Ruthie Rogers

We have the ‘Baroness of the Riverside’ on the podcast this week, the legendary Ruthie Rogers of the River Cafe in London. I made Ruthie Marbella chicken for lunch, and she brought a delicious trio of River Cafe puds for us to taste - including the iconic Chocolate Nemesis! Ruthie knows absolutely everyone and we loved hearing all her stories of the incredible people she has cooked for. We also learned she was taught all her cooking tricks from her grandma, she was born in Woodstock, New York, she developed a podcast in lockdown, and she is our only guest who has ever asked what season of the year her last supper would take place in! We could listen and talk to Ruthie all day! Ruthie’s podcast ‘Table 4’ is available everywhere now. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:35Jessie Ware?

  Hello and welcome to Table Mellers. I'm Jessie Ware and I'm here with Lenny, looking very gorgeous.

• 0:41Speaker 02

  I'm not looking gorgeous.

• 0:41Jessie Ware?

  You are, and it's like you knew that I had olives in the recipe today. Because you are dressed as a green.

• 0:48Speaker 02

  Green goddess.

• 0:50Jessie Ware?

  Green olive, I was going to say. Yeah, sure. Green goddess, let's go for that. So I'm on cooking duty today and I'm not nervous. I wasn't nervous until I thought about it and I thought, oh my God, I'm such an idiot for doing a pesto. When we have probably the queen of British Italian restaurants. We have Ruth Rogers coming over. I don't know whether I should be calling her Ruthie or Ruth. You were like, why are you calling her Ruthie? But I.

• 1:15Speaker 02

  I think that's the name of her podcast, but I always have known her as Ruth Rogers.

• 1:19Jessie Ware?

  So Ruth Rogers, Baroness Ruth Rogers of the Riverside. I think that's her like title. Well, that's an amazing title. Do you get that, like, because your restaurant?

• 1:30Speaker 02

  Well, she's an honorary, she must be an honorary peer.

• 1:33Jessie Ware?

  But the Riverside bit is like, you know, she has the River Cafe. They didn't like just for good measure.

• 1:39Speaker 02

  I don't know, darling. We'll ask her how you get your name.

• 1:42Jessie Ware?

  So like if you became the right honourable or whatever, the Baroness of Manners.

• 1:45Speaker 02

  I'll be the Baroness of Clapham South.

• 1:47Jessie Ware?

  Well, you wouldn't take the title though, would you?

• 1:49Speaker 02

  No, wouldn't.

• 1:49Jessie Ware?

  Anyway, we have Ruth Rogers coming over to eat with us, to chat and to talk everything River Cafe. I'm really excited to meet her. It's like many other people, one of my favourite restaurants in London. Took my husband there for his 40th this year, last year.

• 2:06Speaker 02

  Did you have a white peach bolognese?

• 2:08Jessie Ware?

  Of course. Well, it depends what's seasonal, yeah, um, but.

• 2:13Speaker 02

  I remember we went there.

• 2:14Jessie Ware?

  For Hannah's graduation.

• 2:16Speaker 02

  It was gorgeous.

• 2:16Jessie Ware?

  It's one of those places where you go.

• 2:18Speaker 02

  For something special.

• 2:19Jessie Ware?

  But what I love about it is that it isn't stuffy. So it's got like really great energy and just lovely people. Ruthie is bringing the pudding. I wonder if it is the chocolate nemesis. That's River Cafe, isn't it?

• 2:36Speaker 02

  I've got all her cookbooks. They're gorgeous and they're simple recipes, but just with delicious ingredients.

• 2:45Jessie Ware?

  Well, I have made, Hannah, I think my sister was like, why have you done this for Ruthie Rogers? I've done Marbella chicken. Why are you, but why, why?

• 2:56Speaker 02

  Well, first, Marbella's in Spain.

• 2:58Jessie Ware?

  So, yeah, but I wasn't gonna go to Italy, Mum.

• 3:00Speaker 02

  Her whole association is Italy.

• 3:02Jessie Ware?

  But I wasn't gonna go there.

• 3:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's a bit ersatz, isn't it?

• 3:05Jessie Ware?

  What's ersatz?

• 3:06Speaker 02

  It means it's contrived, it's not kind of a pure recipe. Like pesto rice.

• 3:12Jessie Ware?

  Do you think this is a really bad idea?

• 3:15Speaker 02

  I'm not saying a thing.

• 3:16Jessie Ware?

  Well, you know what? I love Marbella chicken and I love our little pesto rice that we do and I made fresh pesto.

• 3:21Speaker 02

  Don't let it go dry.

• 3:22Jessie Ware?

  I'm not gonna let it go dry. I've got a timer on because last time I made it with Emma and Richard, it was dry. Yes, I'm aware of that, Mum. Thank you, no pressure, look at you, sitting there. Anyway, I'm making Marbella chicken, which I really like. And now I feel like you, whatever, maybe I won't call it Marbella chicken. Fuck it, I'm proud of Marbella chicken, I love it. It's delicious, haven't made it for a few years. And it's tasty. Do you agree that you still enjoy the taste of Marbella chicken?

• 3:50Speaker 02

  I don't know, because I haven't made it for so long.

• 3:52Jessie Ware?

  Well, I'm thrilled that I'm about to give it to somebody who has retained a Michelin star since nineteen ninety-eight.

• 3:57Speaker 02

  It ain't Michelin star, darling.

• 3:59Jessie Ware?

  No, but why would she want Michelin, like, why?

• 4:01Speaker 02

  No.

• 4:02Jessie Ware?

  Ah, Jesus, oh, whatever. My husband will enjoy it later.

• 4:07Speaker 02

  I'm sure it'll be delicious.

• 4:08Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, I'm sure it will too, Lenny. It's been marinating for twenty-four hours.

• 4:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 4:13Jessie Ware?

  I've made homemade pesto to go in our rice.

• 4:15Speaker 02

  Good.

• 4:16Jessie Ware?

  As master.

• 4:16Speaker 02

  Oregano.

• 4:18Jessie Ware?

  Yes, from the garden, thank you very much.

• 4:21Speaker 02

  Have you got oregano in your garden?

• 4:23Jessie Ware?

  Yes.

• 4:23Speaker 02

  You're kidding.

• 4:24Jessie Ware?

  Anyway, Ruthie Rogers coming on to talk about our podcast, to talk about food. And I'm gonna be feeding her Marbella chicken with pesto rice.

• 4:41Jessie Ware?

  Now Ruthie, are we calling you Ruthie or Ruth?

• 4:44Speaker 03

  I think Ruthie.

• 4:45Jessie Ware?

  Does that mean we're on like friendly terms? Is that because you're always Ruth Rogers down as like NBA Ruth Rogers?

• 4:51Speaker 03

  Do they say, that sounds so serious.

• 4:53Jessie Ware?

  It does, I mean it's powerful.

• 4:54Speaker 03

  Ruth is a kind of biblical, serious name. So I think what's quite nice is to put the IE at the end of it. And I think Richard always called me Ruthie. And so now I just try and when they, even when, you know, on a legal document, I try and say Ruthie. It's just a nicer.

• 5:09Jessie Ware?

  Oh, really?

• 5:09Speaker 03

  I try, but then they send it back and say you have to change it back to Ruthie.

• 5:13Jessie Ware?

  Well, Ruthie, it's a pleasure to have you. You've come in with your dear family friend Sophia from Oregon, who's sitting here.

• 5:22Speaker 03

  And listens to your podcast.

• 5:23Jessie Ware?

  That's very sweet.

• 5:25Speaker 03

  In Oregon? Yeah.

• 5:26Jessie Ware?

  In Oregon? Hello, Oregon.

• 5:28Speaker 03

  There you go, we travel.

• 5:29Jessie Ware?

  How was your weekend?

• 5:31Speaker 03

  What a weekend, I came back from New York. I was working on a book in New York. And I got back on Friday and it was, it was coming back, you know, January in London sometimes can be a bit grim and grey. But I had a great weekend and got back into the River Cafe. It was wonderful.

• 5:53Jessie Ware?

  Buzzing?

• 5:54Speaker 03

  It was buzzing, well, not always, you know, like every other restaurant, you have your quiet times and your not quiet times. And so I went, I got back on Friday morning and had dinner with friends on Friday night there. And, you know, this is for my children. New York, it's interesting. Well, I love, I have to say, I do love, you know, when I go to New York to have the kind of food you don't have in here. So I don't go for the Italian or the French so much, though they're really good Italian restaurants. I go to Manetta Tavern, which is owned by Keith McNally or Balthazar.

• 6:27Jessie Ware?

  Keith McNally, I follow him on Instagram. And I'm terrified if I ever offended one of his waiters, he would come for me.

• 6:36Speaker 03

  He would come for you, he would.

• 6:37Jessie Ware?

  But I wouldn't offend one of his waiters.

• 6:39Speaker 03

  And he wouldn't do that. And he also, he really loves the people who work for him, you know. And he, so he has Manetta Tavern, which is basically. Very American steaks and you know roasted chicken and great oysters and he's he's a really he really cares about food and it's also a great atmosphere and I like Balthazar which is you know a great kind of event place and for breakfast I go to Saint Ambrose because I

• 7:08Speaker 02

  Where's that?

• 7:09Speaker 03

  It's a it's a Milanese you know cafe which opened in it's on the Upper East Side but it's um it's like being Milan you know you walk in and there are all the cakes and the pastries and then you go in the back and you can have a risotto. I don't usually go there except for breakfast so I don't know about the food. I like going to the Carlisle when I'm uptown again when I

• 7:31Speaker 02

  Carlisle

• 7:32Speaker 03

  That bar

• 7:32Speaker 02

  Oh my god

• 7:33Speaker 03

  The best bar

• 7:34Jessie Ware?

  I wanna sing in the Carlisle one day

• 7:36Speaker 03

  Why don't you?

• 7:36Jessie Ware?

  I would love to

• 7:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, what I love about the Carlisle is you go down there and you see somebody who's even older than me

• 7:45Speaker 03

  Hmm

• 7:45Speaker 02

  Kind of come downstairs

• 7:46Speaker 03

  You're not old anyway

• 7:47Speaker 02

  I'm very old Dark glasses on

• 7:49Speaker 03

  Yeah

• 7:50Speaker 02

  And they live in the Carlisle or something and they come down they say what would you like and they'll say I'll have my regular

• 7:56Speaker 03

  Yeah

• 7:57Speaker 02

  And they all know what you're drinking and the snacks are really great there and the cocktails are the best

• 8:04Speaker 03

  Yeah, really good and that bar is great and also

• 8:06Speaker 02

  That bar is gorgeous

• 8:07Speaker 03

  The murals on the wall you know the best by Benelens yeah

• 8:10Speaker 02

  And the floor that that black and white I love it

• 8:14Speaker 03

  And where else do we eat but then mostly you know when I travel either to New York or to LA I eat a lot in people's homes you know so it's nice just to eat and even in New York

• 8:25Speaker 02

  But they don't cook a lot there

• 8:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, really do you find that

• 8:28Speaker 02

  People aren't big cooks. People have a lot more takeaway and

• 8:31Speaker 03

  Yeah

• 8:31Speaker 02

  And yeah, I find it quite astonishing. People aren't big cooks there

• 8:36Speaker 03

  We went to the have you been to Bar Piti?

• 8:38Speaker 02

  Yes, I love it in New York. It's my favorite

• 8:41Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's great, isn't it?

• 8:42Speaker 02

  I love it, love it, love it, yeah

• 8:45Speaker 03

  And also the Waverly Inn I really like. Uh Grayden Carter you know who was the editor of Vanity Fair he he bought the Waverly Inn and I think it's it's really good

• 8:53Speaker 02

  Yeah

• 8:54Speaker 03

  Because that's a kind of you know and I like having the kind of food that you have in America you know in the States it's so it's it's a kind of fun to eat that kind of food

• 9:06Speaker 02

  Yeah, it is

• 9:07Jessie Ware?

  Having a bit of food.

• 9:08Speaker 03

  Uh, very little.

• 9:09Jessie Ware?

  Okay.

• 9:09Speaker 03

  Cause I had a late breakfast, so just really, or I don't have to have any food.

• 9:14Jessie Ware?

  Well, I'd love for you to have a little bit, but but I'm also very aware that you are you and. I have done Marbè chicken.

• 9:23Speaker 03

  Great.

• 9:24Jessie Ware?

  Okay, fine.

• 9:25Speaker 03

  Fantastic.

• 9:25Jessie Ware?

  Fine, cause it's hard to know what to cook for you, do you know what I mean?

• 9:29Speaker 03

  I was just asked if um, you know, and I'm sure you get this, oh, I couldn't, you know, what do you feel, I said, people say. I couldn't cook for you, I'm scared to cook for you or whatever. And I say, I'm the easiest person to cook for, cause I'm so appreciative of somebody actually cooking for me.

• 9:43Speaker 02

  If you were at home though, making just an easy Sunday lunch, what would you, would you make an, would you, would it be like the River?

• 9:50Speaker 03

  Yeah, we, yeah, it would. It's my, it's my language. And so I don't go home and then make something. I'd make, you know, I make French food, you know, so. So we have, you know, an onion soup or we'll make um, I love il flottant, you know, the, you know.

• 10:06Speaker 03

  It's a dessert where you make the, you you poach the egg, you whip the egg whites and then you poach them in milk.

• 10:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 10:12Speaker 03

  And then you use the milk to make the custard, it's kind of creme anglaise.

• 10:15Jessie Ware?

  Oh, it's a floating, yeah, okay, got it, got it, got it.

• 10:18Speaker 03

  Yeah, so I use the French, floating island, or it's called uffalanege, and so we do.

• 10:23Jessie Ware?

  And that's what you're gonna do, like, when you.

• 10:25Speaker 03

  No.

• 10:25Jessie Ware?

  Get, no, that's for when, if we were coming around.

• 10:28Speaker 03

  You said for a Sunday lunch, if I was cooking, you know, at home, but I I cook Italian food. We have a lot of pasta, we have. You know, my, our go to pasta, we just say is um, you know, pasta with tomato sauce, you know, with all the. Various pastas you can have, I always go back to the simple ones.

• 10:45Jessie Ware?

  And what would be, what would be your pasta of choice?

• 10:47Speaker 03

  Uh, I do taglerrini pasta, I do a kind of thin. I really like the Cipriani brand of pasta. I don't know if you use them, they're horrendously expensive, but they're really well done. And they come in boxes, and so the taglerrini is is really good.

• 11:02Jessie Ware?

  And you're not just gonna ask one of the chefs, you're just not gonna, you know what, I'm just gonna take some of the pasta from River Cafe.

• 11:07Speaker 03

  No, I don't take, I really try not, I don't, I end up taking food, but if I know I'm doing something and I want the River Cafe to cook. The food there, that I will, but I, I don't really take food home from there that's like, you know. Been cooked. So, I mean, sometimes on a Saturday or Sunday, if I'm home, I'll say if there's any vegetables or. Or cooked beans, something that I might not do, but generally, I don't take food home.

• 11:35Speaker 02

  Got all your cookbooks. And the blue one is one of my favorites.

• 11:39Speaker 03

  That was our very first.

• 11:42Speaker 02

  And I love the silver one as well.

• 11:44Speaker 03

  What do you love about it?

• 11:45Speaker 02

  I just like, I like the simplicity of it, that it's good ingredients. But not so complicated that you can't manage it. Although I don't, we were talking about chocolate nemesis. And whether that was everybody's nemesis.

• 11:59Speaker 03

  Well, Julian Barnes wrote a piece and it was really funny. You should, really you should Google it. He wrote a piece about the nemesis and it was something like, you know. There, there was a time in the nineties when you walked into any house and any dinner party that was being given and you saw this splodge of chocolate.

• 12:18Speaker 03

  Nobody could make it work.

• 12:20Speaker 02

  No one could make it work.

• 12:21Speaker 03

  I say to people now, I say, you know, give, give me a break. It was our first cookbook, you know, which is very professional. But we, it, it did work, but we just, it's very big. And then, um, we in both, in all the following books, I think the easy book has one, easy nemesis. And certainly the thirty has it.

• 12:39Jessie Ware?

  Oh, there's an easy nemesis.

• 12:41Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah, but also they are, it is an easy cake to make. But I think we just did it in such a big tin and, and it does work. You can make the nemesis from that, that recipe.

• 12:52Speaker 02

  I think all of your recipes, the simplicity of them is the attraction for me.

• 12:56Jessie Ware?

  Oh, thank you.

• 12:57Speaker 02

  And it's, I think it's just delicious ingredients. Like you mentioned, using a special pasta and it's worth buying it.

• 13:03Speaker 03

  I think that, you know, they don't have to be expensive ingredients. I mean, ingredients now, like good or bad, everything is expensive. But I think that if you're making something very simple, like a pasta with tomato. And we would say, you know, use the best pasta you can find, use the best tomato and olive oil and then you're there. You know, it can be very simple.

• 13:26Jessie Ware?

  Sorry, I've.

• 13:26Speaker 03

  Wow, this is exciting.

• 13:28Jessie Ware?

  Is this too much?

• 13:29Speaker 03

  No, that is perfect.

• 13:30Jessie Ware?

  Fine, mom, is that you?

• 13:31Speaker 02

  Delicious.

• 13:31Speaker 03

  Um, tell me about what this is. Go on.

• 13:34Jessie Ware?

  My, my mum thought it was quite funny that I chose to do this because basically I used to do this. Loads when I was younger for dinner parties, but basically so I could prep it the night before. You know what it's like when you're having people over. Otlangi all taught us that like you prep. So anyway, and I it's been so miserable, the weather. Now at least there's like kind of blue skies. I it's actually more of a summary dish, but you've probably you've had Marbella chicken before.

• 13:58Speaker 03

  Tell me about it.

• 13:59Jessie Ware?

  But I just like it.

• 14:00Speaker 03

  So how did you make it?

• 14:01Jessie Ware?

  Oh god, I just put bunged everything in.

• 14:03Speaker 03

  No, go on, tell me how you made it.

• 14:04Jessie Ware?

  Alright, eight cloves, uh ten cloves of garlic, oregano that had so much frost on it from outside. Um bay leaves, um olives, capers, apricots, prunes. Um wine, wine cup goes today. I actually, I don't know if I've put enough brown sugar on, but whatever, because I thought it had so much sweetness anyway. Um capers, vinegar, olive oil, delicious, easy. And mixture of thighs and breast, because last time I made it, it was quite dry. And with the the breast, because I overcooked it. Anyway, I I think I put more sauce in. But and then um and then I realised, because we always serve it with pesto rice. It's just been a thing that we've done as a family.

• 14:42Speaker 03

  So, yeah.

• 14:43Jessie Ware?

  But I realised, why am I doing pesto when I've got Ruthie Rogers here?

• 14:47Speaker 03

  No, no, no.

• 14:48Jessie Ware?

  So I made some pesto yesterday and I've shoved it in with basmati. It's not a risotto.

• 14:51Speaker 03

  So excited to do this.

• 14:53Jessie Ware?

  And um and then with just a herb salad. Um but um I just quite like it because it's quite peppy and it kind of gets the back of your throat.

• 15:01Speaker 03

  Kind of also comforting, isn't it?

• 15:02Jessie Ware?

  Yeah, it is, it is.

• 15:04Speaker 03

  We want to eat.

• 15:04Jessie Ware?

  It is. So um can we start at the beginning, Ruthie?

• 15:08Speaker 03

  Sure.

• 15:09Jessie Ware?

  You were born in New York?

• 15:11Speaker 03

  Mm hmm, upstate New York. I was born in a town called Woodstock.

• 15:14Jessie Ware?

  Oh, yes.

• 15:15Speaker 03

  I know, I used to say I was just come from a small town in upstate New York and then I could say Woodstock. And I went my last, I went to the local school. And then my last two years of high school, eleventh and twelfth grade, I went to um school on a ranch in Colorado. It was like a very progressive school.

• 15:32Jessie Ware?

  Wow.

• 15:33Speaker 03

  We all had to kind of clean out the stables and cook in the morning and then, yeah, and then.

• 15:37Jessie Ware?

  Were your parents progressive?

• 15:38Speaker 03

  Very. Yeah, my my parents were very, I mean, not not not, no, no, not in that way at all. No, I have to correct that. They were, they were, my father was a doctor, my mother was a teacher and librarian, we, you know, it was kind of that. But they, politically, they were. I thought they were pretty far to the left, especially in America, so.

• 16:00Jessie Ware?

  And who was around the dinner table?

• 16:02Speaker 03

  Um, well, in Woodstock, it was just my family. Um, I have an older brother who's a writer and a sister who's an artist. And so the family meals were very geared around family stories. I came from a kind of family. My, you know, my grandparents were immigrants who arrived from Russia and Hungary and, um.

• 16:23Jessie Ware?

  Oh, you're Jewish?

• 16:24Speaker 03

  A hundred percent, yeah.

• 16:25Jessie Ware?

  So are we.

• 16:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, uh-huh.

• 16:27Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 16:28Speaker 03

  And so I think that there was a lot of talk, you know, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, that was the food. That was the food. And, um, my grandma was, my grandmother on my father's side was apparently, was, I didn't really know if I was a really great cook and a kind of force. And she, she'd come with her own rolling pin.

• 16:52Speaker 03

  But my mother had, for her only male grandson, my mother, she came up to visit and my mother said, do you want to come and see the baby? And she said, no, let's eat first. So there you go.

• 17:06Speaker 03

  Food was, um.

• 17:07Jessie Ware?

  Let's eat.

• 17:08Speaker 03

  But, um, and then I grew up in Woodstock, went to school Colorado, and then I went to, um, college in Vermont. And then I came, then I came.

• 17:18Jessie Ware?

  What did you study?

• 17:19Speaker 03

  I studied, you know, liberal arts education, you know, in America, so with a, with a major in English.

• 17:26Jessie Ware?

  So what was memorable dish from your childhood?

• 17:29Speaker 03

  Well, funnily enough, I would say that a memorable, for me, when I think about growing up in Woodstock in the country, it would be corn on the cob. Because we lived in a rural area and there were a lot of cornfields, a lot of cornfields, and they had markets.

• 17:47Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 17:47Speaker 03

  Right, where the, where the farms were. It wasn't like now you had these kind of farm to table. It wasn't as sophisticated that. It's just simply that you could go and buy the corn. And so I just, I still have a memory when I bite into an ear of corn. Of growing up in the summer and having that, you know, I also remember picking blueberries. I remember, uh, my mother's pot roast, you know? And I remember cheesecake, but I think mostly it's the.

• 18:15Speaker 03

  The memories of food and community and talk and family and occasions was more than. And there were a lot of artists. When I, my parents moved to Woodstock, it was an artist community. And so there were a lot of artists. And then Bob Dylan came there, you were just saying, and it became.

• 18:35Jessie Ware?

  Did you see him?

• 18:36Speaker 03

  Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I used to see him around. And I would say that my friend Libby and I were, after school, we used to go to this place called The Bear, which is a cafe. We were doing our homework. We had a test the next day and Bob Dylan sent over a note saying, would you two like to come? And see the band rehearse. We're going from here to there.

• 18:55Jessie Ware?

  Oh, my God.

• 18:56Speaker 03

  And we wrote him back a note saying, no, we have a test tomorrow.

• 19:01Speaker 03

  No, I don't know. Not, not, not.

• 19:04Jessie Ware?

  Biggest regret of your life, Ruth? Did you pass the test with flying colors?

• 19:08Speaker 03

  I don't think so.

• 19:09Jessie Ware?

  Ruthie, you, the River Cafe is beloved, like by everybody. When you get a whiff of the guest list or the reservations, have you sometimes been like, you know what? I'm gonna pop in. They're on the list. I'm quite interested to see what they order.

• 19:27Speaker 03

  Yeah, of course. You know, it's nice when you see the list. It could be a writer whose novel you read or, you know, somebody who worked on the COVID vaccine. It can be any, you know, it's not necessarily just a.

• 19:40Jessie Ware?

  Of course.

• 19:40Speaker 03

  I get, I get very excited by, I think we all get excited when a chef comes in, you know. It's all, you know, we all love seeing the movie stars or the, the actors and the right, you know, the directors, film, film people. We, you know, we all love that. The musicians, artists, but when you see somebody who actually works in the same field you do, who is a cook, then you, especially if you really admire them, that means something.

• 20:07Jessie Ware?

  How are you finding doing a podcast?

• 20:09Speaker 03

  Well, I love it, you know. It's.

• 20:11Jessie Ware?

  You're great with, I mean, I understand why you started.

• 20:13Speaker 03

  It's, um, it just is something that happened. I always thought, there's a restaurant in Brooklyn called Roberta's. Have you ever been there? I remember going there twenty years ago, or maybe less, but ten, fifteen years ago. Maybe a long time ago. And they had a radio station. I thought, oh, it's so cool. Maybe we should do River Cafe Radio. And just when people are coming through, they could.

• 20:33Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 20:34Speaker 03

  And then, of course, we didn't do anything. And then who would have thought podcasts would happen? And when COVID, we were all going through that. We closed the River Cafe for a long time, longer than we. Well, there are no guidelines, but we just wanted everybody to be safe, you know. And so we closed it. Then we thought, well, what should we do? And I thought, why don't we just read a recipe every day? Just for three hundred sixty five days a year, we'll just read a recipe. And it was a way of sort of getting to communicate with people who we ate in the restaurant we didn't see. Because we really missed them. And and then when I told this to a friend of mine in New York, he said, that's like not enough. You've got a segue from, you know, recipe to a story.

• 21:17Speaker 03

  And then we did three. We did, we tried it. Luckily, there were three great people.

• 21:23Jessie Ware?

  Who were the three people that you went through your back black book?

• 21:26Speaker 03

  Well, they were just people that were close to me. So I had just really good friends. So we asked Jake Chilinall. He's a friend.

• 21:32Jessie Ware?

  Sure.

• 21:33Speaker 03

  And we asked, I know this is gonna sound obnoxious.

• 21:35Jessie Ware?

  No, I love it. No, it's great.

• 21:37Speaker 03

  And we asked Michael Kane.

• 21:39Jessie Ware?

  Sure.

• 21:40Speaker 03

  And, and because he's in the restaurant every Thursday. You know, we were all at home. Nobody was doing anything. And we asked Wes Anderson, who's a really good friend of mine. And all we asked him to do was to read a recipe. And then, and then we did the interviews. But on that basis, we sold them right away to iHeart Media, Paul Pittman. And then the rest, and then we just started and we did those three. Well, Wes actually did his, we did his later. I think we did. It was a kind of obnoxious list because we did those three and then we did Paul McCartney. And then once we had Wes and Paul and Jake, then we did. Emily Blunt was in town, so we did with her. And then David Beckham, Victoria, did one.

• 22:25Jessie Ware?

  He's, they're hard to get, Ruthie.

• 22:27Speaker 03

  Well, those days, again, it was just, nobody was doing.

• 22:30Jessie Ware?

  No, it's because you're loved and they like your food.

• 22:32Speaker 03

  No, I don't know. I think they would. I always say that it's a bit like when you ask. If I were to say to Beckham, let's talk about football or Paul McCartney, let's talk about the Beatles. But if you say, what was the last recipe your grand, your mother cooked for you before she died? Or they bring it up, or Beckham tells you that his, actually his father or grandfather's Jewish, did you know that?

• 22:53Speaker 02

  Yeah. Stop. Didn't you know?

• 22:56Speaker 03

  And they had, like, in the East End, they had, you know, kind of that, uh, welks and yields and

• 23:02Speaker 02

  Cockle, yeah, prime mash.

• 23:03Speaker 03

  So that whole story, it brings up memories of Nancy Pelosi, I was, I'm a huge, you know, fan of it now, friend, you know, had chocolate, she never, she never ate a meal without, she was Italian, first generation Italian, father was mayor of Baltimore, she never had a meal without a tablecloth.

• 23:23Speaker 03

  So things like that, you know, and she has obsessed by.

• 23:26Speaker 02

  In the whole world.

• 23:27Speaker 03

  I'll show you a picture of her.

• 23:28Speaker 02

  Oh, my God.

• 23:28Speaker 03

  I said, she came over, because we're big supporters of Biden, and I gave her dinner, and she came over to speak, and she's just awesome, you know, it's amazing. Eighty-four, she came Sunday night, she did a thing about her book on Monday lunchtime, did the dinner at our house on Monday night and flew back Tuesday morning to San Francisco, and she's eighty-two. She's, she's incredible, and such values and, you know, we need those people.

• 23:54Jessie Ware?

  So you came from a Jewish family. It's interesting, because having Nancy Silverton on too, Jewish family.

• 24:00Speaker 03

  Hmm.

• 24:01Jessie Ware?

  Both going to Italian food.

• 24:02Speaker 03

  Well, my parents, I have to say, going back to my parents' politics, although they came from, and always ident, you know, would identify as Jews, they were not, I grew up with no, very little from my parents, um, I had the cultural identity, but, you know, we didn't have, you know.

• 24:20Speaker 02

  Did you go to synagogue, temple?

• 24:22Speaker 03

  No, no.

• 24:23Jessie Ware?

  Do you go now?

• 24:24Speaker 03

  No, no, I don't, I, I feel, I, you know, this is another story, but I go to, you know, I really enjoy knowing about the holidays or, you know, my friends celebrating Passover, going to a seder.

• 24:37Jessie Ware?

  So, and you were saying about your mum and, and the food, so was there an Italian influence then?

• 24:41Speaker 03

  No, it was only when I came to England and I met Richard's mother.

• 24:47Jessie Ware?

  Your, your husband?

• 24:48Speaker 03

  Because I grew, oh, yeah, sorry, Richard Rogers' mother, who da, uh, died a guy Ringo, she was born, who, Richard was, Richard was born in Florence, and although his name is Rogers.

• 24:58Speaker 02

  Oh, he was Italian?

• 25:00Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah, a hundred percent.

• 25:01Speaker 02

  I didn't know.

• 25:01Speaker 03

  His father and his mother, the Rogers family was his great-great-grandfather, but who was, came from the North, and then they all went on that kind of, you know, tour, the English, the, the European tour, lived in Greece, and then subsequently, everybody was married to an Italian, and so he was Italian.

• 25:22Speaker 03

  Richard's mother was born in Trieste. And they met in Trieste. And then they moved to Florence and Richard was born in Florence. And then during the war, they came to London. Because he'd always kept his British passport, my father-in-law. And so when they had to get out because of Mussolini, they came here. And she came, she'd come from a kind of aristocratic Italian family in Trieste. And probably had never been in the kitchen. But when she came here during the war, that was what she learned to do. And she learned to cook and she was a phenomenal cook. She taught both me. And because Rose Gray knew Richard before I knew him, they'd been to school together. Um, she taught Rose, she taught Wendy Foster.

• 26:04Speaker 03

  She was the kind of Italian cook at Wimbledon and Cheem. And so a generation of, so she really taught me. She taught me Italian food. And then Rose went to live in Italy. So we met over our love for Italian food.

• 26:19Speaker 02

  Do you spend time in Italy?

• 26:21Speaker 03

  A lot, yeah.

• 26:22Speaker 02

  Have you got a house there?

• 26:23Speaker 03

  We have more family in Italy in a way than we have here. Um, no, we don't have a house. But we go to the same house for the last 25 years.

• 26:31Speaker 02

  Where do you go?

• 26:31Speaker 03

  We rented in, um, it's called the Val d'Orcia. And it's an area between, um, it's an hour and a half north of Rome and an hour and a half south of Florence. So it's between Pienza, Montepulciano and, um, Montalcino, that area. It's an incredible, almost a desert landscape. There's no wine, really, well, very little wine. Multiple, well, yeah, when you get to Montepulciano, you get to Siena, or you get to Montalcino, there's great, great wine. But this area between them has very, very little trees, very little vegetation. Um, it has a beautiful mountain called Mount Ammiata. So there is green, but it has a big sky, which I love. And, um, so we've been going there since 1993.

• 27:25Speaker 00

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• 28:00Jessie Ware?

  Whilst you two carry on talking, I'm just going to get out some of the delicious puddings that we did, well, we basically said if Ruffey Rogers is coming, I'm being cheeky, but I'm getting a River Cafe Pudd.

• 28:12Speaker 03

  I didn't even know you asked for them.

• 28:13Jessie Ware?

  Oh.

• 28:13Speaker 03

  It was, I called up this morning and said, can we bring some cakes?

• 28:16Jessie Ware?

  Oh my God, I love you. Thank you. Thank you.

• 28:20Speaker 03

  I said to them, would you make a polenta cake, you know? Either make a polenta cake, because I didn't think of it until quite late. And so I'm sorry that you, well, we had the same thing on our mind.

• 28:28Jessie Ware?

  Please, no, it was me being audacious.

• 28:30Speaker 03

  And then, well, I never knew. And then I said, well, you know what? Instead of making a polenta cake, why don't you bring two lemon tart, two nemesis, and I hope two almond tart? So I don't know, we'll see what they pack.

• 28:40Jessie Ware?

  Thank you. Well, I'm just going to get a few on a plate and just kind of, yeah, absolutely.

• 28:45Speaker 02

  So if you were going to go to a desert island, not death row, because I can't bear the thought of it.

• 28:50Speaker 03

  No, I agree with you. When people ask me my death row recipe, I always say, why would I eat? And why do I want to think about?

• 28:55Speaker 02

  So if you were going to a desert island for six months, and you had to choose a meal that you'd like to remember, what would it be?

• 29:05Speaker 03

  What time of year is it?

• 29:07Speaker 02

  Whenever you want to be.

• 29:08Speaker 03

  Well, let's choose, should we choose the autumn or should we choose the summer? What would be, what would you rather have?

• 29:14Jessie Ware?

  I love how specific you're, no one has gone seasonal and thought about that. Ruffey, how many years have we been doing this for, like seven?

• 29:20Speaker 03

  Seven years.

• 29:21Jessie Ware?

  I love, you do, you can do any season.

• 29:24Speaker 02

  So why would you choose autumn particularly?

• 29:26Speaker 03

  Well, I think autumn, you know, we all love. I love every season. I do think that there is a quality to every season. But I think for being a cook, the autumn is an incredible season to have. In the summer, you have the joy of the, you know, the peaches, you have the joy of the tomatoes. Actually, as I'm describing summer, I'm really liking summer. You have peas, you have asparagus. So maybe we should talk about summer food. But I think in the autumn, when you have, um, you know, the, the boilotti beans, you still, you have the boilotti, you have artichokes, you have pumpkins, you have, uh, game, which I love.

• 30:04Speaker 03

  You have grouse, you have partridge, you have pheasant, you have chestnuts, you have walnuts, you know, fresh walnuts, fresh chestnuts. And so I think, and most of all, in November, you have the olive oil, you know. And so there's something about cooking in those seasons when you really have time to slow cook ingredients. You can make cavolo nero and, um, we do cavolo nero pasta with the cavolo nero puree. That might be one of my meals I'd love to have.

• 30:31Speaker 02

  Cavolo nero puree.

• 30:33Speaker 03

  Um, so it's, it's, you know, the, the exciting thing about autumn is that in November, you have the, the olive oil coming out at the same time as a cavolo nero.

• 30:43Speaker 02

  Where do you get your olive oil from?

• 30:45Speaker 03

  Well, we, we have gone to the five estates or six estates that we work with, with wine in Chianti. So this Selva Piana, this Felsen, this Cappuzana, um, this Fontodi. And we, we go to them because these wine producers also make olive oil. And, uh, we go there. It's, it's actually an interesting thing about the River Cafe is that from the very beginning, we wanted to expose the people who work for us, the real ingredients of, uh, cooking of Italy. So in the, in the early days, we would take three or four people to Italy on a trip. When Rose and I went to taste the new wine and also to choose the olive oil.

• 31:28Speaker 03

  We would take two or three or four chefs. Now we take almost thirty. So there, so what we have to do is we take ten or twelve, maybe twelve, to Tuscany. And then the next year, you get to go to Piemonte. And so those are the two trips. And the idea is that you will have worked in the River Cafe for two years or a year and a half. And it is a kind of, it's something everybody really wants to do. It's, it's very, you know, it costs quite a lot. It's, it's, it's, uh, it's intense because we work quite hard. We get it quite early in the morning. You get in a, in a little van and you drive to the wine estate, say, Capinsana. And then we go in and they, they talk to us all about the wine.

• 32:13Speaker 03

  And then you see the process. You see the olive trees. You see the olives. You see the, the press. You see the oil. You taste the oil. And then we go in and they always cook us lunch. And so it's, it's a, and then you go to another one. So it's quite, just when you finish lunch, you get back in the van and then you go again to another estate. And you do the same. And then you have dinner. So, and then you get it the next morning. It takes two days, two and a half days. But they come back so inspired. And you know, you, when you pick up a bottle of olive oil and you've seen it go through the process, um, you treat it differently. You realize why it is kind of so special.

• 32:51Speaker 02

  It's special. So you're going to have cavolo nero?

• 32:55Speaker 03

  Yeah, we could do that. We could have the cavolo nero. And we might do, we do it with, um, we can do it with a pasta, a fresh, uh, papadelli or a fresh tagatelli.

• 33:05Jessie Ware?

  I've made a, I've made a meal of your, your almond. I'm sorry.

• 33:09Speaker 03

  No, it's perfect.

• 33:10Jessie Ware?

  It's so beautiful, but it did kind of fall apart. I'm sorry.

• 33:13Speaker 03

  This is an almond tart that I learned to make when I lived in Paris. And there was a restaurant called Benoit. And it's, it's, we make it all year round, not with pears, but we make, it's the almond, um.

• 33:26Speaker 02

  Is it like a frangipan?

• 33:28Speaker 03

  It is a frangipan. It's ground almonds. It's butter, sugar, ground almonds and eggs. And that's kind of it, a bit of vanilla. And then we, in the season, I like it most with pears because I think the pears cut the sweetness of the almond. But we make it in the summer with raspberries or strawberries on the top. We do it with apricots sometimes, but the pear is in season right now.

• 33:52Jessie Ware?

  These are delicious. I've just gone dug into the almond cake, which is the most moist, delicious, beautiful thing. I do have cream, but I don't feel, I don't.

• 34:01Speaker 02

  No, you don't.

• 34:02Jessie Ware?

  Okay, fine. I didn't wanna be blasphemous.

• 34:03Speaker 03

  Oh, no, we don't make cream. Well, this one, we always serve with crème fraîche.

• 34:07Jessie Ware?

  I've got crème fraîche as well.

• 34:08Speaker 02

  That is.

• 34:09Jessie Ware?

  I feel like, okay, would you, would you, I'll put a dollop of crème fraîche on the side.

• 34:13Speaker 03

  Only if you wanna, I'm, I'm not gonna have nemesis, but I'll try this.

• 34:16Speaker 02

  So what, do you have your starter, or are you starting with the pasta?

• 34:19Speaker 03

  Yeah, I start with the pasta. I love starting a meal with the pasta.

• 34:22Speaker 02

  And then?

• 34:23Speaker 03

  And then I might just do a lot of vegetables. I love following a pasta. When I have people over very often, I'll start with the pasta, um, then have, um, well, sometimes I do.

• 34:39Speaker 03

  Langoustine, which I'd love langoustine.

• 34:41Speaker 02

  How do, how do you like to cook them?

• 34:43Speaker 03

  I'm not too keen sometimes on the kind of first course, main course and dessert thing. So I, I like starting with the pasta and then bringing to the table. Kobe's amounts of roasted pumpkin, um, fresh, you know, cannellini beans. Uh, and always a green braised spinach or braised, but I love it.

• 35:01Speaker 02

  Do you get fresh cannellini beans?

• 35:03Speaker 03

  You can buy them in tourist, yeah, yeah, yeah, and bollotti. So if it was in the autumn, we'd have a cavolo nero pasta. And then because they're really, um, we'd have langoustine, which would be, uh, you, you split, we split them. Lot, and then we roast them. So we put a bit of oregano and dried chili on them. And you put them in the oven, they come out and they're just very clean. Well, not very long, about ten minutes, you know, in a hot oven. And then, um, you'd have those on the table and then we'd have probably, I'd like to have vegetables cooked in different ways. So I'd probably roast, um, pumpkin, um, or vealletta squash. And then we would have, um, they're really nice winter tomatoes you can get from Sicily.

• 35:46Speaker 03

  And we have those very hard tomatoes that you only get in the winter. Cause we don't do tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes in, except in the summer. Uh, but these are really interesting. And then we might have, um, slow, you know, slow cooked fennel, which is in season right now.

• 36:01Speaker 02

  I love fennel.

• 36:01Speaker 03

  And then olive oil, maybe just do spinach. So with the langoustine, you would just have these vegetables. And then for dessert, my favorite dessert would definitely be ice cream. I just love to end a meal with ice cream and actually my favorite ice cream is probably. Pistachio or vanilla. I love vanilla ice cream.

• 36:23Speaker 02

  And do you put the olive oil on the top?

• 36:25Speaker 03

  No, I don't do things like that. I mean, I think it's probably really good, but very well, I don't know, recently a chef, one I. I thought it was in New York and they said, try this Ruthie, it was vanilla ice cream with olive oil, but I'm a bit. Old school, so I don't do that.

• 36:39Speaker 02

  Pistachio ice cream and vanilla ice cream, probably the.

• 36:42Speaker 03

  We do a very dark caramel as well, but I love ending a meal with ice cream.

• 36:47Speaker 02

  Do you eat ice cream every day?

• 36:48Speaker 03

  Probably, yeah.

• 36:49Speaker 02

  I love it too.

• 36:51Speaker 03

  And they don't even ask me when I go as, you know, to the river cafe, they just.

• 36:55Speaker 02

  You just need a little, don't you?

• 36:58Speaker 02

  A little tiny bit and it's great. What are you drinking?

• 37:01Speaker 03

  Friend of mine, uh, uh, son, actually, I actually won't mind if I met, but you know, Greta Gerwig, who directed. She's a really good friend of mine and Noah have a son, no, come back, have a son called Harold and. I said, Harold, do you like ice cream? Have some ice cream. He said, I I don't like ice cream with you. It's too cold. I said, well, what can we do about that?

• 37:24Speaker 03

  So, um.

• 37:25Speaker 02

  What are you drinking with that?

• 37:27Speaker 03

  Well, with the ice cream or with the whole meal.

• 37:31Speaker 02

  What do you start with? Do you like an aperitif?

• 37:34Speaker 03

  I love an aperitif, yeah. I was saying that I would have probably five years ago said, I'd love a Negroni, I'd love a dry martini. I love Cosmopolitan, but I really, since I lived, I had to live in Mexico. I didn't have to, but I I did have to because my husband. Had an accident there and so I lived in Mexico City for four months and um, I was just blown away by tequila. You know, and I had tequila, I don't, what you really, the great thing about tequila in Mexico is that you don't, you you you drink it with the meal. And so you don't have a tequila and then go on to wine.

• 38:09Speaker 02

  Do you drink it neat?

• 38:10Speaker 03

  So, yeah, so you just get a little shot of tequila and I can drink tequila through, I even. Uh, an Italian meal, I just really, it doesn't go down well with my wine department, the River Cafe, so I don't, but I. I really love starting a meal with just a.

• 38:26Speaker 02

  What, with ice, just on ice?

• 38:27Speaker 03

  No, I just have a shot. I used to say, I would use say margarita. I guess in the summer I'd have margarita, but I just love tequila.

• 38:34Speaker 02

  Are you friends with Alison Roman?

• 38:36Speaker 03

  Uh, no, I don't know her.

• 38:37Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. She was going to go to your restaurant.

• 38:40Speaker 03

  Yeah, was she?

• 38:41Speaker 02

  She came to, don't you remember?

• 38:46Speaker 02

  Yeah, but she says, and I think it's great, if you have a dinner party. Make a big jug of margaritas.

• 38:53Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 38:53Speaker 02

  And give people margaritas. And I tried it once. Everyone wouldn't have cared what I'd made for dinner. They loved. They were happy, they enjoyed life, the dinner was great.

• 39:04Speaker 03

  Kathleen Tyne, and you know, she was a great woman and writer, and her husband was a playwright and critic, Kent Tyne, and died. And I said that I would do the party after the funeral at our house. And Joan Buck, who's then the editor of French Vogue and other friends, she had a lot of really sort of great friends. And um, she said, well, what are you gonna have, Ruthie? And I said, well, we'll have, you know, red wine, white wine, champagne, whatever. And she's looked at me, she said, Ruthie, I'm gonna tell you something. And this was in nineteen, maybe nineteen two. Never give a party without margaritas.

• 39:43Speaker 03

  Whether it's a funeral, a wedding, a birthday. I think, and so since nineteen ninety two, I've never given a party without margaritas. So there you go.

• 39:52Jessie Ware?

  I love that.

• 39:53Speaker 03

  I like that kind of advice, don't you?

• 39:55Jessie Ware?

  I love that. And can I ask you, when you um, married your late husband, what, what was on the menu?

• 40:02Speaker 03

  Oh, of our, our wedding?

• 40:03Jessie Ware?

  Yeah.

• 40:04Speaker 03

  Well, we, we were married in, in my parents' later house in Long Island. So they're on, on the water, on the Long Island Sound. And we went, it was like one of those old, you know, nineteen forty movies where they get in the car and they go to the, the uh, justice of the peace in their house. And you know, we sort of like, we weren't eloping, but with my parents, it was very small, and my sister and brother and a few friends. And we went into this kind of little one-story little house. And the man came out and he and his wife married us around their fireplace. It was very sweet. It was really sweet. And um, then we went back home and we had lobsters, you know, because where, you know, the Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean has very good lobster. Just grill them? We boil them. Boil them?

• 40:48Speaker 03

  Boil and split and then, uh, what do we have? We had just a lot of greens. We had oysters to start with. Oh, no, we didn't have oysters. We had clams. And it was in, uh, we got married in November. So I think we probably had, I can't really remember the greens, but we probably had, you know, spinach and lobsters are so, they're so big there. That, you know, you really get this huge lobster dough here in America. And, um, and then Philip Johnson, who's an architect, who taught, who was the head of the Yale School of Architecture. And built, you know, the Missus Van der Rohe, the Seagram Building and the Museum of Modern Art. He's a great, um, kind of father of architecture, would always take us to a restaurant called The Four Seasons.

• 41:30Speaker 03

  In the Seagram Building, not the hotel, but it's called The Four Seasons. And it was the kind of chic, most chic place you could go to in New York. And so he sent us, um, a chocolate cake from The Four Seasons for dessert, which is really amazing. And, um, and it was, yeah, it was beautiful. It was nice. It was in nineteen seventy-three, so quite a long time ago. Yeah.

• 41:52Jessie Ware?

  Ruthie, before we let you go, um, it's a pleasure to have you over and listen to your stories. You are such a good storyteller. And, and this, you may have already answered this with the corn on the cob, but is there a nostalgic taste that can transport you back somewhere?

• 42:06Speaker 03

  Well, I would say that for Italy and for Florence, I think when I have the new olive oil. And I have it on a piece of bruschetta and it's the best piece of bread with grilled, it's the right, you know, way you'd have. You know, sea salt on it, um, molten salt on it. Oh, and then the new oil. I'm transported to the first time I had it, which was with Richard when we arrived. The first time I went to Italy with him. And we went to this little place in Florence and we were served that and I kept saying, there's something else on this. You know, because the olive oil was so peppery and it was just, it was so, and it was only three ingredients.

• 42:46Speaker 03

  It was just the bread, the olive oil and, um, a bit of hint of garlic. So I think when I ever ate that, I'm transported to that moment with Richard.

• 42:54Jessie Ware?

  You've met the most amazing people.

• 42:56Speaker 02

  Through the River Cafe, probably through Richard as well. Who would you have at a dinner party, alive or dead now? If you could have your best dinner party?

• 43:08Speaker 03

  Ted, Ted, I'd have dinner with Richard.

• 43:11Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 43:11Speaker 03

  Yeah, the two of us, that'd be my dinner party. Somebody said to me the other day that he'd met somebody and she was living in Hong Kong. He said, Ruthie, it's kind of a long distance relationship. And I said, that's what I have.

• 43:24Speaker 02

  Oh, he's still there.

• 43:26Speaker 03

  Yeah, we're just long distance.

• 43:28Speaker 02

  How long is it since he passed?

• 43:29Speaker 03

  Two years, yeah. No, we're good, we're good, we're good. I've had an amazing family of thirteen grandchildren and I have my family and I have my friends and I have the River Cafe and have you and I have you. So I have Sophia and you, we're all, it's a life, we're good.

• 43:45Jessie Ware?

  Thank you so much for coming on. Good luck with the new M series.

• 43:48Speaker 02

  Do you know, you're so calming, we've not even argued.

• 43:51Jessie Ware?

  I know. You've actually been like conflict resolution. We're all peaceful and serene now.

• 43:56Speaker 03

  It's beautiful to be here, it's what it really was like. Thank you for asking me.

• 44:00Jessie Ware?

  Oh my God, such a fan. And I can't wait to let you know next time I'm in River Cafe and eat a bowl of ice cream with you.

• 44:08Speaker 02

  I'd love to come, yeah.

• 44:09Speaker 03

  Just let me know when.

• 44:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'd love to.

• 44:10Speaker 03

  Come every day.

• 44:25Jessie Ware?

  Ruthie Rogers, what?

• 44:28Speaker 02

  Alleged.

• 44:29Jessie Ware?

  Alleged.

• 44:30Speaker 02

  Absolutely alleged.

• 44:31Jessie Ware?

  She is fabulous, she is generous, she is cool, warm, just a very good storyteller.

• 44:40Speaker 02

  Knows so much about food, but all the people she's met who've crossed that that threshold at River Cafe. Um, it's, it's fantastic. She was a treasure chest of food information and stories.

• 44:54Jessie Ware?

  I loved hearing her stories. I could have had her for, well, a full season, to be honest.

• 44:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, she has a lovely voice.

• 45:01Jessie Ware?

  Oh, heaven.

• 45:03Speaker 02

  Yeah, a really nice voice.

• 45:04Jessie Ware?

  And so warm, gave me lots of cuddle. And I just loved her.

• 45:07Speaker 02

  Lovely woman.

• 45:08Jessie Ware?

  And lovely, beautiful Sophia who she came with, who's a fan.

• 45:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 45:11Jessie Ware?

  And I got to eat Chocolate Nemesis on a Monday afternoon, so that is great news for me.

• 45:16Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 45:16Jessie Ware?

  Ruthie's podcast, Ruthie's Table Four is out now for a new season and she does have fantastic guests because she knows everyone. She loved my Marbella chicken.

• 45:27Speaker 02

  I know.

• 45:28Jessie Ware?

  It was delicious today.

• 45:29Speaker 02

  It was very good darling, it was really, really good.

• 45:31Jessie Ware?

  You know what, never underestimate the power of the marbels.

• 45:34Speaker 02

  Marbella.

• 45:35Jessie Ware?

  And then thanks to Ruthie for bringing delicious, delicious puds. And shout out to River Cafe and the gorgeous chefs that will be listening and that I can't remember your names. And I feel very bad about that, that's really shit of me. I apologise, but you're gorgeous and I'll see you soon and then you can spit in my food because I forgot your names. All right, we'll see you next week.