excited in Kettering.

that there was an episode set in Kettering and the kind of butt of the joke, the whole series, the whole episode, the joke was... Mark fucks a sheep, yeah. ...that they're in Kettering...

And it's rubbish. But, yeah, I really want to remember who else said it, because a guest came on and referenced it, and maybe... What are you paying them for? Benito, put on the screen whatever guest referenced that line in Peep Show. He's not going to know. He's going to be back there looking at his spreadsheet. His fucking head's going to be popping off. He's going to be a comedian, I fucked. And we watched it at the same time. It says, I don't know that obviously, on the screen. LAUGHTER

Phil Dunster said it. Oh, there you go. We've got someone who probably remembers it. Phil Dunster from Ted Lasso. I haven't checked him. You know Ted Lasso? No, but you know I auditioned for it. I got quite close to a part and I was like, here we go. I'm an actress and I didn't get it. That's exciting. What part was it? Some lesbian in the second season. I don't remember what character that would be.

Probably went to Anne-Marie. She gets everything I don't get. Are you having it in the can and it tastes like metal or are you going to have it in the glass bottle? Can, can, can, can, can. Can all the time? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Ice cold? Ice cold, can. Beautiful. And then alcohol. I like a thin rimmed glass of dry white wine with at least four ice cubes in it because I'm a heathen. Oh, that ripples. The girlies know...

You can't tar all girlies with that brush. You're an absolute heathen. You fucking can. And we all need our phones taking off us when we've had three of them. LAUGHTER

I call it mad juice. Yeah. Let's go mad. Let's get wild. See, this is good. This is a good opportunity for you, I think, to launch your own wine called Mad Juice. Fucking hell, I'd love to. There's a song on my new album, though, where I talk about my sort of love-hate relationship with alcohol. She laughed. Um,

So I think all the alcohol sponsorships are going to stop after my album comes out. Some of the really irresponsible companies might get on board. Well, genuinely, I was like, they're always like drink aware. And I'm like, well, I've literally written a song saying, just don't drink too much, eh? Yeah. Like the Barbie movie. They basically slagged off Barbie in it and celebrated it at the same time. Mattel absolutely loved that.

I'd love, yeah. You could do that with alcohol. I'd love the Barbie movie money. You are obsessed with money. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You would be too if your parents weren't rich. They're not. I am. You did it, baby. My parents are old and penniless. And you've already said they look horrible, so... They look like shit. Yeah.

I didn't even go to university. Do you want to guess where I went to university? Loughborough. Do I look like I did sports science? Do you actually want me to guess? Nah, Durham. Boff! Yeah. What did you do? Philosophy. Boff! That's what I shouted when I picked up my degree. Boff! What did you get? 2-1. 2-1. Fucking hell. My ex is doing a philosophy course.

It's taken her ages. It would take ages. The BA is the classic three years and I really didn't read any of the stuff I was supposed to. Who's your favourite? Oh, who's my favourite philosopher? I don't know this about you. This is exciting. I don't know who your favourite philosopher is. My favourite modern philosopher is Chris Martin from Coldplay. I'm mine. Will you arrive at your dream dessert? All right. Okay.

Kierkegaard. Just want everyone to know I do know some philosophers. She loves Kierkegaard as well. Yeah, Kierkegaard's good. Who's that? Danish. It's Stoic? Love a Danish. Is he a Stoic? I can't remember that. A lot of good religious stuff, anyway. Yeah, love that. Drink dessert. Now... It's very specific. It's very Pacific. Are you familiar with the works of Mr. Rudyard Kipling? Yes. Hang on. Oh, let's see. Okay. Yeah.

Please, carry on, Rebecca. He does this thing called a cherry bakewell. OK. And they come in sixes. Yeah. And you'd think I would have four of them, but I have six of them. Yeah. In a bowl. Decant them from their little silver coats. This is good. This is good. Put them in the microwave for... Whoa.

No one was expecting that. I was going to say 80 seconds, but what I meant was under a minute. Yeah. Both things can be true. Yeah. Philosophy. So like 40 seconds. You're very nimble. Yeah. Not nimble enough to get this goddamn fly. The guy grew up in the garden, he had to be nimble. Oh, yeah. Fair, fair, fair. Especially during the winter. LAUGHTER

When the robins were out. Burying all my food. Anyway, you put them in the microwave briefly, custard, on the hob though in a...

Pan, ideally these days, since, you know, Six Music played me loads, I get the vanilla pod. Yeah. Finest. Custard with black bits in. Custard with black bits in. Almost all of the pot of custard. And that's my favourite dessert. Great. This is great. What's wrong with that? No, that is delicious. I was going to really back you on that, actually. I think that is fantastic. Is it custard from a particular place? Yes.

Just, yeah, I like Tesco or Sainsbury's. Finest. A good, like, £4.50. Do you know what I mean? Yeah, nice proper custard. And how did you... Because this sounds like a dessert you invented. No, it's genuinely from childhood. Like, my mum and dad would do... We'd have Sunday... We would have Sunday dinner and then it would be like a dessert in a silver jacket, you know? And it was different types of...

Always by Mr Rudyard Kipling? Yes. Every time? So it should always be a Rudyard Kipling? Well, why would you deviate from perfection? Well, exactly. Tell me a Rudyard Kipling dessert you wouldn't eat. You can't. Benita, can you put the full catalogue of Rudyard Kipling desserts?

On the screen, please. No, I can't tell you. Can you? No, I don't. I mean, Rudyard Kipling means a lot to me. When me and my wife first met, we were, like, hanging out for a long time. We just used to sit in the house and rot and just eat loads of mini Battenbergs and just... Oh, my girl. This is mad. Like, watching her eat mini Battenbergs. She'd peel the icing and the marzipan off, eat that first, and then eat the cake, just straight in, like a beaver chewing a log. LAUGHTER

I can see why you're married her. Yeah. But one day I'm going to marry that marzipan beaver. How long have you been married? Since 2021. But they've been together for like... Loads. 30 years. Oh, you're one of them, are you? Yeah. Big wife guy. Wife guy. Love that. Anything to add? I think it's a nice relationship. Can you remember when Kelly came up? Yeah.

You weren't here for that. Did you hear what we were talking to Kelly about? No. Can you guess? It was probably Corby related. No. She listed all the comedians you've shown. And she knows them all. Keeper of my secrets. Yeah. What will you do with the silver little jackets afterwards, by the way? Are you rolling them up? So, genuinely, I would make... Because from childhood, I was a big Barbie head. Mm-hmm.

My current male lover is really good looking and tall. Great. Has like nine abs. Fantastic. And I call him... That's weird though, isn't it? Nine's a bit weird. No, I mean... I'd want there to be an even number. You know what? Ten. Ten. He's got ten. The tenth one's on the way. He eats like so much food and nothing happens to him. Yeah. Six sausages a day. Wow. Honestly. Nothing green passes his lips.

Are you sure that the abs aren't just sausages, though? They might be tumours. I call him my Barbie, because I like dressing him up in clothes. That's nice. Anyway, what were we talking about? I don't think it matters. I think that's all the information we need. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What happens to the little jackets, I think? That was it. So Barbies, I loved Barbies. And I used to make little, you know those hats? Millennial women in the house, raise up.

You'd make those hats that came up at the front with like a rose on, blossom hat. So I'd make little blossom hats for all my Barbies with them. With the little silver jackets? Yeah, quite easy to do and I still do it to this day. Lovely. Yeah, his head's too big for it. It'd be funny if he had a tiny head after you...

The rest of the description of him. All the emasculation is... Really tall, eight abs and a tiny head. My guy. Great thing is, his tongue will always keep growing. Yeah. I've had a right laugh here. I really have. So, I love the sound of this dessert. I think it sounds great. I'm going to read your menu back to you now and see how you feel about it. You would like Topo Chico sparkling water with lots of ice and a wedge of lime.

Poppadoms with all the bits. Onion salad, mango chutney, yoghurt and lime pickle. Starter. Olive tapenade, grilled aubergine, chicken salami, cheese rocket and pesto sandwich from Bregasi's in Sheffield. Main course. Christmas dinner. That's M&S turkey, sprouts, leek gratin, gravy, cheese sauce, tiny little sausages, cranberry sauce and stuffing with Janet and Andy. Stuffing. Sorry that stuffing was last. Stuffing with Janet and Andy. Stuffing with Janet and Andy. That's...

That was out of my hands, that one. It was written in order of what you said, I guess. Yeah. That's less than ideal, I'm apologising. Side dish, chips with chicken salt from Tampa in Sheffield. Drink, ice-cold can of full-fat Coca-Cola, thin-rimmed glass of dry white wine with at least four ice cubes.

Dessert, six Mr Rudyard Kipling cherry bakewells in a bowl, microwave briefly, pop heated with the finest of customs. That is the off-menu menu of Self-Esteem. Thank you very much. What a delicious menu. Thank you. So we're going to do a photo in front of the stage, which will be the photo we put out on Instagram. You'll all be in the photo. Is it okay to put my arms around you? Of course. No. Give it up for the brilliant Self-Esteem.

Rebecca Lutig Taylor hi everybody thank you very much for coming guys you're a fantastic audience we'll see you again soon bye bye have a lovely evening

Well, there we are, James. Self-esteem at the London Palladium. Fantastic. Fantastic episode. Thank you so much, Rebecca, for coming on the podcast. Thank you to the audience as well for being there. And Self-Esteem's new album, A Complicated Woman, is out now and she's on tour across the UK and Ireland in September and October 2025. So go to selfesteem.love for dates and tickets. And a reminder, we are back

being live boys because we are bringing off menu live the tasting menus to the Royal Albert Hall in London in March 2026 go to offmenupodcast.co.uk for dates and tickets bye hey it's Paige from Giggly Squad real talk if there's one store that I absolutely love walking around it's Sephora it's my total guilty pleasure they have amazing brands that other people don't have and I find something great every time I walk in and there's

literally one down the street from me so I do that a lot. It's so fun to shop in the store and online and the products are just too good. No regrets ever. For example one of my favorite beauty brands is Makeup by Mario who just launched his new lip gloss that I absolutely love. So the next time you're in the market for great beauty shop all the hottest products and brands only at Sephora.

Hello there, Off Menu listeners. It's me, Amy Gledhill, and you might remember me from my episode of Off Menu when I chose to have seaweed on mash and I'll be taking no further questions. And my name is Ian Smith, and you may remember me from the one line of dialogue I had in a non-broadcast Channel 4 pilot. Maybe you were in the studio audience at the time. Who can forget? But that's not what we're here to talk about. No, nor

the news, our podcast is coming back for series four. And don't worry, it's not a boring news podcast. No way. We're two northerners living in London and every week we catch up on the weirdest, most bizarre local news from up north. Things like? Woman in tears after spotting spitting image of dead dog in bath mat. Pure evil blackbird named Derek terrorising Yorkshire village and attacking children. And we're joined by special correspondents every week like

Like you one and only Ed Gamble, who you might have heard of. You'll remember him from this podcast, the one you're listening to now. Yeah. He hosts it. Yeah. Co-host. He was on my episode of Off Menu. Was he? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think he was in the non-broadcast Channel 4 pilot I did as well. Oh, he will have been. He's a nice guy. That's Northern News, out every Thursday, wherever you get your podcasts.