5: "Doors" & "Violet" (S3E3&4)

[00:00:00] Hey everybody, welcome to our podcast. I'm Lucy. And I'm Peter. And this is Let It Rip The Bear Cast Episode 4. This episode we're covering The Bear, Season 3 Episode 3 Doors and Episode 4 Violet. It's a double bill. It is a double bill. And you know what pleases me about this?

[00:00:40] It pleases me that we're now on episode 4 of our show, but also covering episode 4 of this season of The Bear. It's been driving me a bit crazy the numbering from our episodes doesn't match the numbering of the episodes of the show. But it kind of does now.

[00:00:54] We didn't number the minisode last week. No. We'll leave it unnumbered. It's the dendym. It can be a 0.5. It's a 0.5. It's a 2.5. We are coming to you a little late this week for good reason.

[00:01:08] We recently just returned from our epic Scotland trip, which you heard a little of last week's minisode. We had, I would say, a pretty spectacular time. Yeah. Well, we hung out with podcastica celebrities, Jason, Karen and David. Yeah, we did.

[00:01:25] And we met some amazing listeners at the Listener Meetup in Glasgow. It was so nice to see Helen from Yorkshire again. We last saw her in San Francisco. We got to hang out with Derek O'Neill. Derek and I go way back.

[00:01:36] We used to do not under the comic covers. We used to do comic talk on The Walking Dead cast. And under the comic covers? No, that was Mr. Blog and Gracie Lou. I was just being heretic there and claiming that we'd done something we hadn't done there. Sorry.

[00:01:49] You and Derek were better though, right? No, not at all. Did you ever listen to under the comic covers? Oh my God, if you didn't, you should. It's brilliant. It sounds racy. It was super, super racy. We also met Brian, who runs Ultramarithons. Yeah, holy moly.

[00:02:04] Yeah, Brian's like a bit of a legend. A world where you look at marathons and think no more. More. We also got to hang out with Robin, who's from my part of the world over on the East Coast, and Jillian, who came along with Helen.

[00:02:18] It turns out they were both listening to podcastica and didn't realize it. So that was super nice to meet all of those people. And some of our good friends turned up as well. Ian and Deb were there.

[00:02:28] Ian and Deb in fact, fed into this episode quite literally because they presented us with the Matty Matheson Cookbook. Indeed they did. From which we will be cooking later, so stay tuned for that. And of course, our dear friend Douglas. Who was also there?

[00:02:41] Who was also there and lost no one a bit with Jason Kibbesi about books in the Bible. Yep, everybody. There is a book of Timothy. There is a book of Timothy. Apparently it's a bang and read. So that was wonderful.

[00:02:55] But I will also remember our trip for the crazy good food that we had. We had so many good meals. And obviously listeners, you heard us talk about that a little bit in the mini-sode.

[00:03:06] Although I think I would say the best meal that we had actually came after that. Well, I was literally about to ask you what was the best thing you ate this week. So let's do it. Let's talk about it. Look how in sync we are here.

[00:03:17] It's almost as though we have an agenda. Yeah. Oh yeah, we do. We recorded our episode in Mainz of T-Mouth. And after that, our little group went down to Glasgow. And we in a really fantastic vegetarian restaurant called Sylvan,

[00:03:36] where I learned and Lucy showed me that you can smoke a tomato. And it was great. Not like not like drugs, but like over wood chips. Just to make this really clear. For the point of the doubt, we were not hanging around the back of a bus shelter

[00:03:54] trying to light a tomato. No, that would be weird. Yeah, I think Sylvan's standout dish, which I'd had once before is a kind of smoked tomato with a kind of light chilli oil on some garlicy yoghurt. It is so good. Oh yeah.

[00:04:10] And that was probably for me the best thing I ate on that meal, although the broccoli was very good. There was some tender stem spicy broccoli that I'm still thinking about and a very good goat's cheese that I think won Karen's heart.

[00:04:23] We ate a lot of really good food that night. And although I think Jason ate pretty fancy after we left him. Yeah, I'll be chatting to him about that on Walking Deadcast because poor Jason's been stuck in Edinburgh for an extra couple of days. Yeah.

[00:04:38] So I think he's he's finally escaped. I believe he's in the air at present so we can grill him on what he ate when we weren't there when he gets back. But no, it was great. Those were really memorable meals in great company.

[00:04:51] Also shout out, we went to a really good wine bar and I tried some very interesting wine on the side side of Glasgow. So Glasgow, you did us proud. And if you ever get a chance to go to Sylvan and eat their smoked tomatoes, I would not hesitate.

[00:05:04] We talk a little bit about this when we're cooking later in the episode. But one of the things I liked best about Sylvan was it was so simple, like the sides were like rice or a flatbread, but the flatbreads were fresh.

[00:05:16] They were light and they were just the perfect accompaniment to all this really intricate intricate but also simple veggie food. So yeah, 10 out of 10. Yeah. I think they I think they knew the the sides were just just a vehicle.

[00:05:29] I don't think they wanted them to distract from the from the mains at all. No. And I'm I'm a recovering vegetarian. I was a vegetarian for a number of years. I only stopped a couple of years before we met actually.

[00:05:40] And what is my favourite tip for going to fancy restaurants? You when you when you are faced with a tasting menu will often go for the vegetarian option. Yes, I believe and I have no scientific evidence to back this up

[00:05:52] other than my own experience that you tend to get more interesting and inventive things on the veggie menu. Often on a meat tasting menu, there'll be like an exceptional bit of beef or duck

[00:06:02] or something as we see in the episode doors, you know, duck with duck with a vellute with a veggie menu. I think you have to push harder into the flavours and I think you can get some really magic things there.

[00:06:13] So to go somewhere like Sylvan where it's a really good price point for a really decent meal and enjoyable times was really just a pleasure to share with you all. So this episode is not sponsored by Sylvan, but if you go, please tell us about it

[00:06:27] and tell us what you ordered and we will live vicariously through you. So turning our attention to another restaurant, The Bear. Yes, because this is a double bill episode, I thought we might go through episode by episode, although I think we will inevitably switch between the two.

[00:06:42] Bear season three, episode three doors. What were your thoughts on this episode? So anticipating the point that you're making that we might dot back and forth a little bit, I liked doors more than I liked violet. Interesting. Go on.

[00:06:59] Yeah, I try to I will try to make the argument when we when we come to violet that it feels a little bit like violet is treading water. I feel like it lacks the pace of some of the other episodes or the kind of creativity of it.

[00:07:19] And none of that none of that's to say that violet was bad, but it didn't feel quite as quite as inspired. It felt more just like a straight episode of TV where you check in with an ensemble of characters. And that's fine. So what made doors so good?

[00:07:33] Well, for it's probably worth saying that we have an introduction that feels quite different from the rest of the episode where we see Marcus's grandma's mom's funeral. Yes, mom's funeral. And that's quite slow and contemplative. And as is tradition in a TV show, it's a family event,

[00:07:54] but everyone from work has come and they're sitting at the front. Yep, because apparently you have no friends or family outside of your work colleagues. Yeah, interesting choice, interesting choice. You know, hi dad, here's my line manager and my managers, line manager and they're currently not talking.

[00:08:12] They won't sit together. Yeah, it's really important that they're centered at this. But I did take away from that that it was great that that Marcus's mum let him watch Robocop. That is that is full marks for that. Anyway, after after that quite quiet intro,

[00:08:30] we have a sort of what I would say is a classic bear, very stressy, quite fast camera work. Chaos menu. Chaos menu kind of episode. Interestingly, for those of you who are have been paying attention to the music in it and clarit

[00:08:45] entirely using instrumental, what I would call as a layperson classical music. But I think someone with a better understanding could place the styles of music a bit better. I don't know why you're looking at me because I'm not that person.

[00:08:57] But sure, there is a great website you sent me a link to that lists all the music that's used in the bear. And yet everything on this is things like l'amico frites, Billet Chick Suite number two, all sorts of different things all performed by like the Berlin Philharmonic,

[00:09:14] an Italian orchestra, Estonian National Symphony Orchestra. Yeah, I don't think it I wouldn't put yourself down for calling that classical music. No, I think we all we all know what I mean by that, even if technically that's not all classical music or maybe it is.

[00:09:28] Interesting to notice that because I think one of the things that the bear is credited with in some ways is maybe rehabilitating dadrock. Don't call it dadrock. It's like in yellow jackets when we looked up Jeff's rock and dad playlist

[00:09:44] and we were like, but we remember this when it first came out. Old shit that dad's like old shit that dad's like. It's depressing. Let's not dwell. Let's not dwell. Yeah. So I'm interested to know with that choice of music,

[00:09:57] because it's very much off of what the bear does in an episode that otherwise feels very much like an episode of the bear. What where do you think they're going with that there? To me, the bear is trying on its new identity in this episode.

[00:10:09] We see it from the outside. We see that it doesn't have the name of the restaurant on the outside, which we all know is code for very fancy. Can I just say that Uncle Jimmy pointing out all the bullshit

[00:10:18] in this episode made my life like Jimmy just coming in and giving them a shit about the butter and not having the name of the restaurant and things like that. I love that. I love him as a proxy for kind of old Chicago non sort of millennial aesthetic

[00:10:33] and just asking what the fuck is going on because he's so concerned about his investment. I'm enjoying more Jimmy this season. I think it's about the bear trying on an identity. I think it's we're seeing the bear as no longer the kind of bedraggled sandwich restaurant.

[00:10:49] We're seeing it as this new high end tasting menu place. And there's so much tension underlying that like no one is happy. No one is relaxed and enjoying it. I think the music speaks to that.

[00:11:01] I think when they use these needle drops in the first couple of seasons, it's so much about I think Chicago is a city about the people within the bear, about the kind of chaos that is created there and the kind of from the heart music

[00:11:15] that comes with the use of things like Counting Crows, R-E-M, Wilco. This feels like they are all trying very hard to reach a new aesthetic and the tension is starting to show. And I think the juxtaposition of the mistakes with the classical music heightens that quite a lot.

[00:11:31] Yeah, I think that I'm glad I asked you first because you articulated something I was trying to find my way to there because I think the music which feels refined and controlled and polished is presumably like the product.

[00:11:48] It's like the way that the customers are probably experiencing the bear and it's in contrast with the tension and the drama and the chaos that's really occurring inside the kitchen. And I thought it was also interesting that that opening in the church,

[00:12:01] there was a couple of things that were interesting there, but one of them was the silence. Yeah, there was no music. You would expect maybe that kind of, I call it like funeral entry organ music that's sort of neither here nor there, but it was silent.

[00:12:12] And we really focus in on the faces of everyone in the group. But I'm very conscious watching this that Karmie probably hasn't been to a funeral since he missed his brothers. It's probably Richie's first funeral since Mikey's and He Looks Very Uncomfortable.

[00:12:25] Fat has an arm on Natalie's shoulder and she's touching her bump as Marcus talks about parenting. I don't know what it is to be a parent, but I know what it is to be a child. There's also a shot of Richie there who's clearly thinking about his daughter

[00:12:37] and the parental role he has in her life. And there's a point where I think Marcus says something about looking really closely at each other and there's this intense focus on the faces of all the people there. I just thought it was a really interesting opening

[00:12:50] and those tight close-ups really gave it a different feel. Yeah, it was a real cam before the storm. Absolutely. And RIP Angela Brooks, she sounds like an amazing mom. Yeah, she sounded great, didn't she? And I also noticed that there were purple and white flowers

[00:13:08] that we focus in on before we cut to the restaurant and that comes back in violet. Yeah, I wondered if that was your theory about that. Yeah, I think Marcus is clearly thinking about something

[00:13:19] when he looks at that flower and I wonder if it's a link between the two. So it was quite nice to be discussing the two of them together. So I touched on it earlier, but I thought there was quite a lot of humour in this episode.

[00:13:29] I really enjoyed Jimmy's line about the butter, the Orwellian butter from Vermont, which he asked if it came from the rare Transylvanian five-titted goat and then asked if it was dystopian butter. I love dystopian butter. Dystopian butter. One of my favourite lines.

[00:13:45] One of our favourite things to do is pick lines from shows to name our Wi-Fi network after and I would be surprised if dystopian butter is not our Wi-Fi network. And I do enjoy the frustration of the people around him

[00:13:58] as Karmie sort of gets deeper and deeper into the kind of tweezing of very small bits of her, but onto little bits of fish. Why shouldn't Richie have non-negotiables? I love Richie's non-negotiables. Why is Karmie? Who made Karmie the king of non-negotiables? I agree with you.

[00:14:17] I was actually thinking about the humour in this episode but as I was making my notes and I think we had full Matty Matheson at various points in this episode. You know, in some ways doing a very different tone from maybe Karmie but he gets some great lines.

[00:14:38] I loved the sequence where things are starting to free and he sent out to serve the miropoie. It's from Chef Karmie. This is a broth from Chef Karmie's mind. I pour it in front of you. Enjoy.

[00:14:55] And he has a few moments there where he's gradually running out of energy. His eyes are glazed and he does make it hilarious. And I think lighten what could probably be a hard watch otherwise. And I suppose maybe one of the interesting things to think about here

[00:15:16] is we've spoken a couple of times about should the bear be treated as a comedy? And there are moments like that, like dystopian butter, like a broth from Chef Karmie's mind, where it absolutely is a comedy. And Richie's non-negotiables. Yeah. Joy just in general.

[00:15:34] Open heart, open mind, razzle dazzle and the dreamy. I personally prefer his non-negotiables. They're better aren't they? I think one of my biggest frustrations at the moment and I think the show wants me to feel this is Karmie's dismissal of Richie

[00:15:50] when he's actually doing an incredibly good job a lot of the time. And this sort of assumption that everything Richie does is is crap or not good or not well thought out when actually he's you see a lot of growth from Richie in this episode.

[00:16:03] He apologizes to Sid when he loses his temper. You wouldn't have seen that last season. He has some good ideas about taking the customers to the kitchen. He's got his eye on the prize and he's trying to keep it all together.

[00:16:15] And Karmie is just so dismissive of him because he can't deal with his feelings about what's gone down between the two of them. I'm just going to offer a visual for our listeners that our cat is sitting

[00:16:25] on the table between us as we podcast and she's going up to whoever's talking and sort of hugging the mic. So I've currently got a tabby cat sort of attached to my microphone. So I don't know what audio effect that's having, but she seems happy.

[00:16:39] We also see fact just keeping pouring water going. Karmie's been to Copenhagen. Have you been to Copenhagen? Which is just I think it's what you're talking about that kind of zoning out in for comedic effect. The moments with Richie and Karmie, I think do they are tense

[00:16:55] and they are difficult to watch and things they're on a very thin wire between the two of them. They're on a knife edge at all points. And Sidney is really carrying Karmie and carrying the piece of the kitchen. She's moderating him talking to Tina.

[00:17:11] She's making sure that people are not losing their shit or stressing in the way that Carmen is when he's just an absolute rocket ready to go off as we see when he starts to have a panic attack later in the episode. So yeah, I enjoyed the lighter moments.

[00:17:25] I enjoyed the humorous moments and I very much enjoyed both Jimmy and Richie's contributions to it. And of course, and of course, the pinata cake. I want to say it was half pinata, half cake. It was, I guess, well, I guess we'll never know.

[00:17:39] I guess we'll never know. The author is dead. How do you how do you wish to understand the pinata? How do you create meaning? Wonderful. And again, one of those things where Karmie sew up his own ass, he wouldn't countenance having that.

[00:17:53] Whereas someone, I don't know, Richie Feck and Sugar can see actually that is a good thing to do. That's customer satisfaction, putting the customer first. I two other things. One is the super soaker joke for idiot, Richie, idiot, fucking idiot, idiot. And Sugar's like, it's actually quite fun.

[00:18:13] I'd really want to know what they do. And the other question I have, I don't really have an answer to is who's in the right about the mushrooms? I feel like you and I are going to have different answers to this question.

[00:18:26] So intrigued to see who's going to fall down on which side? I don't think you should have to eat something you don't like. I agree. Oh, OK, good. I thought you were like, no, you should give it a go

[00:18:35] if it's been cooked and dressed in my or something like that. But then you secretly hate mushrooms. I think mushrooms are more capable of being cooked badly than many other things. True. But do you feel that respecting dietary restrictions is fair

[00:18:50] in a high end restaurant like the Bear or rather dietary preferences, not restrictions? Well, this was part of the debate, wasn't it? I was with Richie there as I was with Richie with most of the episode because

[00:19:05] and I think that this is what this is what Jimmy is getting at as well is Richie understands that it's a business and he's trying to deliver customer service. At this stage in the show, Kermi is effectively a tortured artist.

[00:19:22] Yeah. And he is he's trying to create art. And so, you know, he doesn't care. It makes no sense to him to compromise that art by leaving out an essential ingredient. You know what I'm thinking of is in forks where one of Richie's triumphs and one

[00:19:39] of the nicest moments is when the chef over here is that one of the patrons hasn't tried deep dish, so they send Richie to get deep dish and they serve it on this little plate, like just a little cookie cutter piece of deep dish.

[00:19:50] And I'm like that that's what Richie is aspiring to. And it's that balance of deep dishes, not whole cuisine, but it's bloody enjoyable cuisine and people have a right to experience the things they want to experience and enjoy them.

[00:20:05] Yeah. I suppose if I try to read into this quite far, I don't see any evidence that Kermi is really interested in the customers in this. He's interested in creating a perfect restaurant. He's motivated to get his Michelin star and in fairness to him.

[00:20:26] He has to meet certain criteria in order to not lose the restaurant. So he's utterly laser focused on that to the cost of everything else. But and I think the show is telling this, that's not... I don't think that's sustainable either in terms of the cost to staff

[00:20:44] or just the cost in terms of dystopian butter. Like I think the show is not convinced that this is a viable model for Kermi to sustain. But of course at the same time, one of the themes is you can't make something like this without sacrifice.

[00:20:59] Yeah. So I don't think the show would ever accept a situation where the restaurant was amazing and also everything was fine and easy. Yeah. Yeah. I do wonder though, if I could slightly cheekily use that to segue into my next point. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:21:17] Thank you. Thank you because there was something I actually quite liked in this episode and I thought it was very pleasing in some ways where we cut to a sequence where the staff are all cleaning the restaurant at the end of a shift together. It's very quiet.

[00:21:34] It's quiet and it's serene and Tina, I think it's Tina. You know, just if I will ask the question, do we actually have to do this every night? Yeah. But aside from the fact that the scene is quiet and serene,

[00:21:46] I thought there was something very pleasing about the fact that all of the chefs are cleaning and maintaining the space. They're not just walking away. Yeah, Sid's in pot wash, Karmie's out on the main deck. Yeah. So that element of care

[00:22:02] that I still think is so important to the bear is I know it rhymes. It's so annoying that it rhymes because it cuts through everything. Yeah. There's a rainbow shooting at my chest as I say this.

[00:22:16] I don't think the show is forgetting that while also saying this is blood and fury and drama, it's also showing that that element of care and thoughtfulness that also needs to go in. And I just I really liked that scene because of that contrast. I'm worried about Tina.

[00:22:34] Yeah. She's been pushed from being a sue in a sandwich joint to a high up chef in a top end restaurant in the space of months. And she's more than capable, but I think it's a lot. It's a lot.

[00:22:48] Yeah, I mean, she's she's been given a completely different job that she didn't ask for. Is she being paid more? Hopefully. Hopefully, you know, they're struggling to break even, are they? Or more? Here's open. No one's opened the docusign, so we don't know. Someone asked Pete.

[00:23:05] We demand to see the docusign. We demand to see the docusign. I just have some other kind of lines and moments that stuck out for me. The contrast of Richie saying a vibrant collaboration and opening the door to a massive argument in the kitchen.

[00:23:16] That really made me laugh. Where's the fucking money? Jimmy screening at sugar, I think was quite hilarious as well. Him, Jimmy just wanting a bigger table and the name of the fucking restaurant outside on the fucking restaurant, I think also made me laugh.

[00:23:28] I love that they interspersed this with him being very paternal with sugar and being like, you really, you sure you don't need to go to the bathroom, sweetie, because it's a long drive. So their relationship always makes me laugh.

[00:23:37] We spoke a little off air about the role of Expo. So Expo is the role front of house that we see Richie learning about in Forks and we see Sid primarily take on in this episode, which is the timings and coordination of when

[00:23:53] dishes are going out to certain tables and so on and so forth. One of the moments that made me absolutely kind of lose my mind was the symbolic moment where Karmie and Richie are fighting and being pulled away from one another.

[00:24:06] And all of a sudden the Expo just gets ruined. Everything's on the ground. It's absolute chaos. And it's Sidney who has to take responsibility for it because Karmie is intent on blaming Richie and Richie is being pulled out of the room spitting.

[00:24:19] And at the end of the episode, we see Sidney looking at a footprint on one of those slips on the ground, just quietly seething. And I just, yeah, there's so much tension building up here and they're losing their shit about things like balls being wrong

[00:24:32] when actually there's this much bigger risk to the restaurant, which is their inability to cooperate and coordinate. And that's it, isn't it? And I thought I was toying with about that. And I don't know what you think, but is the problem at this point just entirely Karmie?

[00:24:52] I think so. Well, we know the rest of the team can work well together. Yeah. We know that Richie and Sid are in a good place. We know that Sid has managed to kind of come to a good relationship with Tina.

[00:25:04] We know that everyone else has done this one night of very successful restauranting when Karmie was locked in the fridge and he's come out now and is holding everything so tightly. He's suffocating it and that's tragic to watch.

[00:25:17] He's just not willing to let anything loosen up or let anything fly freely. And I think that's going to be the downfall. And interestingly, at the back of the restaurant, you've got Ibra in a complete chaos with the sandwich side of things. Yeah, I was thinking about that.

[00:25:36] And I was thinking back to season one and you've got a whole restaurant who I know they're serving other dishes, but they're the core of what they do is they make these sandwiches and all these people are rushing around

[00:25:47] trying to make these sandwiches and now Ibra's doing it on his own. He just does it on his own with his arthritic hands. Yeah, that seems like a lot. It seems like a lot. I think they touch on that briefly in the next episode, where I believe

[00:25:59] the original beer guy comes to give him some advice about getting rid of baskets and whatnot, but yeah, I'm worried about you, bro. He's lived a life. He doesn't just need this. He doesn't need this energy. I'm guessing that you did a deep dive on mirepoix.

[00:26:15] You know, I did do a little bit of reading up at mirepoix. What is it? Are we going to make one? Well, we kept seeing it. We're told that they're changing the menu every night, but at least within the show, we see that this mirepoix dish

[00:26:32] getting served kind of all the time. It seems to be a bit of a staple for them. My on the point of changing the menu, what I noticed from this episode is it's not so much that like one night it's chicken, one night it's fish.

[00:26:43] It's that there's tiny iterative changes like, oh, it's cherry, cherry's you. It's red apples. It's things that are always a little bit close to one another for you to remember them and that seems to be a source of chaos. Sartin listened to her crinkling there.

[00:26:58] We had a cat climbing into a bag to have a snooze. She's now in the bag. Yep, she's not snoozing yet. She's having a bit of a think about it. She's just yawned. You were saying, Peter?

[00:27:07] Later where we'll have her jump on a bag of crisps for a bit. Okay, so mirepoix. So I don't think that the research that I did necessarily totally satisfied me that I understand the dish that FACC was serving. However, what is a mirepoix?

[00:27:23] Well, a mirepoix is a mixture of diced vegetables cooked in fat without colouring or browning. And a mirepoix, as you may guess from the name, is the French interpretation of an element of cooking that actually appears in a lot of other cuisines. So for the French,

[00:27:45] you would usually expect the mix to be onions, carrots and celery. That's kind of like a... A cefrito. Cefrito, yes. Exactly. And that is to maybe to many people on this call, certainly to Lucy and I, a cefrito is very, very familiar. It's the same set of ingredients.

[00:28:06] It's still slowly cooked. The oil might change, but it's the base for other things. We wouldn't think of a cefrito as being something you'd serve. It's the start of something you might cook. You use it very well in a bolognese. Of course I do. Or risotto.

[00:28:22] And they exist in loads of cuisines, some of which I can pronounce, some of which I can't. But my personal favourite was the German Zupengurun. Zupengurun. Zupengurun. Would that be a green soup? Soup greens usually come in a bundle.

[00:28:40] You'd get a leek, a carrot and a piece of celeriac, although you may get other elements. In any event, we're talking about slow cooking, a mix of vegetables in fat, but not to the point of colouring. And presumably what's happening in the beer,

[00:28:57] because of the way it's being served, is that... I mean, I have to say, when I see it in the pictures, they don't look like they've been cooked. They almost look like they might be raw. Yeah, I thought it would be something like a DIY ramen situation,

[00:29:08] where you just add hot water and it's noodle if you will. Yeah, just a fun little thing. It's a base of cooking in tons and tons of cuisines. Excellent. I enjoyed the way this episode was framed. We start one minute before half past five,

[00:29:27] we see a whole month of doors, we see the whole month of June 2023, and then at the end, the clock turns to 11pm, so it's like it's been one evening, and we're left with Sydney in the kitchen. We see Sydney and Richie both staring at things

[00:29:44] that are annoying or upsetting them, like the footprint on the slip or Richie looking at a rogue fork. I learned on IMDB that some Michelin reviewers will leave a piece of silverware on the floor to see if a member of Waitstaff will pick it up.

[00:30:01] So I don't know if that's something that's happened there. We do find out in the next episode that more reviewers have been in than we've realised, so who's to say? And then that final crescendo of a montage, where we see things being smashed, things being dropped, there's chaos,

[00:30:15] there's burns, there's cuts, and then we see every second counts and those shouting of doors. It was just, yeah, it was a very... I think one of the things neither of us has said is this was a really stressful episode to watch.

[00:30:29] I think Karen noped out after five minutes. I feel like my jaw has not released since watching this. I'm still gritting my teeth. Yeah, and something that's, I guess, interesting thinking back on re-watching is, and I apologise, I can't remember the name of it right now,

[00:30:46] but there's a similarly very, very stressy episode in season one. Review. Review, thank you very much. And that is an episode about everything getting very fraught in the kitchen. Richie gets stabbed in the butt. Richie gets stabbed in the butt, but it's shot almost in real time.

[00:31:05] It is. So it's a winner, I think. Most of it is a winner. Yeah, and I hadn't spotted that until you pointed it out to me when we re-watched it, but that was in a single shot, covering an incredibly compressed period of time. Whereas this is...

[00:31:19] It's very similar themes, whereas this is the opposite. This is an entire month done the same way. I wonder how conscious that decision was? Oh, I bet it is. Showing off. Yeah. Any other notes on this episode?

[00:31:33] No, I think that's the best of what I had to share on that episode, aside from sitting down the standard right now that I think this was the better of the two. Excellent. Don't talk to me until you're integrated, Jaggolff. Great line.

[00:31:47] I enjoyed sugar and karmie having a duh argument, and that always makes me laugh when siblings be siblinging. Do you want to lead on our next episode, which is of course Violet? What is this episode about? Violet. It's in the title.

[00:32:04] It opens with a Claire and Karmie scene, which I found quite interesting, that I made me think that the episode was going to be about pain and about things either hurting so much that they don't hurt at all or things which haven't started to hurt yet.

[00:32:17] So that was kind of what I took as the thesis of the episode, and we see Marcus in pain of grief, in the pain of losing his mum, and he takes that and puts it into creation. We kind of see Richie's pain and discomfort

[00:32:32] with what's happening with his daughter and her mum and them moving on with their lives. We see Natalie talking with Pete about her mum and the pain and fear she feels about that. Tina kind of gets a monologue from the farmers market

[00:32:47] about the problems of being a produce seller in today's economy. Like that felt like a bit on the nose as a lesson, but like sure. Ebra is struggling with I guess real physical pain and dealing with making the sandwiches. I think Sydney has a different kind of frustration

[00:33:05] that's maybe not a pain where she's having to deal with Kermes kind of crazy that's inherited. And then we've got Richie and Nat talking about the fear of passing on pain or passing on confusion or upset to children. So yeah, I don't know.

[00:33:21] I kind of read it as being an episode about that, but that could also be bollocks. No, I like that because you've helped me out of my much worse analysis. Jason says that to me every week. He just edits it out.

[00:33:39] You're saying somewhere there's going to be a track of just a compilation of you saying... Do you know what they say? You're so right. I have it as my ringtone. It's great. I'm kidding. Obviously, that only happens nine times a day.

[00:33:49] Jason would never admit that you were right. No, it's true. When I was trying to keep my notes on this, it felt kind of like it was an episode just where members of the cast had a good quiet think about their feelings.

[00:34:04] I think that's actually what I just said. It just did it in a different way. I suppose where I was going when I put that kind of unfair question to you out of the blue, right, what's this episode about? Summit up.

[00:34:20] It felt like there wasn't a through line of a story in this episode. It felt like a series of moments where most of the ensemble get a few minutes where there's a scene just about them. Isn't that life though? No, life is all about me.

[00:34:39] It's all about Molly. Molly is our cat. So just as you were summing up, Kari, Marcus, Sid, Richie, Sugar, Tina, the Facts and Ibrahim all get their own scenes where they get a bit of time just

[00:34:51] for us to check in with where they all are, which maybe that's necessary in telling their emotional stories that they're in. But I'm going to say right now, I doubt that Violet is ever going to be anyone's favorite episode from season three.

[00:35:12] I think sometimes you do need to take a moment to catch your breath and just show where the characters are. What about the Heartnut fans out there? Well, shall we come on to that? Yeah, let's do it. It's funny.

[00:35:25] I feel we went to the cinema at the weekend just after we got back to see Twisters. Fantastic. Enjoyed it very much. Was very tired, so it was good to just watch Glenn Powell and Daisy Edgar Jones be attractive around some Twisters would recommend.

[00:35:40] And there was an advert for a trailer rather for a new M Night Shyamalan film featuring Josh Heartnut. And I hadn't thought about Josh Heartnut in Gears. And lo and behold, here he is. Here he is. Talk to me about Josh.

[00:35:53] So one of the characters that I think gets a bit of extra time in this episode is Richie. And I suppose part of that is just confirming our theory from our rewatch that Richie's kind of the MVP of the show.

[00:36:10] But what Richie's scenes are essentially all about, I think, are Richie coming into that point of some acceptance about the fact that his ex-wife is moving on. We see him take his wedding ring off. That's a big step. That is the way movies tell us that something's happening.

[00:36:36] I love how you say it as you know as though it's something I've done today. I'm like, yes, I took my wedding ring off dramatically. I don't have one. And you're cool with it. I'm fine with that. We'll save that conversation for a minute.

[00:36:49] So that's the thread through Richie's various scenes. And in one of the scenes towards the end, we find out that the person that Richie's ex now plans to marry is Josh Hartnett in the classic TV and movie move of making sure that the new person is unrealistically hot.

[00:37:19] Do you think he's still got it? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Cool. I was never a Hartnett fan at the time. So like... No heart for Hartnett. No heart for Hartnett. I'm going to confess. So I accidentally got spoiled for this episode, but I got trolled real bad.

[00:37:36] There was an article in the AV club called Cold Blood and Josh Hartnett played 4D chess with nail polish on the bear subtitle. Richie's ex-wife's new fiance is a calculating killer. And when he comes at the king, he doesn't miss. So this is by Matt Schimkiewicz.

[00:37:52] It's a funny article about essentially Josh Hartnett making sure that Richie sees that he's got this nail polish on which shows that his daughter has been painting his nails and there's this familial kind of bond between the two of them.

[00:38:05] I, having read the subtitle and the subtitle, was like, oh, I can't read the article because we're in the pod. So I thought we were going for like, oh my god, he's actually an abusive horrible person and that's going to get revealed and there's going to be a...

[00:38:20] I had a whole thing in my head about this. Turns out no. It's just about mind games but whatever. I kind of like the fan fiction I had in my head anyway. Well, he just seems like an annoyingly nice guy in those muted colors that always comes

[00:38:36] with the replacement boyfriend. I think, annoyingly nice but I think there is some power play going on there with making sure that Richie sees the nails and kind of being overly friendly to him. I don't know. Yeah, no. I mean, that's a fair point.

[00:38:51] I'm not convinced he's a totally nice guy but we'll see. I also think it's weird that they've invited Richie to the wedding. Yeah, that is weird. I wouldn't go personally. I think that would be really strange but I do love that we hear Evie or Eva.

[00:39:07] I can never remember what Richie's kid is called saying. Auntie Dee Dee is coming to the wedding and Richie finding this hilarious and me thinking, who is Dee Dee? And then in the next scene we get revealed that Dee Dee is of course Donna Barzato. Yeah.

[00:39:19] So that, I mean, I'd pay to go to that wedding and be hilarious. Well, it does occur to me that the upside of Richie coming to the wedding is free child care. Yeah. I don't feel like Auntie Dee Dee would be a... Yeah, no, no, definitely not.

[00:39:39] I'm trying to think of my next point. We find out how Karmie got his scar. It was a hot pot burn. Yeah, now did you feel like we were getting the whole story there? I think so.

[00:39:50] I think it was being made poignant in the first episode and I think the reason it was being made poignant was for this scene, which is clearly a very intimate sharing between the two of them.

[00:39:59] It's one of the first times we've seen Claire be anything other than kind of manic pixie dream girl to be honest is this moment where she's sharing the story about having screwed up at work. I loved the soundtrack, cocktail twins pearly dewdrops drops in the background and

[00:40:14] I mean, Claire and Karmie are just a disgustingly good looking couple I think. So these kind of intimate scenes with the two of them are never unpleasant to watch, but it's... I don't know that it's my favorite part of the show and I'd rather see them dealing

[00:40:27] with what's actually happened than kind of having these flashbacks. It's interesting that they're keeping the character of Claire in the show like this. Do you think that we're going to see her coming back? I think there has to be a recon. Yeah, I think that.

[00:40:47] I think that's coming and I wonder if that's why they're kind of sustaining her in that. And Molly Gordon is great. Yeah, absolutely. So that was an interesting way to start it and to start it on complete darkness and then

[00:40:59] bring the lights up like that is a really nice artistic choice I think. I also enjoyed the more kind of raw pragmatism of Sydney and her dad in the apartment that Sydney has just rented.

[00:41:12] I think there's something with Sydney and her dad's relationships that taps into a deep vein of parental interactions when you're in your late 20s, early 30s and you're trying to convince your parents you're actually an adult. I am. I promise I'm not at home.

[00:41:25] I can do it. Shut up. And then things like you want to get an L-shaped couch and then being told you have to go to the second hand store and things like that. I don't know. I have a lot of affection for Sydney's dad.

[00:41:36] I enjoy him in the scenes that he's in. Yeah. Sydney and her dad have a really nice dynamic between them, don't they? But it does seem that there are some reservations both with her dad and with Sydney who has yet to open the docu-sign.

[00:41:50] Yeah. And I think as I read it, she's kind of lying to her dad. She's like, like her dad thinks that she's not got the document. Yeah. And I think that the scene with her and Adam Shapiro who plays one of the chefs from Everett.

[00:42:05] Now, I was very confused. So the actress called Adam Shapiro. He also appeared in Mindy Kaling's Never Have I Ever as a teacher called Mr. Shapiro. And in this show, he's also called Adam Shapiro.

[00:42:15] I think it's a thing that this actor slash comedian is always called Adam Shapiro. Why? I don't know. Adam Shapiro. Call us. Yeah. Yeah. Let us know and let us know how you're persuading the script writers. Let's email Adam Shapiro at hotmail.com.

[00:42:30] If he doesn't have it, what a waste. What a waste. On that point, a bit of a docu-sign trivia for you here. Oh, good. Love it. Yeah. If you ignore a docu-sign, it automatically sends you so many reminders.

[00:42:45] Interesting. No, that's interesting because I thought at the start of the episode, the email said yesterday and I was like, is this way back? Are we back at the start? Because Karmie talks about docu-sign in episode two.

[00:42:55] So is this like we're back in time but it's just a reminder? Maybe. In real life, I don't know if in the bear of airs, but in real life, docu-sign would be hitting her with automated renders pretty hard.

[00:43:14] Excellent. I love that we have a little docu-sign dive every week. How about you? What's your next point? That is a really good question. I suppose something that crystallizes in this episode. I think to the point that it is advancing the story, the story it's advancing is

[00:43:37] this is all about the reviews coming in. This season is about there are reviews coming. And I think something that really clarified for me or helped me to start to see where the show

[00:43:49] was going with this is we get a little bit of exposition dump snuck in here and there in the episode. Sugar gives us an info dump about the Michelin star system. She uses the term Michelin. It gets used there. No, sorry, Richie uses the term Michelin.

[00:44:07] And it surprised me because they were so conspicuously avoiding it that I thought there was some sort of issue that they weren't allowed to use it. But Richie does use it. We also have the facts pinning up pictures of reviewers. So there is that flow through-

[00:44:23] One of whom you think is a literal child. Yes, is Rosie Anderson actually a child? Maybe it's an Easter egg. Maybe it's like someone related to- Did you Google her? I'm going to Google her right now. I did. I had a food critic. And I didn't find anybody.

[00:44:39] Yeah, I don't think she's real. Maybe it's a little Easter egg. Rosie, if you're listening, right in. Yeah, just- Tell us who you are. We're just curious. You know, if you bump into Adam Shapiro, let him know because I think he's sending

[00:44:51] us a message anyway. He's sending us a message too. Yeah. So if the two of you want to piggyback on that, that's absolutely fine. Excellent. We'll get back to you. Yeah. But yeah, that seems to be to the extent

[00:45:02] there's a thread in this episode that seems to be it. And it's interesting that the episode ends on a cliffhanger. Cliffhanger here of there's been a review. It's the Chicago Tribune, I think it's- It's asking for photos. They're a big deal, of course. And

[00:45:23] the show isn't coy about this. Everybody looks really sad and worried that this has happened. Which is funny when you're not in it with them because you're thinking, right, you're trying to get these good reviews. It's kind of been implied in the show that there are

[00:45:39] reviews happening and some of those montages already. But I think the part of the point here is this is a different kettle of fish. This is a much bigger deal, this newspaper.

[00:45:51] But yeah, that was the coming back to my original point. What on earth is this episode about? Yeah. That's what I think the story of this episode is rather than the themes of this episode, which I think you covered much better. Thanks. I enjoyed Richie getting stuck into

[00:46:08] the Michelin system, a dusty French-Turr marketing exec. I'm a Pirelli guy, although good years may be better for Chicago winters. That's useful information. I thought Richie in that scene was really lovely, actually.

[00:46:21] I loved Richie telling this really beautiful story about William Friedkin. It turns out it was a Chicago-born director and then having that moment where you realize that someone, everyone hates, i.e. Pete also likes the same thing as you and being like,

[00:46:33] oh, it works on many levels. I don't know. It's not- Whatever. And I thought Richie was very honest about his worry about should he be withdrawing from Eva's life. Yeah, it was sad. It was sad to kind of see him in that position,

[00:46:44] but I thought it was a really interesting conversation and looking ahead to next week, one of the episodes is titled Children. So this theme of what we pass on and what we inherit,

[00:46:54] I think is going to come back. This could be the Space Babies episode of The Bear. Oh, God. It's a Doctor Who reference for those of you who are up to date with Doctor Who.

[00:47:06] Evianz, yes. I also am 90% certain that Pete is going to miss the birth of his child. They were very clear to- So Natalie and Pete are hugging. She says she promises to see her

[00:47:17] mum before the baby comes. Find Daddy before Daddy finds you. Pete's going away for a week and the baby is due in two weeks. Someone's missing the birth or it's going to be a less

[00:47:30] minute run. Is it going to happen in the restaurant? Oh, God, I hope not. I don't think you can come back from that in terms of hygiene, if I'm honest. Maybe not. I've literally just on the Walking Dead

[00:47:44] rewatched. We just revisited Judith's birth. So I mean my impressions of childbirth at this point are very jaded. So I assume it's not usually like that and there would be less viscera, but here we are. You don't see Pete covered in blood hunting people.

[00:47:59] Hopefully not. No. Like Sid coming out like, yeah, no, I think it'll be better than that. I did find the facts very enjoyable to watch. Fact pre-memorised. Yeah. I think the show is increasingly working on the basis that your little comic relief that

[00:48:19] they can have garnished through the episode just to kind of lighten up a bit every so often. I think there was some of that in the Richie and Frank scene as well where he's calling Frank

[00:48:31] Waldo, which is better than asshole. And he's kind of trying to suss out what Frank's dealer, you know, oh, you must have inherited money to get the house. Nope. He's also from a broken home. Also the ultimate betrayal. We've got a Taylor Swift song in the background.

[00:48:44] Do we? It's a deep cut as well. Which one? Taylor's version of Long Live. Taylor's version of Long Live. That's a cover, everybody. It's a deep cut. That's Lucy's version. And, you know, Frank wants to come and support the bear

[00:49:01] and Richie says he can come when it's perfect. So, that interested me because Karmie's not the only one who's got high standards. And I think the mistake he's making is assuming that everyone around him's an idiot when actually they are all working to the same

[00:49:15] goal, but that's that tunnel vision he can't quite get past. I think that's a really good point. Yeah, we don't, aside from Sid, we don't see that much evidence that Karmie has confidence in his stuff?

[00:49:31] And Sid is so good with him. I wondered if you wanted to talk about the grapefruit scene. Go on. You go first. Well, one, I've got a new way to cut grapefruit because I can never do it.

[00:49:41] Mine always come out really pithy and awful. So, I think I'm going to try peeling it and cutting it that way. Sidney takes that moment between the two of them passing work back and

[00:49:48] forth to talk about the miscommunication, not just between front of house and back of house, but between Carmen and everyone else where he's making changes after things have gone to press. We find out that quite a lot of time has passed. He's on 41 days of no smoking.

[00:50:02] So, 41 days have passed since the fridging. And Sidney tries nicotine gum and it is awful, which I can imagine it would be particularly if you've never smoked. But I think Sidney is... She's in this position where Adam Shapiro, as Adam Shapiro from ever

[00:50:17] points out that the scallop dish she came up with was lights out fantastic. She's kind of tied to Karmie in a way now. Her star is very much tied with his. So, when is that going to start being a frustration for her? When is that going to

[00:50:31] start being something that's holding her back rather than giving her opportunities? And she, again, all these illusions to Karmie's mental health was the kind of crazy that's inherited and the way that's impacting the people around him. I just think we're really

[00:50:45] building up to something big here. Well, you put down your marker at the start of this, that we were working towards some sort of crisis for Karmie in his mental health.

[00:51:00] And I would say at the moment, I would agree with you the evidence would seem to be building. And in clear words, multiply that by fucking hell. Do you have anything else to add about violet?

[00:51:14] You know, not a great deal. One point that I will note is that Abraham has a great line. I worked in a hospital once. Many people died. Many people died. He delivers some hilarious lines through this show and I think it's easy to miss them. So,

[00:51:31] I just wanted to take a little moment for that line. And what's the response? You're a morbid fuck man. Oh, amazing. The other line, you kind of alluded to this already. In Tina's trip to the market, she used the phrase, whatever goes together grows together.

[00:51:55] No, whatever grows together goes together. That's better. It grows and then it goes. It's kind of the same though. No, it's better because what I'm suggesting is if you put two potatoes on a bus together, then they'll grow because they're going somewhere together.

[00:52:10] But what I'm saying is if two potatoes grow together, they'll want to get the bus together. Yes. And that's why yours is better. Thanks. So with that useful clarification everybody, I think maybe one of the other things that this

[00:52:24] episode has been looking at a little bit are those elements of communication and the interactions between the characters. And I think one thing I wonder about occasionally, maybe more so in the previous episode than this one, is whether Richie and Carmi are both

[00:52:40] competent at this stage but incompatible. Yeah. So do Richie and Carmi go together or grow together? You know, I... One of them is growing and the other one's not. Yeah. And it's not the ones you would expect.

[00:52:56] Yeah, exactly. So yeah, again, I'd like to outline, I think the show was trying to club me on the head with a point there but I was looking in the wrong direction so I didn't really understand the club that was coming at me. Interesting. Yeah, good visual. Yeah.

[00:53:11] Excellent. Well, I did a little IMDB dive. Oh, great. I learned that fact about Michelin inspectors and forks. Good. IMDB Violet says the episode title comes from the violet that catches Marcus's eye. Violets are common in the Chicago area, especially in lawns and are edible. Lovely.

[00:53:29] I don't recommend that everyone goes out if you're listening from Chicago and eat the violets in your garden because this is, as I say, IMDB trivia. But I thought that was interesting. Also, indoors Richie Talks about restaurants on Orlians and Huron,

[00:53:41] that Chicago intersection is the actual location of Mr Beef, the real restaurant that serves as the set of the beer. So a wee strike there. That was good catch. We decided in the last two weeks that we are going to go to Chicago next summer to see family,

[00:53:55] but also to eat our way through the city. Nom nom nom. Like Pac-Man. All right. That is our discussion of doors and violet. We will take a break. There's more to come. Stay with us. Now, for the first time ever, we have a news section.

[00:54:14] And the reason for this is that the bear has 23 Emmy nominations. It has now beaten the existing comedy series record for Emmy nominations. Do you know who held that record previously? I do because I'm looking at your notes. Oh, dang that. But okay. Who was it?

[00:54:31] It was 30 Rock, which is a firm favorite in this household. Honestly, most of our communication is just quoting 30 Rock at each other. Truly. And it's become very, very unconscious at this stage. Yeah. We did a rewatch and it was just a bit depressing early on.

[00:54:47] It wasn't like, we were like, oh, we don't really... These are just the things we say. Yeah. Well, the bear has come in now with 23 Emmy nominations. Ones that stand out. We're not going to get into the discussion about whether or not the bear is a comedy,

[00:55:01] but it has been nominated for comedy series. We've got lead actors for Jeremy Allen White, lead actress for Ayo Edd-Berry, supporting actor for Lionel Boyce, Ebon Morse-Bacherach and supporting actress for Lisa Coulon-Zayas, guest actors for John Burnthaw, Bob Odenkirk-Will-Poulter, guest actress for Olivia Coleman and Jamie Lee Curtis,

[00:55:22] directing for Christopher Storer for Fishes, directing for Rami Yusef for Honeydew, which was the Denmark episode, and writing for Christopher Storer and Joanna Cowell for Fishes. If you could make any of these come true, which ones would you make come true? Supporting actress for Lisa Coulon-Zayas. Yes.

[00:55:43] Just so good, so subtle as well. I think it would be a real pity to miss that performance. I think guest actor for John Burnthaw. Yeah, he's just that good, isn't he? And guest actress for Jamie Lee Curtis.

[00:56:01] I'm going to say something controversial that might get us deported from the UK. Oh, I can see where this is going. What do you think I'm going to say? You're going to say Olivia Coleman wasn't quite in the same way as Jamie Lee Curtis. Olivia Coleman, right?

[00:56:15] She's lovely. I've loved her ever since she was on Green Wing back in the early naughties. But she kind of does the same thing wherever she is. I've seen her be amazing in outstanding in films, but I just don't think this was...

[00:56:29] I felt she was cast more as a like, oh, this is a nice role for Olivia Coleman to play. It's low-key, it's gentle. Whereas Jamie Lee Curtis came in an absolute tempest in that role. That was a powerhouse performance. Whereas Olivia Coleman peeled some mushrooms, both are good.

[00:56:47] But if you were going to give the Emmy to one, surely it would be JLC. Yeah, and I suppose if we were being generous to Olivia Coleman, if Olivia Coleman somehow needs you and me to be generous to her. If we were trying to be generous to her,

[00:57:02] Jamie Lee Curtis is in fishes, which on these Emmy nominations is also the best direct, maybe the best directed episode. It may be the best written episode. Yeah. She's got great fiery material that she's working with and she's using it. She's incredible. She's electric in that episode.

[00:57:24] Olivia Coleman, of course, is working with something that's more understated. I think if she came in delivering Aunt Dee Dee in that scene or those scenes, it would be... Olivia Coleman would never. She would never. She's too nice, can you imagine? It would be bizarre.

[00:57:39] But I'll credit her. She does have this nice combination in that part of being, as Chef Terry, of being both very charming, but she does manage to somehow convey the steeliness behind her as well. Especially in what we see of her in the start of this season.

[00:57:58] I should say the reason that season two is the feature of these nominations is, I think, to do with the writer strike and the delay in the Emmys last year. So I think they're falling at a slightly funny time,

[00:58:08] which is why this is coming from last season rather than this season. Yeah. I do also think Lionel Boyce and Ebon Mossbackerac would both be very deserving of supporting actor, but I think Forks pushes it towards Ebon Mossbackerac for me.

[00:58:23] Like, this has surely got to be the role of his lifetime. Yeah. And I'd love to look up the Emmy rules and see if more than one actor from a show can be eligible for lead actor, because is Ebon Mossbackerac really a supporting actor in this show?

[00:58:43] Yeah, I had that thought. He's also not a little bitch. I feel like I don't give Jeremy Allen white enough credit because I find Karmie so intolerable a lot of the time, but he's amazing in that role. Yeah.

[00:58:56] And I think if he won lead actor, which he did last year, I believe, it wouldn't be the wrong decision. Yeah, it would be utterly deserved. It's in part just one of these situations where because you know he's the lead actor,

[00:59:10] because you know he's the center of the show, you don't feel like you need to talk about that role. You want to try and amplify the other elements. But yeah, I'd be interested to know how that classification system works because

[00:59:25] I think at this stage it feels too much of an ensemble show for those divisions to feel quite right. Yeah, and I think I should also say if any one of these nominations came true, it would be deserved. I think Bob Odenkirk is amazing in fishes.

[00:59:43] That's something I hadn't appreciated the first time around. And Will Poulter as well gives him a crack in performance in Honeydew. But I just feel that Burnthol is such a part of the fabric of the show. And even Lionel Boyce, when we see him delivering his eulogy indoors...

[01:00:03] I barely spoke about that. Yeah. It's not just moving but... It's very realistic. Yeah, it doesn't feel like acting. Yes, I am acting. It feels extremely natural and extremely real and it's fantastically understated. And so I think... Or are you coming around on Coleman now?

[01:00:28] Are you like actually hold the phone? I'd let me tell you who else is understated. Could we say perhaps that Olivia Coleman is the restaurant that does not wear its name on the front of the restaurant? Whereas Jamie Lee Curtis is the bright arches of a McDonald's.

[01:00:43] I think Jamie Lee Curtis would be... I think Andy D would be mortally offended. I love a McDonald's. How should I? You know, they know what they're about. Yeah, I know. And everyone on the podcast is like, you what? And I'm like, what?

[01:00:57] Sometimes she just won't achieve it. Well, we will keep you apprised of what becomes of these nominations we'll be interested to see but well done the bear even though all discourse is just now is the bearer comedy. Let's just say yes and get on with it.

[01:01:12] So Peter, we cook this week. What did we cook? You bet you bet. We cooked Matty Matheson's Blackberry Coffee Cook. And we're about to go back in time and take you through that process. Stay tuned. After a two week delay of not being in our own kitchen

[01:01:30] and traveling around Scotland, we are back in the kitchen of our house and today we're doing something a little different. What are we doing today, Peter? Well, today we are making cake. We're making cake. Now, I don't remember cake from the bear. Why are we making a cake?

[01:01:46] What cake are we making? We are making a cake because some good friends and occasional listeners gave us a copy of Matty Matheson's Cookbook. Who Matty Matheson? Who Matty Matheson? Matty Matheson is of course, Fack. Fack! Amazing.

[01:02:05] Okay, tell us a little bit about the recipe that you're making. So he mentions in his Cookbook that he doesn't like baking. So we thought the best way to appreciate his book would be to cook a cake from it. Nope, I spent some time with this book.

[01:02:22] It's a really nice book. It's well worth a read. There's a million ways to deal with meat in there, which is always fun. But there is also this really lovely recipe for a Blackberry Coffee Cake.

[01:02:34] And I'm sure we'll talk a little bit more about the whys of the recipe when we come to cooking it. But we're excited about it because, well, one, it's cake and two, Blackberry's are in season. Yeah, I think that sounds like a great idea.

[01:02:48] Now, eagle-eared listeners may be hearing some hob noises in the background. What you're hearing in the background is nothing to do with the cake. It's my slight treat that I make for us when we're both feeling a bit tired out,

[01:03:02] which is putting a pot of beans on the stove. And by beans, I mean dried beans. In this case, I'm using white beans that Peter's mum very kindly brought us back from Italy. I've thrown half a cup of beans, soaked them overnight in water, drained them.

[01:03:15] They're now on the hob, in some water with half an onion, bit of garlic, end of a parmesan, a bay leaf or two and some rosemary. And they're just putlin' away. And later on tonight we're gonna eat some. It kind of makes a little soup.

[01:03:29] So yeah, it's nice to have as a side. I view these beans as a way to take care of yourself in a week where you're feeling a bit bit down, a bit tired, a bit post-holiday fatigue. Make yourself some beans. Do tomorrow's self a favour.

[01:03:41] And after our beans we are gonna hopefully have some cake. Honestly, the beans are great. I have tried making them annoyingly. I just can't quite get them right. But somehow Lucy is holding back something in the recipe.

[01:03:54] She's not shared it with you there because she's not shared it with me either. I'm the reincarnated spirit of a Tuscan nonna who just wants to make fagioli. Right, so I'm looking at your ingredients, Pete. There's stuff I'd expect to see for a cake. I've got flour.

[01:04:07] I can see there's sugar in there, a bit of salt, some eggs, bicarbonate of soda, baking soda. But I'm seeing some rogues. I'm seeing some sour cream and there's booze. Tell me about the booze. There's booze. So this recipe calls for a tablespoon of brandy.

[01:04:22] We don't have brandy in the house right now and we weren't going to buy it for a tablespoon. So we are actually going to use Rye Whisky. And there's a couple of reasons for that. Firstly, it's kind of fun to use whiskey when you're cooking.

[01:04:40] And secondly, on our kind of listener, hopefully listener theme, we're using a bottle of Rye Whisky that we got from one of our favorite listeners, Karen Shee. Yeah, it's Jeffrey Dean Morgan, MF Bonfire Smokey. Right now, if you have any doubts about celebrity endorsed whiskeys,

[01:05:03] put them aside for this because it is delicious. It makes excellent old-fashioneds and we have been savoring it since we came into possession of it but we thought this would be a worthy use of it. It's only a tablespoon.

[01:05:16] So I think it should add a nice kind of savouriness to the cake. It's funny because it's a coffee cake as in a cake to have with coffee. There's no coffee flavoring in it. But this whiskey, I believe, is flavored with L'Ap Sairing Souchant Tea.

[01:05:29] So I'm interested to see what that does to the flavor. I think it'll work though. I think it'll be good. Peter's now drinking some whiskey from a tiny espresso cup. Still good? Yep, this is contributing nothing to the cooking apart from my own pleasure. It does smell good.

[01:05:43] Why not? I'll take some too. So tell me what your first step is going to be while I chug this tiny amount of whiskey. So step one, like a lot of the nice friendly easy cakes, we are going to combine the dry ingredients in a bowl.

[01:05:56] We're then going to combine the wet ingredients in a bowl. We're then going to put them together. Excellent. Tell me a little bit about your relationship with baking. Here's the funny thing.

[01:06:08] I learned to cook for my mum and that was mostly because she was busy so she would get me to make dinner and that means that I'm quite comfortable cooking dinner. She also did lots of baking but she wasn't necessarily baking for dinner,

[01:06:25] which means that I didn't learn as much as much baking from her. So this is a lot of self-taught. It's not where I'm at my strongest. I think if anything you probably do more baking than I do.

[01:06:35] I think the rough rule of thumb is that I tend to be the baker and you tend to be the cook but I quite like the times that you do cook that you do bake rather

[01:06:44] and to be fair to your mum, she gave us some absolutely banging brownies at the weekend we just finished those off today. They were very good. They had, I was particularly pleased because they had the,

[01:06:54] I call it the brownie crackle on the top you know that kind of shiny but cracked surface that I think is the indicator of a good brownie so yeah we polished that off with our afternoon tea so very good.

[01:07:07] All right so I'm watching the whiskey and sour cream get combined in a different bowl to some flour, the powders. Is there sugar in that as well or just salt? It's flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. What are your expectations for a coffee cake?

[01:07:29] What do we think of when we think of a coffee cake style cake? I think with this volume of fruit involved I'm hopeful that this is going to be pretty moist.

[01:07:37] I hope that things don't sink to the bottom and we have a couple of tips in the recipe that I think are going to help us with that but I hope that I'm going to be enjoying this with my coffee tomorrow morning. Here's hoping.

[01:07:52] I like for a coffee cake, I think a coffee cake is usually a little dry but that's a good thing. I often think of when we're on holiday in Europe you get like rogue breakfast cake that always makes me think of coffee cake.

[01:08:03] Oh I love a rogue breakfast cake. Right. That's the egg going in so two eggs. Oh no here comes the third. Now are we whisking or are we folding in? We are whisking it turns out. Fold in the cheese just fold it in.

[01:08:26] It's a shit's creak joke for anyone listening. What are you most happy baking would you say? That exciting noises us trying to get stuff out of our kitchen utensil holder. Let's see don't undersell it, we succeeded in getting stuff out of our kitchen utensil holder.

[01:08:42] You know what I really think is underrated for making is a good flatbread. I think it feels and tastes great when you bring it out the oven or even in some cases

[01:08:55] you cook it in a pan but it's actually nowhere near as much effort as it feels like. Yeah you know what I'm thinking now, I'm sure we'll talk about it on the main pod of that meal

[01:09:05] we had last week in Glasgow at the vegetarian restaurant where the sides were really simple. It was just rice and flatbreads but the flatbreads were fresh, I think they were pan-cooked and a

[01:09:14] bit puffy very tasty. But I would argue that you've chosen a fine line between baking and cooking there. You're damn right I have. I enjoy baking a lot, I have a particularly good salted caramel brownie recipe that I like to use.

[01:09:31] Cookies are a big hit as well. There's a graphic novelist called Lucy Nisley spelt K-N-I-S-L-E-Y. She has a memoir called Relish, My Life in the Kitchen and in it is a little comic which has one of the best recipes for chocolate chip cookies you'll ever experience.

[01:09:48] We're now going to zest a lemon. Neither of us have any idea if sessing a lemon makes for interesting audio but we're all going to find out as a group today. If you're lucky you've also heard our cat meowing in the background.

[01:10:03] Hey Molly do you have anything to say to the listeners? She just sniffs the microphone. They may be a little needy since we got back from our trip. So some lemon zest and blackberries. Now quite a lot of blackberries. Now blackberries often seen in the wild in Scotland,

[01:10:26] picked off of hedges but we refer to them as brambles. But we had a bit of a discussion offline about whether or not bamble, bambles, brambles and blackberries are the same thing. Yeah I need to, I need to loop this on. Okay.

[01:10:40] Proveer to learn more our feedback section I think. All right so I notice you've made a wee well. I have indeed and I'm going to pour the wet mixture into the middle, stir until fully incorporated. Excellent. All right let's do this.

[01:10:56] Here it comes again the bubbling you can hear in the background is nothing related to the cake. You know someone, one of my friends is a big fan of Nigella Lawson as we all are because we have eyes and mouths.

[01:11:17] And one of the things they pointed out is that Nigella's programs which I'm sure you can get on BBC America and on iPlayer here, the sound mixing is off the hook. Like they do such a good job of making cooking noises. Interesting but not disgusting.

[01:11:31] And as we have been recording these bits of the podcast I find myself even more in awe of Nigella's team because it is not easy to get kitchen audio and it is even less easy to make it not absolutely gross.

[01:11:43] You're asking about my experiences learning to cook and baking. So it's cake batter is not edible. Flour is not edible because when it's raw and there are raw eggs in here too.

[01:11:58] That being said as a child the prospect of trying to get hold of the cake batter was pretty interesting. You know what I loved that you probably never experienced? Packet mix cakes where you would get like just a,

[01:12:12] just like a packet of powder and you would basically just add an egg and or some milk and then just whisk it up and I just loved that. Cerelli, something like that. Yeah, Cerelli. I'm sure there were some British brands as well and that was a particular joy

[01:12:24] because it felt very simple but very rewarding. I am readying your rubber spatula. The rubber spatula. Have we buttered the tin? We have not buttered the tin. Would you would you care to butter the tins? I can butter the tin for you bear with me one second.

[01:12:42] I'm going to get some kitchen roll. Oh no you're going to get the kitchen roll. Hi Molly. Alrighty we had a brief break there to rewater the beans because they were starting to run a bit dry and now we are what are we about to do?

[01:13:01] So we have made our cake batter, we've combined our dry ingredients and our wet ingredients and now we are going to fold in one cup or 140 grams of the blackberries with a rubber spatula. And what does fold it in mean I'm shitting you it's fine.

[01:13:20] Just fold it in. These blackberries look fantastic. Not to like brag but we did shell out 20p more for the slightly upmarket deluxe British blackberries from a local German named supermarket of our choosing. You've got a 50-50 chance of guessing which one.

[01:13:39] So that's only about half of the blackberries we have there. What are you doing with the rest? They go again when we add the new cake mix to the tin. Now as we are avid viewers of the Great British Bake Off,

[01:13:53] how are we going to avoid these berries sinking? Well I don't know but my theory is that that is why we're only folding up some of the black but folding in some of the blackberries now. And then we're leaving the rest on top to kind of sink in?

[01:14:09] Yeah so I think they you get a little they got a whole journey down through the cake. A journey to the bottom of the cake. These are huge by the way. I'm looking at them I would say this is more strawberry sized than raspberry sized for a visual.

[01:14:25] Tell you one of the things I was most jazzed about eating up in Scotland, you know what I'm about to say? Scottish strawberries. Oh yeah! So that's that's a partly original thing for you as well. Yeah so my parents are both from Tayside.

[01:14:39] So Dundee originally and Dundee is a big part of Scotland for soft fruit picking, jams, jellies, marmalades all very very important and yeah you get amazing raspberries, strawberries, teaberry's all of those exist in Tayside and yeah I think they are the best

[01:14:56] in the world when they're in season which is brief but lovely. And I'm also thinking about our brief dalliance with Saskatoon berries. Yeah I you know I didn't fully understand the the nature of the Saskatoon berry but I know I enjoyed it when I was eating it.

[01:15:13] It was so I thought of it as like if a black currant and a blueberry had a baby it would be kind of like a Saskatoon berry. Does that is that not correct what you say?

[01:15:23] I you know I actually don't know I'm gonna we're what we're gonna do is we're gonna flash to our next segment when we will fact check Lucy. Oh and uh did the black currant and the blueberry have a baby? The berry had a child!

[01:15:37] Okay so the dough's in the tin, the batter's in the tin and you're about to sprinkle over the rest of the bloops not bloops the bloops not the bloops. The recipe's a little vague on the stage it says add the remaining blackberries which seems to

[01:15:52] give me a lot of freedom about how I do that. I'm gonna assume that means don't stir them in so I'm just gonna poke them into. Can I be real with you for a second? I don't think you should put all those blackberries in,

[01:16:05] I think you should leave some for on the side. What would what would Matthew say? I he'd probably scream something at me then tell me who loved me and kiss my cheeks. I don't know actually do you know what I might be...

[01:16:21] I'm sticking with my original thoughts although what I'm enjoying the visual I have currently is that you're doing sort of concentric circles which I enjoy. We're using a springform cake tin um noticing that it's only about half full do you think

[01:16:34] it's going to get a bit of a rise with all the so-done baking powder? Heck yeah. Heck yeah. Yeah I would halt there I think too much more and we're gonna smother the cake a little bit.

[01:16:45] All right so listeners this at this stage we are saying no Matthew Matheson, you are wrong sir. We're leaving five blackberries it's not exactly like a full punnet we're just leaving them to the side for decoration. We believe that he is wrong by 43 grams.

[01:17:01] Okay so we're going in the oven at 175 Celsius how long are we in for? About an hour. Excellent should we chuck this in and then report back once it's cooked? Yes chef. Yes chef.

[01:17:18] Okay listen so we have jumped forward in time, we have baked a cake and we've eaten some of the cake and what are your initial thoughts? I liked it. Good thought right okay stop recording we're done. I enjoyed it it wasn't too sweet. Nope.

[01:17:37] I don't know that we managed to successfully avoid the blackberries sinking. No that is a puzzle that I have never solved but yes the blackberries generally made their little journey to the bottom of the cake which did not affect the flavour in

[01:17:53] any way but did mean we didn't quite pull off the appearance that we were hoping for. I wonder if you'd tell me a little bit more about the recipe because you read it in more

[01:18:01] detail than me because we found out a little bit about Matty Matheson through reading some of the cookbook for example Canadian. Very Canadian and his book is broadly structured around chapters to do with his family

[01:18:17] and his experience learning to cook and this recipe is relatively early in the book and he describes his experience of hiding in and around a blackberry bush while playing at his grandparents house and this recipe brings back a lot of memories of being with them.

[01:18:41] Would you make it again? I would make it again. Would you cut down the blackberries by about 10% again? You know what I would do? What? I would literally cut the blackberries each blackberry in half. That's not a bad idea.

[01:18:55] Because they were so big I think that's maybe why they sank. Yeah if we made them a bit lighter. Yeah if we chopped them up a little bit I think that could help. That's a pretty good idea actually.

[01:19:05] Yeah and I enjoyed that we served it with a side of sour cream. Yeah I think that added something. I thought that was really tasty and the recipe says vanilla ice cream or creme fraiche I think with a berry like that you want something a bit nippy.

[01:19:20] Yeah I think you're absolutely right about that. I think it really completed the experience. Yeah I mean we don't really have much from the bear to compare it to because obviously it wasn't in the

[01:19:30] show per se but I really enjoy the fact that Matty Matheson is such a consummate cook himself and I think it's quite interesting having watched some of his cookery videos. How different fact is to Matty Matheson? Go on.

[01:19:43] Well Matty Matheson is quite bombastic, quite present, quite confident in the kitchen and particularly in episode three which we're going to talk about today. We see Fac go and serve a miropoie and then immediately take it back with him into the

[01:19:59] kitchen and completely fuck that up so yeah I just think it's interesting to see the man behind the character a little bit. So do you have any cookbook tidbits you'd like to share? So as we were discussing he's a Canadian, we learned he was born in New Brunswick.

[01:20:18] Cool. And raised in Ontario although his family are from Prince Edward Island. Beautiful part of the world, great butter. Yeah and he's also apparently if you were maybe if you're Canadian maybe if you're not apparently he was actually a little bit famous before the bear.

[01:20:37] He was in a TV show in Toronto called Burger Wars and he won it. No way. Yeah and I think he gives a really interesting explanation in his recipe book about how he has quite mixed feelings about that wind because he was running a clearly really interesting

[01:21:00] restaurant called Parts and Labor and he talks about I think feeling a bit overwhelmed by this burger recipe that kind of took over everything. Are we going to make that burger recipe? Only if we're feeling mean. All right compared to other things we've cooked where would you rate

[01:21:21] Matthew Matheson's Blackberry Coffee Cake? Pretty good, pretty good. It was a nice straight coffee cake I can definitely see how you would be nostalgic for that cake. I think so and do you know what I think the lap sang sous chan came through a little bit

[01:21:36] with the rye whiskey. Then we have done well. I think it soaked into the blackberries quite nicely. But yeah no I really liked it. My only thing if I was making it again would be to chop up the blackberries a little bit

[01:21:47] but that seems like a shame because they're so beautiful but these ones were I would say mega chunks. They were mega chunks. All right well it was a pleasure to eat the cake that you made thank you for making it. Thank you let's get back to eating it.

[01:21:59] Let's get back to eating it. All right yes chef. All right thanks to our slightly truncated schedule this week we only have one piece of listener feedback and Peter would you like to do the honours?

[01:22:14] Yes thank you so much for getting in touch Penny as this is from Penny Lennox and Penny has the following to say. I didn't think an episode could be more anxious than last week's bickering and yelling but doors really kicked up a notch. Oh yeah.

[01:22:28] Opening with Marcus's simple and affecting eulogy then transitioning into the pressure of the everyday reality of the restaurant was brilliant. The contrast of the solemnity and introspection one feels at a funeral and the rage, fatigue, frustration, emotional baggage and pressure of running the restaurant

[01:22:47] every day made both sections of the show hit harder. Thank you for doing this podcast it's delightful and I'm so glad you gave me a reason to push past all the yelling and really watch this excellent show let it rip. Oh Penny I always love hearing from Penny.

[01:23:01] Penny is doing some amazing coverage of Buffy over on Still Slaying on the podcast and Network and always enjoy chatting with Penny about life, the universe and everything but particularly about shows that we both like so I'm glad that we pushed you further into the

[01:23:18] world of The Bear. And those of you listening next week will be covering episodes five and six so please feel free to send us some feedback about those episodes we'd love to hear from you.

[01:23:28] Absolutely and you know get that in fastest because you know when I look at feedback like Penny's I'm often thinking to myself could we not just copy her homework? I was just thinking well I could just have read this out of the star.

[01:23:39] You and Penny are both lawyers that's not that's a very damning indictment of the legal profession I would say. It's an efficient kind of the legal profession but yes no I like that I agree with everything you said Penny. Yeah absolutely.

[01:23:56] All right everybody so that's our show thanks for listening if you want to write in or leave us a message you can find all our contact information at podcast.com And while you're there be sure to check out our other shows so Cobra Callie is back

[01:24:10] and Rich, Rima and Jason are covering that at present. House of the Dragon, Peter and I are tuning in weekly for our dose of Westeros mythology with Wendy, Renny and Veronica. Special guests Kristin was on, Rima is on this week and Wendy's daughter joined them

[01:24:26] for an episode recently as well so it's always worth tuning in for a bit of House of the Dragon over on Dragoncast. I also wanted to give a shout out to Daphne and Paik's podcast Run for Your Life

[01:24:36] where they cover adrenaline films, films that make you scared, films that make you want to run and they cover some really cool stuff on there so please do go and check them out. Next episode we will have The Bear season three episode five children and episode six

[01:24:56] napkins and I'm assuming that the napkins are for cleaning up after the children. I believe that's how it works. Yeah, yeah that you know mess clean up. We are going to be away from our kitchen again so we won't be cooking for the next episode.

[01:25:08] We are going on a little tour around Europe because we have a family wedding in the Czech Republic so we're going to be going to Slovakia, Austria, Czech Republic and Poland. We're going to be eating our way around Central and Eastern Europe so we are hopefully going to

[01:25:25] come back with some interesting information about things we ate, tried and enjoyed during that trip. If I don't have a pierogi then you know there's going to be riots in the streets. Then what is the point? Yep, what is the point? Why did we even get out there?

[01:25:39] If any listeners have any hints, tips or places to eat or things to try hit us up we're always happy to take your suggestions. All right that is our show. Thanks for listening. Let it rip, Jillian Lurie.