What We Ate
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Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to another episode of Chasing the Sweet Things in Life, the Sweet Paul podcast. What number is this one? This is number eight, and it is called What We Ate. What We Ate for episode eight. Yeah. Oh, God. Are we going to have a... I'm a poet, and I didn't know it. Are we going to have a party for episode 10? We should. Okay. Invite everyone. Invite only. Okay.

Are you on the list? Are you on the list? Only if you're a Frenchie. We'll have a party here. Yeah, we have a Frenchie party. Yes. So what has we been up to? Same, same. But I actually got to see, as part of my fabulous insurance here in California, health insurance...

I got to see a nutritionist yesterday, which was very eye-opening because... Well, you have to say that you had diabetes. Oh, yeah. I was diagnosed with diabetes this year. And so I sort of took the Atkins diet approach to it, meaning no carbs ever. And that sort of works. But after talking to the nutritionist, I realized I need to eat a more

well-rounded sort of diet, having a little bit of carbs, maybe less protein because Lord knows we need. We have, yeah, we have stacked on the protein. Well, and my bad cholesterol has been up a little bit because all we've been eating is chicharrones and bacon and chorizo. Zero carbs, lots of fat. So it's good. It's good to like really, you know, sort of inform myself on,

this stuff and to sort of take control of my health. Yeah. In a real way. So I have to exercise more, eat less animal fats and saturated fats and incorporate a little bit more. Cause you know, on the Atkins diet, you're terrified of things like beets and carrots. I need to stop thinking that way because sort of high fiber foods,

vegetables and some other sorts of carbs are okay.

Well, I'm very excited about beets because I have a recipe for a beet tartare. Oh, yes. I've had it before. So good. Now we can make it. Yes. So delicious. Yeah. And we can incorporate beans and, you know, more starchy things. Legumes, oatmeal. Oh, my God. There's going to be a new chapter in the Palm Springs kitchen. Yes. Yes. So speaking of food. Yes.

Let's talk about the specific dishes you grew up with and also maybe when you started actually cooking yourself. Yeah, I can actually remember my first recipe that I made. Really? How old were you? Well, it was before my sister was born. You were still very young. So I must have been like six or seven. Mm-hmm. So...

I think it was a Saturday evening and we all had dinner. But then my mom was like, oh, I'm a little like peckish. And I was like, oh, leave it to me. Oh, my God. So I knew that my grandmother had some puff pastry in the refrigerator. Yeah. So I took that and I cut that into thin strips. Then we had some tomato sauce and I put a little bit of tomato sauce on each. And then I...

put cheese on it and poppy seeds. And I remember I asked my grandmother to put on the oven for me. Yeah. Yeah. So my first recipe was these like pizza sticks. Yeah. Yeah. And they were really good. Really? Yeah. They were actually so good that whenever my parents had like a little dinner party. Okay. So what you hear in the background is a gardener outside our window. Yeah.

He's cleaning up the garden, which is great. Yes. Love it. No, whenever they had a dinner party, she asked me to make those as a little treat with cocktails.

Which, of course, made me very proud. Yes, of course. And I always insisted on serving them myself. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, so I could explain what it was. And, you know, so that everyone knew that I made it. Yes. Yes. Did the recipe ever evolve? Or it was always poppy seeds? I think I evolved to, like...

Maybe some dried herbs or something. Like oregano or something. Yeah. It was always kind of like the same thing. And there was a period in the 70s when my parents had a lot of parties. Yeah. Oh, my God. That's so classic. Yeah. And her entertaining. Entertaining in the 70s was a big thing. Yeah. And she always made the same things. For dinner, it was beef stroganoff. Yum. Yeah. Which is served over pasta.

Yeah. What kind of pasta? Like the curly Q's? No, back then in Norway, it wasn't, you couldn't get that many different kinds. Yeah. So I think it was just like spaghetti. I actually kind of remember that one time I wanted to cook spaghetti for her, but I forgot to stir after you put them in. So it just became like one lump. One pump. Yeah. So my dad had to go out and get more spaghetti. Yeah. I mean, beef stroganoff with spaghetti is a little strange. Yeah.

Well, you know, we eat it with noodles. It's kind of a separate thing. But it's about all the components. No, I know, I know. But, you know, yeah. Norway in the 70s. But is it actually a German dish? Bistro gonna be, it's Russian. Now, do they do it with a certain type of pasta, probably? I think they do it with noodles or... Like egg noodles. Yeah, what I like is to do it over mashed potatoes or mashed rutabaga or something.

Yeah, that's like it turns into a shepherd's pie kind of. Yeah, kind of. It's delicious. We should do it with cauliflower rice. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. I haven't made beef stroganoff in a long time. It's so delicious. And it's actually really easy to do. There's this blue hair restaurant called Billy Reed. Early bird special. Yeah. Around the corner from us. And they do beef stroganoff, which is really good. I've never tasted it, obviously. No, it's really good. It's very like sour, creamy and dilly. And, you know, it's just perfect. Yeah. Yeah.

What other dishes did you grow up with? So that was the main course. And the appetizers, it was either, you know, aspic. What? It's called aspic. It's kind of like a meat. It's kind of like a stock jelly.

Okay. That she put like different things in. A stock jelly. Yeah. That's so interesting. Yeah. She would make it in a mold and then she would put it on the, you know, it would turn out. Is that those things where there's things floating in it? Yes. Now, is it savory? It's savory. It's not sweet. Yeah. And she would put shrimp and carrots and corn and peas and everything.

Maybe sometimes pieces of fish in there. That sounds so weird. I know, but it's actually... It probably looked amazing. It looked amazing, and it's actually really good. And you ate it on little pieces of toast with mayonnaise.

Oh, my God. That's so weird. In like a clear gelatin. So interesting. I know. I don't know if we did savory molded. No, you did them here too. I have seen pictures. It's a very 70s thing. Yeah. Super 70s. Yeah. And if she didn't do that, she would buy these ready-made...

sort of tartlets that was shaped in... It was in the shape of like a seashell. Okay. And she would make a bechamel sauce with peas, shrimp, and... In Norway, we have something called fiskepudding, which is like a fish pudding. She would cut up in two dices. You can't use words like fish and pudding. No.

Or shrimp and jelly together. I mean, it's just like... If I made it for you, you would be like, oh my God, this is amazing. Because it's really, really good. There's this Swedish dish called Flying Jacob. Oh yeah, what's that again? The way my ex, Frederick, would describe it is he would say, it's chicken with whipped cream...

um peanuts and ketchup like he would say it like that and it was like that sounds disgusting but but so but it's again it's using these certain words like whipped cream no i know i know like it's like oh you mean it's like a creamy you know what i mean what and the ketchup is more of like yeah ketchup and peanuts

Which I believe the dish came from when Sweden was involved in the Caribbean. Because it's very Caribbean. So I think that's where it came from. But anyway, it's using those words that you associate with a sweet thing for savory sounds weird. Fish pudding and floating shrimp in jelly. But I tell you, I'm going to... Now that Thanksgiving is coming up, I'm going to make some of this stuff. And you would be like...

Oh my God, this is really, really good. Yeah. Yeah, so... And I remember she would set the beautiful table. We had a dining room. It was like very... It was white walls. And the walls and the ceilings were like texture to them. She was very inspired by like a Spanish restaurant. Okay. And there was like archways and...

The table and chairs were like super dark wood, very like chunky. Yeah. Yeah. And it was green carpet and orange curtains. Oh my gosh. Yes. And the tableware were dark green.

Yeah, and she would always have like orange and red flowers. It was very... It was so 70s. Yeah. But very... I thought it was like super chic. That's very Spanish. It's not very Nordic. Well, she was very inspired by... No, I know. That's very unusual. I know, I know. That's fun. Yeah, so...

Yeah, so that was fun. Yes, my first recipe was those Paul's Pizza steaks. Yes. Yeah. Became a hit. Which entertained your mother's guests. Yes, absolutely. You have to also remember that...

Like we talked about, you know, serving beef stroganoff with spaghetti. In Norway in the 70s, it was actually hard to get certain things. For sure. You know? International things. Yeah, it was hard to get herbs. It was hard to get, like...

Certain cheeses. Certain spices, I imagine. Yeah, certain spices. I remember there was one woman on TV that she was like our Julia Child. And the way she would use garlic, for example, was that she would rub it into like, let's say you were doing like a leg of lamb. And she would just rub the garlic in the pan where you...

They were very afraid of like, you know. Overusing. Yes. Rather than just cutting up the clove in half and throwing the whole thing in. Yeah. It should be like tons and tons of garlic, but they were very, very careful about flavors like that. So interesting. Yeah. Yeah. It was a different time, you know. I can still remember. So we lived a little bit outside of Oslo in this little community. And I remember that...

There was trucks coming. We had a fish truck, a grocery truck, and a meat truck that would come and sell to the housewives. Really? Yeah. And they would also go to grocery stores? Yeah, we would also go to grocery stores, but I...

I think maybe the truck stopped when I was like seven, eight years old. But yeah, I remember the trucks coming and the housewives go out and see, you know. Oh my God, I wish they still did that. I know. We were just talking about that this morning. I know. I wish someone would bring organic eggs and organic dairy to us every week. Yeah, that would be amazing. The milkman would be like, hi, good morning. What do you have for us today? Yeah, and I was especially, I think...

So I think they came, I think the fish truck maybe came like twice a month or something. But I was very excited when the fish truck came because then I knew my grandmother would make something called a fiskegrateng, which translated is fish au gratin. Again, you just take any dish and put some fish in it and it becomes Norwegian. No, no, this is purely amazing. What she would do, she would take cod, she would like steam it or boil it.

take out all the bones. So it was just like, you know, the flaky meat. And then she would make a bechamel sauce with nutmeg. And then she would mix the sauce and the fish and cooked macaroni. And then she would put that in an oven dish and

And then she would do breadcrumbs on top. So it was like a casserole. Yeah, it was like a casserole. And lots of butter. And into the oven. Oh my God. That was... Yeah, and I love a casserole, but not a fish casserole. Sorry. No, no. I tell you... That's kind of like a tuna melt. No, no. Hot tuna fish, like from a can. Disgusting. Someone once made me... And I'm sorry if that person is listening now. But I don't honestly really care. She made me...

The tuna casserole, hot tuna casserole. It is the most disgusting thing I ever tasted. I agree. It was literally eating cat food. Oh my gosh, yeah. It smelled like cat food and it tasted like cat food. But I love tuna fish sandwiches. Yeah, me too. I love... Everything tuna. But hot canned tuna fish? Oh my God, no, no, no. Okay, and with that, we're going to take a break. We need to, you know, get over it.

So, you know, when I was a kid, I was, you know, I loved watching movies and TV and read books and stuff. And I would always, whenever there was food described, I was very curious about that. And I often would... Describe like in a show or a commercial? Yeah, let's say a very good example is in the...

You know the Narnia series? Narnia? Yeah. Yeah. There is mentioning of something called Turkish Delight. Okay, in the books. In the books. And also in the movies later and the shows and stuff. But the Snow Queen says to one of the kids... I forgot his name. Like the bad one. You know the bad one? Yeah. She's giving him Turkish Delights. And I was like obsessed. What the hell is a Turkish Delight? Yeah. So I...

My grandmother and I found out and I was like, we have to make Turkish delight. And Turkish delight is actually very difficult to make. I don't even know what it is. I thought it was like a candy or something. It is a candy. Oh, okay. Yeah, it's kind of like a soft...

It kind of looks like a marshmallow. Oh, okay. But it's usually pink. They put a little food coloring in it. And it contains rose water. Oh, my gosh. That sounds fabulous. You can imagine rose water. I've seen like little pink marshmallows. It's a little different than that, though. Like the big, cute pink marshmallows. They're usually a little smaller. Oh, okay. Yeah, they're usually a little smaller. They're a little denser.

And why are they chopping off trees today while we're doing a podcast? That's very, you know, that's not cool. No. Whatever. They're sweeter and a little denser. Than a marshmallow? Yeah. Very good. But they contain rose water. And you can imagine finding rose water in the 70s in Oslo. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, my God. We managed to find a recipe. Okay.

And we managed somehow to find rose water. I think my grandmother found it one day in actually a cheese shop. Oh, interesting. Of all places. Well, yeah, it was probably imported from somewhere. Yeah. We managed to make something that was kind of like a Turkish delight. Yeah. And I remember in the book we found with the recipe, it was this beautiful picture of like these plump,

pink Turkish delights on this silver tray. It was really pretty. And ours were kind of like flattish and not plump. Nailed it. Yeah. No, I remember looking at my grandmother and I was like, they don't look exactly like the picture. And then, you know, the famous quote came. She took a sip of coffee and she took...

You know, a puff of her drag of a cigarette. And she looked at me and she said, oh, Paul, perfection is so boring. Iconic. Yes, very iconic. I didn't realize she was the one that said that to you. Yeah, she said that. She also said it once. I had a birthday party at home and I invited some kids from class. And she baked me a chocolate cake and it was a little wonky.

Like, you know, one side was shorter than the other one. And I said the same thing and she was like, oh, Paul, perfection is so boring. Love it. And she's so right. It is boring. The main thing is that it tastes good. Yeah, and it's just... I don't care about, you know, the cake doesn't have to be like...

I'm over overly decorated cakes anyway. That trend needs to stop. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Yes. I don't need it. And there is a lot of beautiful cakes out there that just don't taste very good. Exactly. I'd rather have a cake that's not perfect, but that is delicious. Exactly. That is the main thing. Exactly. Yes. Love it. Yeah. And then, of course, we had home economics in school. Oh, interesting. Yeah. So, it's actually really good. So...

We do home economics, and then we also do sewing and woodshop. Yeah. In theory, we have that stuff in the US, but I never remember learning anything in home ec. No? No. It was all just a waste of babysitting. Yeah.

In Europe, kids really come out of school with a trade or a craft or real knowledge, practical knowledge. Yeah, I remember in Home Ec that we made, for example, the Fiske Grateng, the Fish of Grattan. And I remember we...

We got the recipes and we took those home. I remember showing my grandmother and she was so angry. Really? Yes. That they were miseducating you? Yes. She said that, no, this is not the way you do it. This is not the way you do it. Interesting. And she's like, why is there no cream? Where is the butter? Where is this? Yeah, because it was very like, you know. Yeah, conservative. Yeah. Healthy. Healthy. And she didn't cook healthy. Healthy was not in her vocabulary.

Love it. No. If it wasn't cream and if it wasn't butter in it, it wasn't food. Yeah. Because, you know, she went through the war and she ate so much crap. So she was like, I am never going to eat bad food again. Yeah. And yeah, I think I said something to my teacher about, are we going to, oh, this isn't really the way you do it. Oh, really? You came back to it? And I got a B.

I mean... I got a B. Do you know what we called that teacher? What do you call her? Milkshake. Oh my God, why? Because she had really big boobs and when she walked her boobs were bouncing up and down. Oh my God. And... Well, Milkshake gave you a B because you tried to correct her. Milkshake gave me a B because I corrected her recipes. And some of the other teachers heard that we called her Milkshake and told her...

And she was like, no. And she actually thought it was kind of like a compliment.

That's good. Yeah. It was. Depending on how you look at it, yeah. Actually, she was a really beautiful woman. She had like big dark hair, very tiny waist, but really enormous boobs. That was like bouncing when she walked. Yeah. And she kind of wore those bras that was kind of like pointy. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Hilarious. So, that was milkshake. Yeah, no. We did sewing and we had woodshop. I didn't like woodshop. I loved sewing. Yeah. And...

One year I made this stuffed penguin.

That became like the rage of the school. Really? Yeah. So every kid, more or less that year, made a penguin in sewing class. Oh my gosh, I love it. Because I made... You inspired the masses. Yeah, I remember. It was black and white, orange beak. Was it like three-dimensional? Yeah. Oh, it was. Oh my gosh. It was like a stuffed animal. Oh my gosh, so cool. I know. It was very... Did you freehand it or did you have a pattern? I think I made a pattern first on paper and then I just...

figured it out yeah kind of went for it yeah and you've been doing that because I was used to sewing at home yeah so you know I kind of knew a little bit of how yeah you know things worked yes and you've used that your entire life yeah yeah totally just figured it out craft your way through it I crafted my way through it yeah

Oh, good stories. I know. What else is there that we did? Well, we did a lot of foraging because we were next to a forest. So the falls, it was like berries and mushrooms. And my favorite thing was because my grandmother, great aunt and myself, we would go into the forest and we would pick chanterelles. Of course. Because my grandmother knew one place.

It was a little far. So we would walk and we would have a little picnic and then we would walk there. Yeah. But she knew exactly when to go and it never failed. It was tons of chanterelles. So we would pick those, go back, and then she would make me my favorite thing ever.

which was a chanterelle toast. Yeah. Yeah. Classic. It's basically sauteed chanterelles. Shallots. Shallots. Cream. Oh, really? You do all that? Cream. Even just salt and pepper and a saute. Oh, yeah, totally. But the key is on a buttered toast. Yes. But she would put cream in it, salt, pepper, tons of dill, and, yeah, on a buttered toast. Oh, my God.

After you've been out all day, like, you know, struggling with your mushrooms. And it just tasted... And she washed them all thoroughly. Yeah, yeah. And she would go over to make sure that we only picked chanterelles, that it wasn't like, you know... Because there's people every year that die. Well, yeah, that's the thing. Speaking of Frederick, his mother...

foraged mushrooms in the Catskills one time. I was like, but you just, these ladies know. Yeah, no, they knew. They knew because she said during the war, that was like a big thing. People out in the forest looking for food. Yeah. You know, anything they could eat.

Love it. Yeah. So those, oh my God, those, I can, you know, right now my mouth is watering when I think about it. Let's make them for this holiday season, Chanterelle Toast, maybe for Thanksgiving or something. Yes, we will. Oh, talking of holiday season, we are going to do a Christmas special episode.

And we would love to get any questions you have about Christmas in Norway, Christmas in Palm Springs, Christmas in general. Or any holiday during the season. Yes, or any holiday, of course. You can send us a question. You can do it as a direct message on Instagram, Sweet Paul Magazine. Or you can send us an email at podcast at sweetpaulmag.com. All right, let's take a break and come back with What's Up, Sweet Paul? ♪

Okay, it's question time. Yes. What's up, sweet Paul? What's up? Okay, first question. Let me put on my glasses so I don't misread. Lin47, L-I-N 47 asks...

Time to know if you did do full face on Halloween. And I have to ask, as I think you both are big Drag Race fans, who's your favorite drag queen? Oh my gosh, mine is Alyssa. Oh my gosh, this is such a good question. Well, first of all, we did go to Ulta on Halloween. We did go over our friend Randy and John's house, which was really fun. We ordered some food.

And we did do makeup and it was an epic fail. Yeah. It's actually not as easy as it looks. No. It's really hard. I've worn...

my entire life to see far. I now wear contact lenses. But now my near sight, my close near sighted vision is going. And I realized after spending $70 on makeup that you can't apply makeup if you can't see. And you can't wear glasses while putting on lashes. No, it's...

So it was just, I was just like, I can't, I like, I don't even get to do this really. No, it's, it was really, I looked like, well, I did one first and I looked like I've been beat up.

Yeah, it was two black eyes. And I took that off and then I did something else, which was maybe kind of like even worse, but you know, whatever. Yeah, but you throw on a red lip and a lash and it all sort of ties together. Yeah, yeah. So it was fun, but we're not going to be beauty gurus. Sorry.

No. If anyone was hoping for makeup tutorials, no. That's not going to happen. But in terms of Drag Race, we are obsessed. We love...

The show, every version of the show from every country. We're obsessed. I, the interesting thing is, you know, when, when I was growing up, the whole drag queen thing, I think for a lot of us was very strange because it was, it was really about the shame of the idea of like, I don't know. It's just that like really small minded, uh,

Oppression of masculinity, right? You're like, oh, those are those gays that want to be girls or what? You know, just like so lame. Yeah. But because of RuPaul's Drag Race, I personally realized that the artistry and the personality and the genius really were there talking everything padded.

Like four layers of this, makeup, wigs, and they're literally doing, we've seen in like a dive bar, them doing Tony Award winning performances. In a corset. In a corset. With like six inch stilettos. Yeah. And they do the splits and they go upside down. Yeah, and I'm sorry, but Meryl Streep can't do that. So it's like the respect of the art and the comedy of drag is just, we're obsessed. Yeah.

Yeah, Alyssa is probably one of my top five. Yeah. I love Kim Chi. Mm-hmm. I love Trixie. Mm-hmm.

Alaska. I love Alaska with all my heart. I think those are my favorites. Alyssa? Who would be like your ultimate, like if you could only see one queen, which one would you pick? I would probably say Alaska. But I think I would be nervous to meet Alaska. I would be nervous to meet Kim Chi. But obviously like Violet Tchotchke is exquisite. Yeah.

I love Bob the Drag Queen. Hilarious. Dina Martina is my OG favorite because she's not a rude girl, but she's old school. Yeah. She's hilarious. Amazing. Genius. See Dina Martina if you can in P-Town or in New York or Seattle, wherever she is. Yeah. Her show is next level, crazy, funny. Yes. And we'll eventually get to the one time I think Paul dressed in drag.

Next question. What about me? Hey, I need to tell. Oh, your favorite queens. Sorry. Oh my God. This is my podcast. Oh my God. Who's your favorite queen? Well, I've seen a bunch of them perform. I think that the most epic ones that I've seen perform was actually Ben de la Creme. Yeah, I've never seen her. He was incredible. Yeah. When I saw that show, and this is right after he competed the first time.

When he was Miss Congeniality, I felt like I was watching a star being born. I was completely blown away. Absolute talent. Everything she did. And it was a tiny stage and it was like maybe 60 people in the audience. But I felt like I was watching something kind of groundbreaking. Yeah.

So I think actually that's my... Well, I love... I kind of love them all. But that's... Yeah. And also the thing that we realized...

Because the Queens used to perform literally down the street from where we live at Two Counts. Yeah. But we saw Morgan McMichaels. We saw Delta Work. We saw Kennedy Davenport. And it's amazing to see how extraordinary they are as entertainers when that doesn't always translate on a reality show. No, that's very true. So being good for TV...

And being an entertainer in a club aren't always the same and equal. No, it doesn't match. Like, I get super, like... Especially with Morgan McMichaels, because she's so intense. And, you know, you give them dollars. And when she takes your dollar, she kind of holds onto your hand and she looks at you. And I get all, like... Clustered? Yeah, I get all, like, it's schoolgirl. I'm like... Yeah, I mean, they...

what they do and what they have to put themselves through to do it. Yeah. I'm sorry, but no one like football players have nothing on drag Queens. You heard it here. Exactly. Podcast. Next question. Next question. Yes. Nick Thanksgiving is coming up. He asks, how are you celebrating? And what are your favorite dishes? Um,

Did you celebrate Thanksgiving in Norway? No. No. We did not. Because that's an American thing. Yeah, totally. Yes. We had no pilgrims. Yeah. Well, I mean, there's a lot of holidays that have been transferred over there. Not that one. But again, Christmas and Easter are big ones for food, no? Yes, very. Christmas is the big, big one. Yes, it is the big one. And in America...

When I grew up, Christmas was less about the meal than Thanksgiving. And I think still it's that way. I mean, honestly, I don't think a lot of people have a big Christmas dinner. It's always about Thanksgiving. Isn't it Christmas lunch? I don't even know. I mean, we always went to church for Christmas, Christmas morning. And then after, I mean, we sort of...

You'd just chill? No, we would just go to my grandmother's after and eat tamales, but there was never a formal Christmas dinner. Okay. Yeah, when it comes to Thanksgiving, yeah, we didn't celebrate that. Favorite dishes. I'm not the biggest fan of turkey, I'm sorry to say.

I stopped making a whole turkey because I think that's a total waste of food. Yeah. And it takes so long. Yeah, it takes so long. So much waste. No one will ever eat a whole turkey. What I do, if I am to make a turkey dinner, I would buy the breasts and I would do like a roulade. I would flatten it out and then I will make like a mixture of nuts and herbs and berries and different things. And I would roll that up.

And maybe wrap the whole thing in prosciutto and then bake it in the oven. Yeah. And then slice it. It's beautiful and it's really – and it's super good. But even just buying a couple of breasts and – or for us, too, one breast. Yeah, totally. And just roasting it. Yeah, totally. And that's enough turkey. I will say my favorite thing is the gravy because I make –

And I'm not going to be humble. I make the best gravy ever. I will take on anyone for a gravy challenge. Well, I don't like gravy in general, so I don't have an opinion on that. Martha?

I know if you're listening. Okay. Is it the maple syrup gravy? It's by maple syrup gravy. It is so freaking delicious. It is salty and sweet. And I usually make it for my roasted chicken. Yeah. But yeah, I will say it's actually beyond this world. It is the recipe on Sweetpaw Magazine. Yeah, it's on Sweetpaw Magazine. Here's the thing. The key to a good recipe

delicious, successful Thanksgiving is being able to serve all of the components of

At the right temperature. Which is really hard. Really hard to do. But the best Thanksgiving meals I've ever had was when that happened. Yeah. Because if you have turkey that's cold or mashed potatoes that are cold or stuffing that's cold or whatever, it's like, then it's just like, oh, it's difficult to do. It is. When you're planning the meal, you kind of have to plan out, okay, these things are going to be cold. I'm not going to worry about that.

This needs to be right out of the oven. This needs to just, you know, stay heated. So it's kind of all about in the planning. Yeah. You know? Yeah.

But then when it comes to like the potluck friends and family, Thanksgiving, it's always a little difficult because you come with a big pan and you're like, oh, I need to heat this up in the oven. Everyone's fighting over the oven space. Yeah, everyone's fighting. But when it comes together, it's the most delicious thing. And even if it's not, it's really about like, you know, spending time with the people you love. Yeah. I mean, that's the most, and I do love a good pecan pie.

Oh my God, pecan pie. I love pecan pie more than pumpkin pie. Yeah, I'm actually not a pumpkin person. I loved pumpkin pie when I was a kid, but now it doesn't taste as yummy as I remember it. Maybe I'm just having the wrong one, but pecan pie is always good. Yeah, your taste buds change as you grow older. You will see that you will need more and more spices to your food because your taste buds are kind of like dying off. Yeah.

Okay, next question. Caleb asks, I love the magazine and the podcast. Did you ever make a cookbook? Ooh, yes, I did. Actually, I made over 30 cookbooks. Yeah. Over your lifetime. Over my lifetime. Most of them in Norway. Here in the States, I actually have, I've had four cookbooks out in the States. The first one is called Pasta a Passion, which is out of print, and I'm sure you can find it.

I'm sure you can find it on Amazon or eBay or something. Yeah, it's a pasta book. The second one is called Slurp, which is a cocktail book. Oh, my God. I've seen that book on the shelf and didn't know it was your book. That's mine. Oh, great. It's really cute. It's cocktails, a little finger food. I shot it in Key West. I traveled from Norway to Key West to shoot it. Oh, cool. That was fun with Nina and Jim.

Then I had a book called Summer Food.

That's my favorite. Yeah. And all of these are actually out of print, but you can find them used, which is about food you eat in summer. Yeah. And the cover is so beautiful. Yeah, it's really beautiful. It was originally in Norwegian and they translated it into English. It's beautiful. Summer food. Yeah. And then the last one is called Eat and Make, which came out. Still in print. No. Yes, you can totally get that in print. Amazon or wherever you buy books. Yeah.

And it's a cookbook divided into morning, noon, and night. So it's everything you eat during the day. There's some cocktails. There are some craft projects in there. And they are kind of based around kitchen entertaining to kind of tie the whole thing together. That maple syrup gravy that I talked about is in that book. Awesome. So go and buy, buy, buy, buy. Go and buy it. It's a perfect holiday present. Yeah. Okay, last question. Yes.

Okay, last question. Alex says, I love the podcast. Could listen to it all day. Oh, that's so nice. I'm a creative just like you two. Well, at least one of us. I'm creative. I just don't want to make anything. My question is, where do you find your inspiration? Good one. That can be anywhere. That can be from a movie, a book, anything.

A magazine. I think I come up with my best ideas either driving, because I think you're well in the car. Yeah. While I'm driving. Or in the bathtub. While I'm driving Paul around or when he's in the bathtub. When he's driving me around in the bathtub, I come up with my best ideas. Yeah.

Yeah. There's something about the motion and the bathtub is something about like the sound of running water. Yeah. That I really like. That kind of like relaxes me. Yeah. So, yeah, it can come from anywhere. And especially if I'm working on something where I want to use like colors, I always look at fashion. Yeah. Because fashion has like the best, you know, combinations of colors. Yeah, I agree. For me, I'm more of a, I mean, I'm certainly not a maker, but I'm

My creativity is more in art direction and creative direction and kind of branding. And again, it's really just like paying attention to everything in the world. And like Paul said, for sure, like even this new brand we're creating, I immediately, I visualized the branding immediately and thought, oh, these words should be color blocked. So of course I was like Valentina, like,

Even in my personal style, I'm more inspired by the women's collections. Not that I'm going to wear a fuchsia gown, even though I wish I could. But it's more about the inspiration and you pull little ideas, whether it's color or texture or volume or silhouette, that you apply to yourself. So it's sort of taking a little bit from fashion, taking a little bit from music, films, just nature, and being like, oh, why don't I do this? Or like...

And so, yeah. So it's like you look to fashion and be like, oh, this color blocking is so fabulous to mix green with orange and pink and yellow and blue. And so it was like, yeah, that's how you could take a little bit. I think that's the healthy approach.

And inspired way of borrowing ideas is not, you know, like, oh, I'm going to make jewelry. I'm going to make jewelry that looks exactly like that person's jewelry. No. Yeah. It's like, oh, you know, looking at architecture or looking at, you know, organic shapes in nature and like, just look beyond what's already been done. Exactly. It's just about getting inspired and to come up with, you know, new ways to do things.

You know, to reinvent the wheel, you know, which you all try to do, you know, every day. But yeah, fashion is a big inspiration. Fashion, music, nature. Yeah, and always, wherever you go, have a little notebook and a pen because you never know when that like brilliant idea that's going to make you. Or take a picture with your phone. Yeah, that's going to make you tons of money, you know. You never know when that is going to come. Yeah, or not even money, just, you know, an outlet for...

Shout out to Gags, Fame and Glory. Money, Fame and Glory. No, just personal satisfaction. That's all we're looking for in happiness. Yes, absolutely. I think that's a good way to end the show. Yes, because it's been a long one. It's been a long one. Sorry to exhaust you. I'm just going to say if you want to... We love it when people comment and rate us and, you know...

Send us questions. We do need your questions. So as I said, you can do a DM on Instagram, Sweetball Magazine, or send us an email, podcast at sweetballmag.com. All right. Until next time. Bye. Bye. Bye.