Dirt Nap City - History's Most Interesting Dead People
Dirt Nap City is the podcast about history's most interesting dead people. In each episode, Alex and Kelly dive into the life of a famous person that you have heard of, but probably don't know much about. Our stories are about actors, entrepreneurs, politicians, musicians, inventors, explorers and more! We also cover things that used to be popular but have fallen out of favor. Things like pet rocks, drive in theaters, Jolt Cola, and many other trends of yesterday make up our "dead ends". But whether we are talking about interesting historical figures or past trends, the show is funny, light-hearted, entertaining, informative and educational. You will definitely learn something new and probably have some laughs along the way. Everyone will eventually move to Dirt Nap City, so why not go ahead and meet the neighbors?
If you love hearing stories from Dirt Nap City, please consider supporting us on Patreon. Here's the link: https://www.patreon.com/DirtNapCityPodcast
If you have comments about the show or suggestions on who we should cover, please email us at not@dirtnapcity.com - we really appreciate you listening!
Dirt Nap City - History's Most Interesting Dead People
Who Was Julia Child?
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
At the peak of her fame, Julia Child was one of the most famous television celebrities in the United States. She was the first cooking show super star, but she didn't learn to appreciate cuisine until later in life when she volunteered for the war effort during World War II. She met her husband Paul when she was in Sri Lanka and he really taught her to appreciate fine food, art and culture.
Julia Child fell in love with French cooking and attended the famous Cordon Bleu in Paris. This was during a time when professional cooking was dominated by men. From there she began teaching friends the French way of cooking and teamed up with some partners to write a French cookbook for Americans. Her big break came when she was invited to be a guest on WGBH, the Boston PBS affiliate. She broke the mold by cooking an omelet on the show and the phones at the station lit up. That was the start of her career on television.
If you like the content we are creating and would like to support it financially, check our Patreon page here: https://www.patreon.com/DirtNapCityPodcast
Or, if you prefer to support us in another way, recommend an episode to one of your friends. We appreciate everyone who listens every month and look forward to making this podcast even better with your support.
Drop us a quick text and we’ll reply in the next episode!
Dirt Nap City is the podcast about the most interesting dead people in history.
Subscribe and listen to learn about people you've heard of, but don't know much about.
Someday we'll all live in Dirt Nap City, so you should probably go ahead and meet the neighbors!
Okay. Don't hurt yourself. Oh man, it's we do it for the we do it for the people, Alex, for the fans. How are you today?
SPEAKER_01That was kind of like a Peter Brady introduction.
SPEAKER_06No, it's intentional. It was intentional, actually. And I think you'll understand why in a moment. But uh clues already. Clues right out of the gate. But I'll tell you, I looked at the weather forecast. So it is September 2023. We're sitting here in our respective studios, uh, Houston and Austin, and it's still 105 here. How's it there?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, it's ridiculously hot. I was talking to somebody today who is from Saudi Arabia, and I said, Is this what the weather's like in Saudi Arabia? He goes, No, it's not as hot as this.
SPEAKER_06Wow. And and and they all drive uh Mercedes and uh Ferraris and uh or is that is that Dubai?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, probably both.
SPEAKER_06Yeah. Um, well, it is hot, but I think it's gonna be cooling down. But I'll tell you, it's gonna get really hot for the next hour because I've got a guest or a or a resident of Dirt Knap City that is so hot it's gonna just burn your face off.
SPEAKER_01Is that another clue? Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_06It is. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Really?
SPEAKER_06I got two. Can you name it already?
SPEAKER_01No, let's see. You uh screamed and hurt I said hello, everybody. Yeah, how is that a clue?
SPEAKER_06How is that a clue? You'll know. You'll as soon as you as soon as you're here, you'll know. And the heat. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Okay, no, I don't know.
SPEAKER_06The heats the heats might be a little confusing. You'll you'll get it, but it's it's less the voice is a little more of a thing. But this person was born August 15th, 1912, in Pasadena, California.
SPEAKER_011912. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06Another another child of the 20th century, your favorite century.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. One of the better centuries. Yeah. Okay, in Pasadena.
SPEAKER_06She was uh she was six foot two inches tall. Wow. And she didn't become famous until she was in her fifties. So she led led um she lived into her nineties, so she led a little less than half of her life being famous.
SPEAKER_01That was a tall woman that was famous in the 1960s, you're saying.
SPEAKER_06Uh yeah, yeah. She started, she started her fame started in the late 60s, early 70s.
SPEAKER_01I've got it, I think.
SPEAKER_06I think I've got it. Do you want me to give you another clue? Or no, you can go for it.
SPEAKER_01I I'm gonna try to guess.
SPEAKER_06Okay.
SPEAKER_01Is this Julia Child?
SPEAKER_04Yes.
SPEAKER_01Wow. Either you're smarter or my clues are getting better. Well, now the the uh the uh introduction makes sense, the heat makes sense. Yeah, and I know she was a tall woman, and I never when I think about it, I never really see anything about her when she was young. No, I haven't seen any of the movies that came out about her.
SPEAKER_06Oh, yeah, I've watched a couple. I've watched a couple in preparation for this, so it's it's gonna be deep. She was um, she was it is Julia Child, by the way. It's not S, not Childs. Some people say Childs, but um I think I just did. I think you did, but that's a mistake a lot of people made. I think I actually have made it in the past, so um we'll we'll we'll part we'll make that part of the uh learning experience here on Dirt Knap City, Julia Child. She actually was born Julia Carolyn McWilliams. Um but one one other fun fact I was gonna give you to really throw you off the clue is that during World War II, she actually volunteered for a government agency. It was a spy agency, like the precursor to the uh CIA. And that agency, um, she was involved in creating and developing a shark repellent to keep sharks away from underwater explosive and explosives and mines.
SPEAKER_01Wow, that wouldn't have helped at all.
SPEAKER_06I know, I know, I know, but that was such a cool thing, right? I mean, but yeah, that would have just thrown you're like, oh, a scientist. Um, she was also the first woman inducted into the Culinary Institute of America's Hall of Fame.
SPEAKER_01Now, right out the gate, I'm um I was surprised she's American. I thought she had an accent.
SPEAKER_06She did.
SPEAKER_04I mean, that's just it. She had this kind of crazy voice that everybody thought maybe was English, but it was actually from California.
SPEAKER_02Julia Child presents the Chicken Sisters. Miss Broiler, Miss Fryer, Miss Roaster, Miss Capernet, Miss Stewart, and old Madame Hen. But we're spotlighting Miss Roaster of the Year, measuring in at 14, 15, 14. We're roasting Miss Chicken.
SPEAKER_06Yes, I don't know. It was an unusual voice. Um, nobody's, I mean, several people referenced it during my research and in the movies and the documentaries that, you know, they said she had this strange voice. As a matter of fact, the first TV producer she ever worked with remembers her calling the station, and he remembered her because of her unusual voice. But no, she was born in California, raised in California, uh, born to a family, a very upper middle class family, John McWilliams Jr. He was a Princeton graduate and a prominent land manager. Her mother was also named Julia Carolyn, uh Weston, that was her um maiden name. She was a paper heiress and the daughter of the lieutenant governor of Massachusetts. So kind of old money.
SPEAKER_01Are you gonna continue to do that accent throughout the the show?
SPEAKER_04Do you want me to?
SPEAKER_01It's hurting my ears, actually.
SPEAKER_06Okay. Uh no, no, but I do have some good clips. Um, we'll where we'll hear the real thing.
SPEAKER_01It's such a unique voice.
SPEAKER_06It is, it is, and I'm glad I'm glad you got the heat and the accent uh part, you know, as clues here. Um I'm here for the clues. As a matter of fact, you might not have got it without the accent, right? Or did did uh did the famous indoor fifties and being tall thing was that enough?
SPEAKER_01I don't know. We'll never know.
SPEAKER_06Well, she was the oldest of three children. Her brother was actually 6'4, and her other sister was reportedly 6'5. Her brother was John, her sister was Dorothy, and her mother is quoted to have said, Good heavens, I've produced 18 feet of children. I love that quote. Ironically, she grew up Is that in the movie? Was that in the movie? Yeah, it was in the movie. Are you serious?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. Her was she said that in the movie?
SPEAKER_06Well, her mother wasn't it, her mother died in uh 1937. But no, but did anyone say that in the movie? Yes, they said her mother was often quoted as saying, I produced 18 fill feet of children. Um yeah, she she did um grow up rather wealthy in Pasadena, California, and the house actually had a cook, um, servants, the whole nine yards. She never learned how to cook, though, when she was young. She had no interest. She played tennis, she was kind of a sporty person, she rode bicycles, um, you know, ran track, all that kind of stuff in uh her younger years, and then went to Smith College and graduated in 1934. But ultimately, her father did not expect her to do much. He wanted her to marry somebody, a doctor, a lawyer, a banker, somebody like that. And, you know, he was very conservative. And I think that's kind of what young women did in the early 1900s. Do you think?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, of course. It was and I don't think there's anything by today's standards that sounds sexist, but I think that's that's that was what people did back then.
SPEAKER_06As a matter of fact, she she actually was um uh proposed to by someone and she said no. Um, and she was so adamant that when World War II broke out, she decided to leave home, and she had one skill at that time. She was a typist, she could type. So she joined the Office of Strategic Services. Now that was the precursor to the CIA, like I said, and she was in the typing pool at the OSS. Apparently, you know, she said she made several references in the movies I watched about being a spy because I think that was a spy agency, but really she was typing top secret documentation. Um, but she said she never had the chance to go into the field, but she thought she would have been a great spy because who would have suspected a 6'3, 6'4 woman?
SPEAKER_01Hmm. On the other hand, um, you can't really be a wallflower at 6'3.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, true.
SPEAKER_01I mean, as a as a big woman, I mean, you're kind of always attracting attention when you walk into a room. So you can't slink around in the dark, that's for sure.
SPEAKER_06Well, speaking of attracting attention, um, she was in Sri Lanka and she met her husband. So again, I said her uh Julia's um maiden name was McWilliams. Well, she met Paul Child in Sri Lanka um in 1944, and she was actually um immediately drawn to him. He was a he was not a very tall man, she was much taller than him. He said he he liked her legs, he was really into her legs. You know, she had long legs, and he was a graphic designer and a photographer. He was actually in charge of some maps that they were doing over there. Um, the government was mapping the area and he drew the maps, you know, as a graphics person. Um, he was kind of a Renaissance guy. He was an artist, a photographer. He loved food, he was a good cook, he spoke English and French. Um, and she had a nickname for him. Now his name was Paul. Uh, she called him Piskey. But but she really he's really the one that taught her to appreciate art, food, and culture because her family, you know, while they did do sports, um, they were very conservative and you know, they didn't really consider culture, art to be important when she was growing up. So after after they were in Sri Lanka, they went to China, and then when World War II was over, they ended up coming back to the US to get married. Now, not all was rosy because Julia's father, John, and Paul really didn't see it eye to eye. As a matter of fact, um Julia or her family had been Republican, and Paul was a Democrat, and she actually switched parties and became more liberal after meeting him, and that of course bothered him. Apparently, there was a time when uh after her mother had passed away, this is when they were living in France, um the family, John, his her um Julia's stepmother, and maybe maybe it's just two of them, came to France and they tried to give them a kind of tour of France because the family had her her father had never been there before, and apparently all he did was gripe.
SPEAKER_01No.
SPEAKER_06So maybe that's a universal kind of thing. Maybe that just happens, but he he was not he was kind of a curmudgeon, from what I understand.
SPEAKER_01Oh, wow. Well, and was he much older?
SPEAKER_06Well, he was born, the father was born in the 1880s, uh 1880 actually, and died in 1962. So yeah, I mean, he was I guess she was born, she he was 32 when he had Julia. So yeah. But um, they uh Julia and Paul ended up moving to back to France after they came home from World War II. They they were in California for a little while, got married, moved back to France, and Julia's first meal in France changed her life. This is what she said. It was um the La Corillon. Have you heard of this? La Corion. It is the oldest inn and restaurant in France located in Raun. And take a guess, uh, which is the capital of Normandy, take a guess when it was founded.
SPEAKER_01Oh, geez. Uh maybe I mean that would have been the things in it's it's so different in here.
SPEAKER_06Right, right. You you would say like 18 years old here, and that would be a long time ago.
SPEAKER_01Oh, even 1345. That's blows my mind. Yeah, something an old restaurant here would be something that was like 40 years old.
SPEAKER_06And I believe it's still actually open. La Corion. It's L A uh Space C-O-U-R-O-N-N-E. So if any if we have any listeners in Normandy, um let us know if uh La Corion is still open.
SPEAKER_01And by the way, send us a gift card for that place.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, what what what'll 50 bucks get you there? Probably get you a glass of water and some some uh might not be expensive, you know? Yeah, it's true. Um so she she had a quote there and she said, one taste of that food, and I never turned back. So that was kind of her introduction to French cooking, which she she had been, like I said, she'd been in Sri Lanka, she had been in China, she had been deployed overseas during the war effort, but she really found French cooking to be the the quintessential, which I think the world agrees it is, right? Have you been to France? I have only been once for a conference um when I worked for a software company. I was in Nice, and uh what's the place where the where in Cannes? The the conference was actually we flew into Nice and then the conference was in Cannes.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_06I I don't know.
SPEAKER_01I've not you had a Le Big Mac?
SPEAKER_06No, it's a Royale with cheese, right? Did you have a Royale with cheese? I did not, no.
SPEAKER_01Um what do they call Whopper?
SPEAKER_06They called it Le Whopper.
SPEAKER_01No, he says, uh, I don't know, I didn't go to Burger King. Oh that's right.
SPEAKER_06Wow.
SPEAKER_01Uh well I have been to Paris uh a few times, and um the first meal I had did change my life. I was ready to give it all up and and uh do like she.
SPEAKER_06I could see that you could see why people would want to move there, yeah.
SPEAKER_01And then the next time we went, even though there's thousands of restaurants in Paris, we went to the same place because it was just so good, and so uh the name of that place was uh La Rotisserie de Boujolet. Nice, and it is um in the heart of Paris, and it's just a simple roasted chicken and mashed potatoes, and it um, well, like we say here, it'll make you slap your mama.
SPEAKER_06Was it was it as good the second time?
SPEAKER_01Yes, yes, it was that's what's crazy about it.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, I was gonna say, usually you get this built-up sense of a restaurant like this was the best, and then you go back and you're like eh, you're setting yourself up for disappointment.
SPEAKER_01Right, and the three of us, it was the same people that went the first time. It wasn't like we were trying to bring anyone else there. It was just really, really good. It's good, it's affordable, it's a nice, it's very French, it's the atmosphere that you want.
SPEAKER_03Nice.
SPEAKER_01Um, my son and I like um escargot. You mentioned snails a second ago. I think it's just wonderful. Just everything about it. I don't think I've ever actually had escargot. It's really, really good.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, I I I do like um I do like uh what are the fish eggs? Caviar. I do like caviar. I like the saltiness of it, but I I don't think I've ever actually had had escargot. I should give it a little bit more.
SPEAKER_01Well then when we got back, we went on this escargot kick where we were trying to find good escargot around here, and it's just not the same.
SPEAKER_06Oh, of course not. Of course not.
SPEAKER_01When you're getting snails out of Galveston Bay, it's just not the same.
SPEAKER_06Well, interestingly, that was kind of the the um thing that that uh they wanted to do, or Julia wanted to do when she wrote a cookbook was allow Americans to make French food with American ingredients. But but that's jumping ahead. I'm I'm gonna I'm gonna back up before they started the cookbook. Um, so do you know the famous, famous cooking school in in Paris?
SPEAKER_01Cordon bleu.
SPEAKER_06Yep, Le Cordon Bleu. Oldest cooking school in Paris, top chefs, people who are, and I don't mean I don't mean Japanese guy, uh top chefs. Um, oh yeah, not iron chefs, top chefs, mostly men. And interestingly, at the time that she was there, there was actually a um government thing, a government program. I didn't know I didn't, I wasn't clear if it was the French government or the US government, but they allowed GIs, uh soldiers who would come back from World War II to do training, and one of the options was to train as a chef at short on cordon bleu, and the government would pay for it. So she decided she wanted to go to Le Cordon Bleu. She got very into French cooking, and you know, again, was one taste of that food, and I never turned back. And so she went and she was one of uh she was the only woman with a an entire class of men, and I think the classes were like 10 to 20 people at that time.
SPEAKER_01It's always um it's always been curious to me how um even so especially back then, how women were supposed to be in the kitchen, but all the great chefs were men. So even as a chef, a woman couldn't break into that world, even though that's what they were expected to do back then is cook. That's kind of crazy.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah, cooking for your husband, cooking at home, cooking for your family. But when it came to the you know, a lot of it, um according to what I've learned in this process of studying uh Julia Child, a lot of it had to do with the fact that at that time you were cooking, it was a um uh what's the what's the word for um when it when it's high status? Uh prestigious. It was a prestigious job, and that was part of why it was reserved for men. And it was also a kind of uh macho atmosphere, you know, believe it or not. I still is, I think. Yeah? Yeah, I think so. Quick quick question. Have you watched this show called The Bear? Oh, I love the bear. Yeah, did you watch the whole thing? Yeah, yeah, we we just finished it a couple of days ago. That's actually part of why I picked um Julia Child. I wanted to do some somebody from the world of cooking, and yeah, it was such a fantastic show. And you kind of look at how it starts with uh one of the characters who's not wanting to follow the program and is really kind of bitter and and like, why do we have to do it that way? And and it's very sexist as well to some of the women in the show, and how he kind of changes over once he goes to that really nice restaurant and realizes what excellent service looks like. Um amazing show. If you haven't seen The Bear, I think it's on Hulu.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, it's a great show. Now, from what I understand about French cooking, it's very technical, like that's why it's so hard. It's very technical. You don't just throw things together, um, but there's a very precise way of doing things. And if you don't do them, so like omelets and souffles and some of those things that are really tough. If you don't do them, you'll fail. I mean, they just won't turn out the way you want them to do.
SPEAKER_06And and and you're teeing something up for me because um that was how France France really figured it out. They they made it a science, you know. It was but it was not just a science, it was art and science, the perfect combination of those two things. What um what happened is that because Julia had been going and taking these classes, she actually started to teach cooking classes to her friends, some of whom were Americans who were living over, you know, expatriates, and some of whom were French. Um, and she teamed up with this woman named Simca, and they decided after they had been teaching classes for a little while, that they actually wanted to make a cookbook. And it was, you know, that was led to the cookbook called Mastering the Art of French Cooking, which is one of the most best-selling cookbooks of all time. And still, and still better. Still, yes, there's I think they did three or four editions of it, and but Julia felt that cookbooks at the time didn't give enough detail, didn't give enough instruction, didn't give enough um kind of how to. And exactly what you said, she wanted it to be a science uh that was down to you know measuring everything and explaining why things happened. They spent 12 years working on this cookbook, and they were initially offered a um a deal by Houghton Mifflin, not Dunder Mifflin, but Houghton Mifflin, to uh deal to make the cookbook in 1953, spent 12 years, and at that time she and Simca, and they had a third partner whose name I don't know, but another French person, they didn't live in the same city. So Julia would type up drafts in English, type up the recipes, she would type them in triplicate. She would send one to Simca to review, she would send one to her sister, Dorothy, back in the US to actually try because Dorothy had to find the ingredients and tell her how difficult it was or how you know how it worked out, and then she would keep one for herself. Literally, you couldn't copy and paste, right? You had to you had she had to type it in triplicate, do it over the mail. Anyway, it took them 12 years to get their first draft of this cookbook.
SPEAKER_01And then you know what have you read any have you read oh, so what happened?
SPEAKER_06Um it was rejected.
SPEAKER_01Oh.
SPEAKER_05Wow.
SPEAKER_06Uh have I read any of it? I the only parts I read were when I was uh Doing studying this studying Julia, so I saw some outtakes from it. It was very detailed. No, no. As a matter of fact, here's what the publisher said when they rejected it. It is a big cookbook of elaborate information and might well prove formidable to the American housewife. She might be frightened by the book as a whole. They rejected it and they said they wanted more of a quote mix and stir cookbook.
SPEAKER_01Yes. And that would be my gut feeling is that she didn't read the well, I mean, who am I to say? She ended up selling, you know, millions of copies. But I would think it's the kind of book, even though she sold a lot, I bet it's not a lot that people read and tried those things. It would be incredibly intimidating.
SPEAKER_06Well, and again, to get the ingredients is difficult, right? Because at that time, um, well, that was a time period, so the 50s, the 60s, and the 70s, even. What what do you think of when you think of um uh dinner?
SPEAKER_01Oh, it especially at that time it was about TV dinners and yes, and getting stuff ready quickly, especially once women started going back to the uh workplace and everything. This seems like it might have been more popular earlier than but 50s and 60s would be the wrong time to for this something. Doesn't seem like it should have worked.
SPEAKER_06It well, uh, there's and and you I'll explain why it did work here in a minute. But the reason that um the reason that it wasn't popular before that was because A, America was pretty isolationist prior to, you know, most average Americans didn't know that much about Europe, didn't know that much about the culture, didn't know much about the food. And after World War II, there was a lot more blending of cultures and a lot more interest in overseas, a lot more interest in in uh that sort of thing. But exactly what you said TV dinners, convenient food. Um, they were saying that one of the biggest, one of the biggest things that was served during the late 50s and early 60s was grilled spam with slices of pineapple.
SPEAKER_01But think about it though. What to what you're saying is that uh probably 30% of the men in the 50s had been to France, you know, through the through the war, yeah, but they got a taste of like French bread and you know, the just some of the finer, yeah. I mean, some of those finer things. That's that's really interesting. It makes sense, and we talked about this a little bit with uh Chef Boy RD. That yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_06That was actually his that was his uh his strength was that he made it convenient. He was he was the king of convenience foods. Right, that's true. So, so uh aside from Chef Boy RD, I was trying to name as many convenience food brands, you know, the the ones that would be on the label of a TV dinner, and I only came up with seven. Can uh can you got any got any for me? Uh Swanson, yes, king, the absolutely the king. There they were the king. Um and and funny fact, the summer camp I went to, uh, two of the kids that were there at that time were Swanson, like that family.
SPEAKER_01So well, that's that's Tucker Carlson's family. Did you know that? No, yeah, that's where he gets all his as he's a uh uh married to the Swanson fortune.
SPEAKER_06Well, that's Hungry Man. Hungry Man. Yes, yes, that that's on my list. Um Lean Cuisine. I don't know if Lean Cuisine came out until later. Oh, you're talking about back then or now yeah, I'm talking about back in the day. That would be a modern one.
SPEAKER_01Oh, so those are the two big ones Swanson and Hungry Libby's.
SPEAKER_06Little Libby's remember if it says Libby's, libbies, libbies on the label, label, label, it tastes better, better, better on the table, table, table.
SPEAKER_01So are these TV dinners or just frozen foods?
SPEAKER_06Well, Libby's made TV dinners.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but I'm I'm is that what I'm going for here?
SPEAKER_06Well, these were all all my list was uh, but yeah, what what what were some other convenience?
SPEAKER_01Well, I mean, I was thinking about Mrs. T's or Miss what was it? The fish dicks.
SPEAKER_06Oh, yes, yes. Is it Mrs. T's? Was it Captain something? Yeah, maybe I don't know.
SPEAKER_01Uh there was there was uh Morton, the the salt makers, trust the Morton fisherman.
SPEAKER_06Yep, yep. There was Rosa Rita. Remember Rosa Rita? Um no Rosa Rita was was well. Here's what's interesting about Rosa Rita is and and Swanson actually, they had what they called Mexican style frozen dinner. It was never called a Mexican dinner, it was called Mexican style.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Um inspired by right, right.
SPEAKER_06So uh there was also uh Banquet was another one.
SPEAKER_01Oh, how could I forget Banquet?
SPEAKER_06And and I've actually got an ad pulled up here from Banquet. Uh it was for a turkey dinner.
SPEAKER_01This was uh this was Banquet Turkey Dinner, which included uh Let me let me get let me add the green beans, well peas and mashed potatoes, peas, yep, and mashed potatoes, yep, and then it had a little cobbler, right?
SPEAKER_06No, this one I have to send I'll send you this image. It was actually uh just three sections, just the turkey with gravy, the green beans with butter, and the um mashed potatoes with butter. Yum. But but here's here's what it says. Here's the here's the ad. This I think this was an ad out of a magazine I'm looking at. It says, Ye Indians are hungry tonight. Be a friendly pilgrim and serve your little tribe a real turkey dinner. Besides tender slices of succulent turkey, there's old-fashioned dressing, fresh tasting peas, and meshed potatoes. Expensive? Indeed. No, just tastes expensive. Banquet frozen foods. Thank goodness for banquet.
SPEAKER_01Oh, nice. And banquet, if you're listening, that was a free read there.
SPEAKER_06That's right. And and and the picture has a housewife with a pilgrim hat on. Nice.
SPEAKER_01Nice. Anyway, so so they're guessing Julia Child was not down with with um well TV dinners.
SPEAKER_06So so funny thing, I don't know about TV dinners. Well, she was a very adventurous person, but apparently later in life, she really liked Costco hot dogs. Like that was one of her guilty pleasures later in life. But yeah, I want to I want to just real quick before we get back to Julia Child, I want to read you some more names of some of these um some of these dinners that were frozen meals in the 60s and 70s. There was the Morton three-course chicken and dumplings, that's pretty standard, the Morton beef patty twinkie supper, beef patty twinkie, uh, beans and franks, that was a Swanson, Swanson jam, corned beef hash, that was a Swanson uh jam, and then Polynesian style dinner. So it wasn't they wouldn't just call it Polynesian, it was Polynesian style, Mexican style, German style, and then Libby, Libby had one called Safari Supper.
SPEAKER_05What was that?
SPEAKER_06I I don't know. I don't know. I just saw the name and liked it. Um, I guess you you eat your um you eat one of the Rockefellers. So that's a callback. That is a callback, anyway. Uh yeah, at the time um when all this was going on, they were trying to get their book published. It got rejected. Uh, they also had another hit. Uh, she and Paul had another devastating blow. Um, Paul had been working in the U.S. government. This was kind of during the McCarthy period, I think it was when people were being called communists, and they came, brought Paul and Julia back from France, and they said Paul was a communist and a homosexual, and he uh had to prove he wasn't, and he, you know, by all accounts wasn't either. How do you do that?
SPEAKER_01Um I guess that was a problem, huh?
SPEAKER_06Maybe so, but it it really kind of he got very angry. He took an ang he took an early retirement from uh he had he had been working in the Foreign Legion or the um, you know, the I don't know, whatever it's called, um, when you're working overseas for the government, he had been a diplomat or something along those lines. He took a early retirement and they decided to move to Cambridge, Massachusetts. Now, in in uh at that time, Julia was still shopping the book around. She sent it to several publishers, and a publisher by the name of Kanoff, K-N-O-P-F, um, took the manuscript and a woman named Judith Jones got it, and she realized it had potential, and she told the publisher, who I guess it was a family-owned business, uh, you know, Harvey Kanoff or or Barry Kanoff or um something like that. Uh, she told him that no, who was the guy? Um, who was the guy on Mad Magazine? Um Alfred E.
SPEAKER_01Newman.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, it was Alfred E. Kanoff, I think. Um because I remember hearing that and thinking maybe they're making fun of this guy. Anyway, Alfred E. Kanoff, she told him that he had to publish this book. It was gonna be popular, and he basically said that he wasn't convinced it would be popular, but she had a lot of uh passion and that you know he appreciated that and thought she would try to try her best to make it work. So he decided to publish it. But he said if it sold one copy, he would eat his hat. Apparently that was a thing back there. If something you didn't didn't believe could happen, happened, you ate your hat.
SPEAKER_01I think I've even used that phrase, but I've never actually Yeah if if anybody listens to Dirt Nap City, I'll eat my hat.
SPEAKER_06I think you said that on day one.
SPEAKER_01Oh, wow.
SPEAKER_06Yeah you got a you got a hat? No, I mean I have lots of hats, but well, here's where here's where it all kind of started to change. So 1961, she and Simca went on a book tour to promote the book, and they really that wasn't a thing back then. Book tours were, you know, the the the term didn't really exist, but they went around to different universities, different libraries, different bookstores trying to promote the book through the U.S. Simca came over here, you know, she was a French woman, lived in France, and Julia got invited to be on a show in Boston. Um, now you know the PBS station there, WGBH, right? Pretty famous PBS station. There was a show called I've Been Reading, and it was sort of a book club, you know, here's what I've been reading, kind of not like I've been reading, like yay for me, but here's what I've been reading. And the author had decided, or the host had decided that uh Julia's book, um, Mastering the Art of French Cooking was something I've been reading. And so Julia had the opportunity to go on the show. Well, before the show, the day that she's supposed to go on, or the day before, she calls the station, she just dials up the number, asks for the producer, and and this is where the producer called out her voice and said something basically like, Um, you know, Julia called the station, and I remember this woman who sounded, I you know, I couldn't place her accent, she had a very unique voice, and she wanted a hot plate to go on this on this uh book show. The guy said, Well, I don't we don't do that, you know, ma'am, uh, but we'll do our best. So they ended up getting a hot plate, putting it on there on the show, and while they were um on the show, she cooked an omelet for the host.
SPEAKER_01She made a proper omelette. And you know, they say that that you're not a chef unless you can make an an omelet.
SPEAKER_06Oh, I didn't know, I didn't know that.
SPEAKER_01You never heard that. That's that's kind of a thing. And in fact, on the bear, when she makes an omelet, that's right. She makes it for the pregnant woman, and puts the puts the chips, the sour cream and onion chips. I mean, that's that's that's a mark of like you're you're really something if you can make an omelet. Apparently, it's a very hard thing to do, is to make a proper omelet.
SPEAKER_06Well, here's here's something that I've never told you. Just like I told you about being in New York on September 11th, I'm gonna blow your mind. When I was in college, I came up with an omelet, and it was called the Cheeto omelet. And you basically put Cheetos in an omelet, and what would happen is the Cheetos would soak up the grease of the eggs, and you know how Cheetos are already just magically delicious? I'm not talking about the puffy ones, I mean the traditional crunchy Cheetos.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_06My mouth is watering just thinking about it. You'd uh you put a little cheese on top as well, but Cheeto omelet was my creation, and I guess I must be a chef.
SPEAKER_01And and I bet you there's places right now that are making those, especially hot Cheetos, because that's a thing now. Everything they they're like Yeah, they use hot Cheetos now as um as a cooking as an ingredient.
SPEAKER_06Well, I this was in this was in the late 80s, early 90s, so I must have been way ahead of my time. Does your son like hot Cheetos and Takis? Oh yeah, yeah, Tate, Tate too. My son as well. Um well, so basically, I don't know if you if you know a whole lot about the history of PBS, but at the time, PBS was just both bow and ring. It was, you know, shows about space, but just people talking with whiteboards, a lot of professors talking about math and science and theories and history. There wasn't a lot of excitement exciting stuff going on. And apparently, when they made this proper omelet on the show, the phones lit up. It was one of these times when the the producer said they never got calls, and all of a sudden people were calling and saying, Who was that woman? I need to get her book, I need to, I want more of that. So he went to his boss, the station general manager, and said, We should try a show, a cooking show. At the time, they didn't have anything set up for that, they didn't have any sort of uh infrastructure or a kitchen or anything like that. Apparently, there was a demo kitchen from another station that they were able to borrow, and they were able to um they had to carry it up several, they had to truck it to the station, first of all, carry it up several flights of stairs in Boston, and then they did their very first show. And at the time, they couldn't even edit, like everything was done live to tape. So if they made mistakes, they had to do long cuts of everything. And that's kind of where Julia um learned to improvise. That's where she learned to, you know, kind of go over her mistakes. And they said that she was really inspirational because she was so authentic. People liked the fact that she wasn't, you know, it wasn't edited perfectly so that everything came out perfectly. If she missed or if she made a mistake, she just kept going.
SPEAKER_01And the fact that it was on PBS, she had room to breathe. A lot of those shows, like you say, um, you know, had people kind of droning on. Um, so it was okay. It was perfect, a perfect uh blend. Did they invent the overhead camera at that time? Do you think, too, for the cooking shows have these days?
SPEAKER_06I mean, well, they did talk about having to do things like that. Um, so at the time they were using tube cameras, they were really big, heavy cameras with tubes in them. And no, not very portable. So, but there's in in in a couple of the documentaries, there's some behind-the-scenes shots where you see people sitting on the floor behind the counter handing her things and pulling things out of the oven and putting them back in. Like a lot of there's a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes, almost like the Muppet show, because there's a hand that pops up with something. Yeah, yeah. Um, so let me just play you a quick clip from this, and this kind of gives you a sense of her authenticity on the show.
SPEAKER_05The French Chef is made possible by a grant from the Polaroid Corporation.
SPEAKER_02Welcome to the French Chef. I'm Julia Child. You know, we speak of a covey of quail and a gaggle of geese and a pride of lions. Well, this is known as a peep of chickens. That's their official name when they're in group, as they are. And you know, we're always broiling, broiling, and grilling and baking and brazing and barbecuing chickens. But what's ever happened to the roast chicken? Here, there's this beautiful, great big old, lovely, not old, it's just a perfect type of roaster, about six pounds, and you're half the time you can't ever find a roaster like this in the market. There just isn't enough demand for it. And I think it would be useful to know is why is this chicken a roaster and why are these others not?
SPEAKER_06So that was called it was called the French Chef, and she just brought this energy and fearlessness to it that people liked. Um, you know, there was no teleprompter. Again, it was live to tape, so they had to do these long takes and she'd make mistakes. Apparently, actually, they had a um they had a uh cue card that all it said was sweat, and it meant that she was sweating into the food and she had to mop her brow. That would happen pretty often.
SPEAKER_01So you know what's great funny about listening to these clips is that it's impossible that it doesn't sound like a parody of her. Yeah, yeah, it's she's been mocked and and parodied so many times that they all sound fake now.
SPEAKER_06Well, funny thing, um, you know, the famous um skit with Dan Aykroyd. Right. Where have you seen that one where he cuts his finger and then kind of bleeds out? That was one of her favorite skits. She loved it, she had she had a copy of that and she would show it to people. Um, and apparently it was based on uh an actual real uh situation where she was on like Johnny Carson or something and she cut her finger before um before she went on the show and and wasn't able to um wasn't able to do the cooking and stuff. She had another chef, uh Jacques somebody there with her that that actually did the chopping and stuff, but she she and and Carson joked, um asked her if it was one of the ingredients, like if her finger was one of the ingredients. She said no.
SPEAKER_01But well, you know what's funny is that these people and we've had a few on the show who get famous later in life in their life. Yeah. And uh I think that we like that when somebody with that much energy and is older comes, it it almost gives this feeling like you're coming in late. Like I should have known who this person is, so I better get on board right now. Um, and I think she she had that. I mean, just you can just hear that from that clip. It just makes you want to go back and watch, you know, watch everything she's ever done.
SPEAKER_06Well, and apparently the first episode they ever did was Bolgognon Bourgognon, which is beef stew with red wine uh on the French Chef. And apparently that show was still playing on PBS, you know, on one of the stations pretty much for 50 years straight. They would keep repeating, you know, because a lot of it they have to fill airtime, and a lot of it is uh classics and such. But yeah, she just she just really had this knack for being on camera, being authentic. She would she would slap the table, she would hammer things, she would hammer, you know, chop things like she would start one of the episodes by chopping a fish's head off in a close-up, and then it would cut to her doing something else or pull out, and you'd see her uh talking about the fish and flopping it around. Um also it was kind of cool because her husband at this point, you know, he had been uh sort of McCarthyized and uh wasn't working, so he kind of got involved in the show, sharpening knives, bringing in ingredients, cleaning dishes. He was uh very supportive of her success. And apparently, for a man of that time to not be jealous or to not want his wife not to feel outshined by her, but rather to really support her and love her was really unusual.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, that's that's great. And um, you know, especially at their age, but you know, he had he was probably he had probably run out of road in terms of what he was gonna do. Um, anyways, so it was it was very convenient that this this came along. Good for him.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, and well, and Julia actually put it, this was a quote from her. Uh, she said that you know, there was the key to um a good marriage was maintain the three Fs.
SPEAKER_05Julia's advice for good marriage was the three Fs. Feed your man, flatter your man, and you had to f your man. Oh, whoa.
SPEAKER_06That that was that was straight out of her mouth. That was what she said kept her kept her um marriage alive. She would feed him, she would flatter him, and she would him. Yeah. So apparently he wasn't gay. I guess, you know, if if she if she could have told that to the McCarthy, you know, the government when they were when they were giving him a hard time. Um maybe she did. So the timing was really right. You know, you and I had just talked about um the fact that America was coming out of World War II, the Kennedys were in office, and the Kennedys actually had a French chef in the White House, a pretty famous French chef. So for her to bring French cooking to the average people, and at the time, unlike today, everybody really respected and admired the president, right? No matter who it was, they they looked up to him. And and so I think the fact that the Kennedys had French cooking, she was doing French cooking, uh, it really just kind of stood out. Television was becoming more of a thing, and people were wanting to do get away from just the TV dinners and stuff like that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Like you said, we said it it shouldn't have worked, but uh but it was lightning in a bottle. Yeah, and it was probably because of her personality. I mean, think about it now. There's more than one network that all they do is is cook, and she started all that stuff.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, she was the first rock star chef, you know, before Emerald, before Rachel, before um Guy, uh before.
SPEAKER_01I remember at the same time, or when we were kids, there was another chef that was on TV. There was a couple. Do you remember one of them was the that Cajun guy, Justin Wilson? Do you remember that guy?
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah. I know the name.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Yeah. He would be the one that said, I'll guarantee that. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And then there was a guy named the Galloping Gourmet. Do you remember that?
SPEAKER_06Yes. I'd forgotten completely about the Galloping Gourmet.
SPEAKER_01Whatever happened to that guy? I don't even know his name.
SPEAKER_06Well, I wonder if he lives in Dirt Knap City, because that could be good following. He and Julia are hanging out.
SPEAKER_01Um I wonder if he was a direct like competitor. Like, hey, I could do that too.
SPEAKER_06Well, you know, it's interesting. You use the term um uh lightning of the bottle. Her husband actually called her cooking sparks from a pinwheel, which I thought was kind of a cool analogy for it. But she became the the show went really well. I think I said she got paid $50 a show initially, and then of course the show took off. It got better and better. The book sold like crazy, you know. So it was sort of a virtuous circle. The book brought people to the show, and the show brought people to the book, and people liked her because of her sort of international flair. I think just like you, a lot of people assumed she was English or or something. My grandmother actually grew up in India when India was uh British colony, and she talks a bit like Julia Child. She has a little bit of that Kelly, you know, sing song, sings bird song kind of voice. Um but you know, interestingly, all that time she did not ever want to embrace the endorsement of products. She was offered a lot of products to endorse, but she didn't want people to be able to buy their way into the program. She also really identified herself as a homemaker, but never as a feminist. You know, she really considered herself more of a homemaker, but she was an inspiration for women, especially when women wanted to become like a chef outside of the home. Um, she didn't have any children, she was very close to her nieces and nephews. And she in 1974 actually appeared on a program of uh someone who we've also highlighted on this show. You want to take a listen?
SPEAKER_00But we had her on the program. And again, this was uh it was almost like science because when you think of it, recipes are like science, putting this together and that together. It's a lesson. And she showed the children how to make cookless spaghetti sauce. It was a safe way to prepare something.
SPEAKER_02Now comes the fun, which you do, and you can what you can do, you can get all this ready in the kitchen and then bring it into the dining room, and then you can toss it and turn it in the dining room.
SPEAKER_00But we had the spaghetti. She had done the spaghetti already, but she made a uh a sauce with olive oil and I forget the different ingredients, and it was so good.
SPEAKER_02A great handful of these chopped walnuts.
SPEAKER_00Walnuts again.
SPEAKER_02And then a great handful of these chopped black olives. And you've got about oh, these are about three or four of those green onions that were cut up there. And then a nice big handful of cheese. This you put in as much cheese as you want. That's probably about a two-inch square, I would.
SPEAKER_00But again, it was showing children how that's creative too. Cooking can be creative too, and uh you can learn a lot from cooking, and a lot of people love it. And and she loved cooking. You could tell.
SPEAKER_06Okay, I think we can I think we can stop, but I'll find a clip from that. That was Mr. McPheely.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you do you do better than this than him, by the way. Um I like the collaborations. I'm always looking for collaborations between people that we've talked about before. Although I didn't hear Mr. Rogers in the background.
SPEAKER_06He he said he said something about walnuts and spaghetti.
SPEAKER_01That was I thought that was somebody else, but yeah, that's it. No, that was Mr. Rogers. Uh that's that's really cool. Um I think one of the reasons she has high energy is she always sounds like she's out of breath.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah, maybe she was.
SPEAKER_01She always sounds like she just ran to the studio.
SPEAKER_06Right, right. Um well, she um she got breast cancer, she overcame it in the 60s. She became uh very um she became a very pro-choice and supporter of planned parenthood. And even to the point where on one of her book tours, after one of the uh oh hold on, funny thing I just noticed too. Um, did you know that the person who played Mr. McPhee was named David Newell?
SPEAKER_01Oh no. Oh, shout out.
SPEAKER_06Yeah. Uh didn't we know of David Newell in high school? Uh so she became very pro-choice and a supporter of Planned Parenthood to the point where on a book tour, she got picketed. People were picketing because she was a supporter of Planned Parenthood and didn't agree with that. However, early on, kind of when in her younger days, she uh sometimes said insensitive things about gay people. She would use the term homos a lot. Um, but she kind of had a change of heart. Not even a change of heart. I don't think she meant it to be offensive. I think it was a little bit of the era she grew up in, perhaps. Uh not to say that that was right, but when one of her friends who was gay died, she actually got really involved with uh preventing AIDS and AIDS awareness and became an activist and you know, talked about that pretty often, showed up at AIDS events and also planned parenthood events. So in 1980, her show started to wane on PBS. She got dropped from some markets, and she actually was um, I guess more she decided the best defense was a good offense, and so she quit. She said, I'm not doing the shows anymore if you're not going to carry them in all the markets. She ended up getting work with Good Morning America. And the big difference with Good Morning America, while she had a bigger audience, she had a shorter amount of time. It was just one segment, right? So instead of an hour or half an hour to make a dish, she had three minutes, and she had to learn to adapt to that.
SPEAKER_01But she didn't really.
SPEAKER_06No, no, no. She she seemed to love it. You know, I think again, a lot it introduced her to a bigger audience than a lot of people who didn't know who she was.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. At that point, she was a household name, too.
SPEAKER_06But yeah, yeah, I think to older people, but I think you know, her big appeal is that she became very intergenerational. And I think a lot of families and especially mothers and daughters would um watch the show. And I saw several quotes about this in the reading and the and the documentaries I've watched about them watching the show, going out, buying the ingredients, and actually wanting to uh have a uh time to cook together, you know, from her show.
SPEAKER_05We should do that sometime.
SPEAKER_06So after Good Morning America, she actually uh decided to go back to PBS with a show called Baking with Julia, and that ran from 1996 to 1999. I guess PBS kept records of all the ingredients they bought for that show. Take a guess how many pounds of butter she used in that three-year period.
SPEAKER_01Oh, jeez, in three years, I don't I mean how many shows is that? Uh don't know 70 70 shows or something. I don't know. Tell me.
SPEAKER_06753 pounds of butter, according to PBS.
SPEAKER_01That's French cooking for you.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah. She she also uh she had graduated from Smith College, as I said, I think in 1934. Uh she had a degree in history, but then later received honorary doctorates from Boston University, Bates College, Rutgers University, Smith College. I guess you got an honorary from there as well, Brown University, and Harvard. So she was very well decorated with honorariums. Uh, what does that mean, by the way? You're a you're a college guy. What does it mean to get an honorary degree or an honorarium? Honorary doctorate.
SPEAKER_01I mean it it just means that you're it's a it's like given a lifetime achievement or something. It's just an award that somebody gets. It doesn't give you any status or anything.
SPEAKER_06So you can't like you can't like demand more money or teach a teach a class or something?
SPEAKER_01No, I don't think so. I don't think it's I don't think it's good for anything. The university can can claim you as an honorary. But no, you you you shouldn't go around as insisting to be called doctor something. You have an honor.
SPEAKER_06Even if you have an honorary doctorate. Dang it. That that's kind of my goal through Dirt Knap City is to get an honorary doctorate in interesting dead people. And you know, yeah.
SPEAKER_01I mean, I think it's something that traditionally people do too when they when you um when they get somebody to speak at a commencement address, you know, they'll give them an honorary degree if they don't have one. But she must have been a wealthy woman though.
SPEAKER_06She was. She was. I mean, you know, she ended up um living in Cambridge and her husband died. Um, he had a stroke and a uh heart attack and kind of became more feeble, wasn't able to help out as much. Um, but she loved him. You know, they they they had a great marriage. Um she said of her longevity, because she lived in '94, that I don't consider vegetarianism a sensible diet at all because you're supposed to have a little bit of everything. How about red meat, which I believe in? As I often said, red meat and gin.
SPEAKER_01Oh, gin. That was her quote.
SPEAKER_06Yeah.
SPEAKER_01What year did she die?
SPEAKER_06Uh she died in 2004, uh, August 13th, two days shy of her 92nd birthday. She died in Monticello, California. And she had a book actually um published posthumously, and the very last line of her posthumously published book was Um thinking back on it now reminds me that the pleasures of the table and of life are infinite. Toujours bon appetite.
SPEAKER_01Good, good, good woman there.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah. No, she she really I think you know, one of the things they did mention was that she wasn't she did have sort of a um tough negotiation style. Like even with her cookbooks, once she became famous, she demanded uh top billing on the cookbooks and more money than Simca, even though she and Simca spatted but stayed friends, you know. But Simca, you've never heard of Simca, right? I don't even know her last name. Um but she, you know, she she deserved it. She was the famous person, she was the draw. She was the reason that book sold so many copies. It wasn't Simca, but Simca was kind of the one who had actually started the cookbook. She actually brought Julia on. She and her partner brought Julia on because they needed an American, basically, too, because it was supposed to be American French cooking for Americans.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06So if you can't get enough, you know, if you really want uh if you really want more, there's a film called Primordial Soup with Julia Child that uh has played at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum um for years and years. WGBH had a series called uh Julia Child, America's Favorite Chef. Um there is Julia and Julia, or Julia and Julia, which was a thing about uh, I guess a blogger who ended up cooking a bunch of his her recipes. Apparently Julia Child didn't like that very much, but Meryl Streep was in it.
SPEAKER_01Oh, she was alive when that came out?
SPEAKER_06Um You know what? I think it was a book first. She didn't like the book very much or the blog. She didn't like the blogger because the blogger mentioned her very often. Um there was uh Julia the documentary, which uh came out in 2021 by Betsy West. Um that's actually one that I watched, and it was really, really great. And then there was this little piece of work that was done for a PBS um series called uh Remixed. Have you heard of this? So they they would take PBS icons and remix them and auto-tune their voices, and so here's a little bit of that.
SPEAKER_02What makes a great show? Well, training and technique, of course, plus a great love of food, a generous personality, and the ability to invent ready to roll, ready to roll, ready to roll, ready to roll, freshness is essential. That makes all the difference.
SPEAKER_01Alex, freshness is essential. I love it when PBS tries to get hip.
SPEAKER_06Right. Right. Stay in your lane, PBS. Stay in your lane. No, it's actually it's it's like three and a half minutes long, and it's kind of and you know, after having immersed myself in Julia Child for a few weeks now, it was kind of uh fun to listen to the whole thing. I mean, it's gets into chicken and beef and gin and juice and all that good stuff. Jin and juice. Right.
SPEAKER_01Did you watch the uh Merrill Street movie?
SPEAKER_06No, no, no, I didn't. I probably should.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I was just wondering if how I I hadn't even seen a lot of clips of that. Did I I bet she did a good job of I bet she had the voice down.
SPEAKER_06Yeah, yeah. No, I maybe that'll be my uh entertainment for tonight. Jody's been into it, she's been into all the Julia Child stuff I've been talking about. My wife is a uh is also an excellent chef, went to culinary school and uh you know, digs all this. So does she make omelets? Oh, she makes she makes killer omelets, yes.
SPEAKER_01But I bet you every time she makes an omelet, you have to tell her about your Cheeto omelet.
SPEAKER_06Anytime, anytime I hear the word omelet, I have to talk about my Cheetos.
SPEAKER_01She went to culinary school, and all she has to hear about is the Cheeto omelet. Uh you know, funny thing too, she thinks Cheetos are bad for you. Put some respect on her omelet.
SPEAKER_06R-E-S-P-E-C-T.
SPEAKER_01Well, that's Julia Child, my man. Thank you. Thank you. That was interesting. Yeah, made me hungry, that's for sure.
SPEAKER_06Well, she was definitely one of a kind, and as I said, came along at the right time. First rock star chef. And and again, authenticity, right? That's really what made her, I think, uh so well beloved by so many people. But if you liked this episode, I hope you will definitely follow us on whatever podcasting app you use, whether that is uh I think there's one called Apple Podcasts. I think there's one called Spotify. Uh there's one called Podcast Chaser, I know. Um there's a few others, but there's usually a little follow button. Hit that follow button. It helped it means a lot to us. And then, of course, please email us, not at dirtnap city. We would love to hear from you. Um we we don't get a whole lot of emails yet, but there's gonna be a time when we do, and we're not gonna be able to read them all, and you're gonna wish you had emailed now when we still read them all.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and if you're getting if you're out to Paris, the um the right the restaurant again is uh Rotisserie de la Boujolée. It's at uh 19 uh Qui de la Tourelle. So uh little little little uh little plug for you.
SPEAKER_06What's your what's your favorite restaurant in uh Houston?
SPEAKER_01Oh geez. I mean, so many, so many good restaurants in Houston, so many different categories.
SPEAKER_06All right, just name one.
SPEAKER_01I mean, I I can't do this. I can't do this. I don't even live in Houston, I've got one.
SPEAKER_06Oh, what's yours? Kim San. Oh, really? I love Kim Son, yeah. Yeah, I love that.
SPEAKER_01Pancho's Mexican buffet where you raise a little flag.
SPEAKER_06All right, everybody, thanks for listening. This is Dirt Nap City, and we will be back in two weeks. Be sure to hit that subscribe button. By the way, we have a Facebook page now. If you go there and look for Dirt Knap City, you'll find us. We'll be publishing some interesting facts about interesting dead people on an interesting schedule, which is very irregular. We love you guys. Thanks for tuning in. Bye.
SPEAKER_02It's a perfectly broken ticket.
