Bonus: Lemons

Ruthie is joined by Sian Owen and Joseph Trivelli, the River Cafe executive chefs, to talk about her latest book Squeeze Me, a collaboration with Ed Ruscha, celebrating lemons with photographs and River Cafe recipes.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Today, we're here to celebrate our new cookbook which is
called Squeeze Me Lenman Recipes and Art by Ruthie Rogers
and Ed Rusche, published by Rizzoli. I'm here with Sean
Manowen and Joseph Travelli, the executive chefs of the River Cafe,
to discuss their favorite recipes, their memories of the recipes,

(00:26):
and cooking with lemons every day. Squeeze Me really happened
because Ed Ruche is an old friend. I think he's,
you know, if I can say, America's greatest artist, or
maybe the greatest artist working today, and someone that I've
always admired. He did a menu for us when we
were doing the River Cafe thirty book, which was a

(00:49):
happy birthday book. We asked our favorite artist to do
something on each menu and Ed did his word, which
is called yum. And we've had and I always thought,
let's do a book together because a lot of his
work involves books. He's done books as a young artist
and continue to do so. And he said, okay, I'll

(01:10):
do a book with you, Ruthy. If it has only
fifty recipes, it's short.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
And it has one ingredient.

Speaker 1 (01:18):
So it was on a visit to his studio in
La which is actually quite an industrial area, and we
walked into the back of this kind of almost like
a warehouse, almost a factory, and there were, you know,
thirty or forty lemon trees. And so we hit on
the idea of doing a book with recipes from the
River Cafe about Lemons. He said he would do the art,

(01:43):
which he uses words as we know, so he would
do the words, and Heather I've who's a poet, helped
him with that, and then the Office of Love from
Johnny Ives's office to the graphic design.

Speaker 3 (01:56):
I think it's a book that is kind of fun.

Speaker 1 (02:00):
You know, if you read it, there are quotes from W. C.
Fields a ground show marks and from Heather Eye. It
has no pictures of food, but it has our recipes
in it.

Speaker 3 (02:12):
And so I thought today.

Speaker 1 (02:13):
Instead of me telling you about the book, it would
be good to have Sean and Joseph talk about the recipes,
about the visuals, about the joy and about Lemons.

Speaker 4 (02:24):
So who starting to use yellow as well, because normally
the River Cafe is so pink and blue. We kind
of us a lot of luminous pink with a lot
of bright blue, and so the yellow is fun for
us all it feels like a break break from the pink.
We're really embracing yellow.

Speaker 2 (02:41):
I'm yellow.

Speaker 3 (02:42):
So what do you feel?

Speaker 2 (02:43):
What do you like to say about the book?

Speaker 4 (02:45):
I was thinking as you were talking. My first reaction
about the lemon, as you were just describing using one ingredient,
was that it's just one of the few ingredients because
it's all broken down parts and you know, use the
whole lemon, so you can use the pith. You can
use the skin, the pith, the juice, the flesh, and

(03:06):
then at the end you're going to the pit you
do with the pip so you can plant it and
plant another lemon tree. You use a whole lemon, and
it's not like I mean, you could use a whole tomato.
But somehow when you're left with just the pit, Yeah,
you can use it in different ways, can't you. Each
part has its own purpose almost, And what I think
is cool about your book is that it's got lemons

(03:29):
used in ways that aren't just conventional lemon ways. And
that's what I think it's quite fun about it.

Speaker 5 (03:34):
It's really nice the way it's kind of just arrived
in the restaurant. It's arrived in the restaurant rather like
a box of lemons, you know, like all the things
that come, you know, because lemons don't grow very well
at all around it if you don't have a walled garden.
Or actually there is one outside the front of my
house that I stole from a party here. Yeah, someone
bought like remember empty lemon.

Speaker 1 (03:54):
Remember I had to send mind to Jerman and Wes
Anderson because they have a conservatory because didn't last in
my terrice somehow?

Speaker 5 (04:01):
Is that the front of my friend Guarden's sort We've
got six lemons on my way here, but I don't know. Yeah,
so that's the you know, you've heard of the mouthy
lemons and you can have but they don't grow easy
around here. So when you're these boxes of lemons, and
we obviously by really nice lemons that come, you know,

(04:22):
with even the stickers on the lemons are beautiful, and
then leaves and in this box is really I was
gonna say, out of the world. It's not o the world,
but it's another place, you know what I mean. And
it's always that transports you there. And I feel like
the books have arrived in the restaurant rather in the
same way like you said it was. They're from the
sort of Los Angeles at California, California, and.

Speaker 4 (04:41):
It's kind of you know, in Lemons and the River Cafe.
Right now as in today, we're waiting for the new
season's lemons to arrive, so we're in a bit of
a slightly depressing zone of mind.

Speaker 5 (04:54):
The green lemons actually yeah.

Speaker 4 (04:56):
But they're not but they're not early, yeah, so we're
waiting for them to be fully yellow and come in.
The lemon season is actually i'd say, what December January
February from in Europe, isn't it. So you kind of think, oh,
surely lemons are a summer fruit, but actually no, they're
actually a winter You do get.

Speaker 5 (05:14):
Lemons in the summer, though, I think that one of
the only plants that fruits, flowers, and germinates all at
the same time, so you have like everything, So you
get a few obviously the bulk of the crop is
in the winter. But you do they do the plants?
Do well?

Speaker 2 (05:29):
Say? Is that what you actually?

Speaker 3 (05:32):
Yeah? Is it? Little toy lemon?

Speaker 2 (05:37):
Wow, We'll go back to lemons.

Speaker 1 (05:40):
But that's really interesting that we've said because we've done
all our books together, and I think that it's such
an early process, isn't it. We stood down, we think
about the book, We get in the photographer, we have
the you.

Speaker 2 (05:54):
Know, the designer. We sit there with the first page.

Speaker 1 (05:56):
We talked to the publisher and this had to be
this is a River Cafe book, the recipes of River Cafe.

Speaker 2 (06:02):
But it was kind of friendship book, you know.

Speaker 1 (06:04):
It was a sort of a friend of mine who
was an artist and three two friends. But I think
that it's the same for me, you know, being handed
this book from California. What do you feel about a
recipe that you when you look through the book that
you like.

Speaker 4 (06:17):
One of the recipes I think is quite cool and
quite unusual. And I had never even considered it until
I started working at the River Cafe's potatoes with lemon,
Because you think cool potatoes and lemon, Like, how is that.

Speaker 2 (06:30):
Going to work?

Speaker 4 (06:31):
It doesn't sound the first instance, to be the most
delicious thing to tell us how to make the So
you cut the potatoes and you cut the lemons into
similar shape pieces, and then you mix it with garlic pieces,
small pieces not too big, not whole clothes chopped up
slightly salt pepper herbs. I don't exactly know what it

(06:55):
says in the book, but you can use marjoram or
regano time stage, maybe rosemary, but I don't feel like
it doesn't suits a small Southern Hemisphere herb or Southern
European herb that you think, and then mix it together
with olive oil, steam it in the oven so it
all goes really soft together, and then uncover it and

(07:17):
it kind of browns and the lemon and the lemon
to be browned.

Speaker 1 (07:20):
Yeah, I think you need that contrast between the potato
and lemons.

Speaker 3 (07:23):
So good, you have it, very good fish.

Speaker 5 (07:25):
But if you ate it and you didn't know what
is the favor, you wouldn't pick the lemon necessarily.

Speaker 2 (07:29):
It's funny.

Speaker 5 (07:29):
It has a really different and it's a great actually
it's it's the best example I can think of, but
something that uses up, you know, an unusual as a
whole lemon, because the pith is definitely part of that,
isn't it, you know, as well as the zest and
you know it always.

Speaker 1 (07:45):
I sometimes put olives in it because that's something about
when you have an olive. It's quite nice to have lemon.
It's quite for the potato and somehow the kind of combination.
What do you feel about your favorite recipe in the book?

Speaker 5 (08:00):
Were not favorite, but there are so many things, but
I like, yeah, actually, yeah, that's it. I mean, that's sorry,
that's the that's the best recipe. That's that's that's a given.
But I really like it when you use the peel
the savory way, you know, So I really like when

(08:22):
we make pork and milk with the lemon peel and
actually you don't put any lemon juice in at all,
you know, in the same way when when you make
when we make pannacottas, you just put the peel in
the cream and you reduce it and it has it's
a very very Italian flavor. Actually, I think that kind
of lemon peel and dairy and I'm a big big

(08:43):
fan of that.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
When you were growing up, your parents were live in Italy,
did did you?

Speaker 3 (08:48):
Would you have had lemon trees where you are?

Speaker 5 (08:51):
My father is from the south of it Inland, so
if you go to Naples, obviously that is the place
where the lemon preps are. Where we are in the
mountains too, people definitely have lemon trees friends with lemon trees,
but it wasn't like it's not a crop that way.
And yes, so I really, I really, I really like
things with the lemon peel that's cooked for a long

(09:11):
time and that flavor comes out.

Speaker 1 (09:12):
I always think that the pork cooked and milk is
so fabulous because it's kind of chemistry, isn't it. You
think when at what point did they realize that you
could curdle milk and it would be delicious, you know,
because usually if something curdles, even the word curdles means
you know, don't, don't do it.

Speaker 2 (09:31):
But when you have it, you just put that.

Speaker 3 (09:32):
Lemon with the milk, and you can do it in pork.
I start doing it in chicken. I'm sure we all
do it other things.

Speaker 1 (09:38):
And that magic that it creates, that kind of almost
nutty flavor. You know, when you do pork and milk,
you want to cook it so that you when you
put the lemon in the milk, that it goes brown.
You know, it's always that kind of dark flavors from
the bottom of the pan.

Speaker 4 (09:54):
And then you know, I don't think you can do
the lemonon No, it's much milder isn't it like that? Yeah,
because when you say you have a whole pork shoulder,
say you're doing a whole pork shoulder that feeds about
twenty people maybe or fifteen at the River Cafe. You
probably would use a handful of scarlet clothes and probably

(10:14):
the zest of maybe four or five lemons, and then
you sot but not the pith, no pith, just the zest,
you know, and then then when you pour that in
with the milk, you see how the heck is this
going to work? And then four hours later you lift
a lid off and you're like bingo the milk.

Speaker 5 (10:31):
It's not kind of acottery around the edge of it's kind.
And also it's completely different if you think. The other
thing that is really nice with the lemon peel is
that we make often and very Italians gremolata, you know,
when you chop the lemon zest up, you know, with
the parsley and again a no Sean, and I because
I hear her talking to the chefs like the like
a lots of lemon zest in grim lata, and that

(10:52):
is to cut through the fat typically of like OsO
some really fatty port. But it's like, you know, it's
the same thing, but it's not cooked. It's completely different.
All of a sudden, it's like sharp, you know, whereas
in the other dishes so soft.

Speaker 1 (11:08):
The other thing is that again Richard's mother never made
any roasted meat, maybe not bet, but chicken and pork
and veal without just roasting it, but then taking the
roastington out, taking removing the meat, and then pouring just
milk into the juices of.

Speaker 2 (11:26):
The pan, removing the fat. And that's how I do.

Speaker 1 (11:28):
I mean, that's how I cook. I never I don't
know how to make gravy, and I guess it is
how you make gravy. But if you have the roastington,
which is quite flat as long as you don't burn
the bits of the meat, then you pour milk over it,
and then you scrape it and you boil it down.
It is really a delicious and very simple sauce for
gravy for the chicken or.

Speaker 2 (11:50):
The veal or whatever you're doing.

Speaker 1 (11:52):
And I think, as again back to the you know,
the magic of how somehow the lemon and the milk work.
And I think, for me, a lemon and on anything,
you know, a piece of grilled fish or a piece
of grilled meat, and France you.

Speaker 2 (12:06):
Would have you could have a burnet sauce.

Speaker 1 (12:08):
You can, you know, I'm sure, and other countries there's
always a sauce you can make, well, even like saucea
very But you know if you if you squeeze lemon
over the fish or over the meat that's been cooked,
there's your sauce. You know, it's just the sauce of
the juices with the lemon makes the sauce. And so
a lemon is pretty impressive as an ingredient.

Speaker 5 (12:31):
Yeah, you know, you're really lucky that you sha chase
lemons because you can do imagine if you said melons.

Speaker 1 (12:38):
We're just talking about the next next book. But what
to do and I won't tell you because we don't
want anybody to hear it, right right, But I think also, well,
tell me more about what you think about.

Speaker 4 (12:52):
Well, I always think, what about for a misto, because
sometimes we do for Mista in the restaurant in the book,
I guess it's the vegetable and lemon frit and misto.
So you can do zucchini artichokes. At the moment, we're
doing a ridicio because it's autumn and not zucchini, but
you know, substituting in vegetables, and then you can do

(13:14):
a thin slice of a circle of lemon and then
fry that with milk and flour or batter, and then
when you eat a fried lemon, that's like mind blowing
because you don't you think, well, I know what a
fried zucchini tastes, like I know what a fried you know,
a piece of a dico tastes. The lemon is suddenly

(13:35):
like it's so fun because it's in batter, which makes
it it almost feel healthy. It's like double do you
think healthy inside it? You think this is actually but
it's really it's really not fun.

Speaker 1 (13:53):
What about lemon lemon desserts because we do use lemon
a lot, We do use lemon, and I do lemon tarts,
we do lemon cakes. Well, I think one of us
should talk about lemon tart because I think that was
on the menu the first day thirty eight years ago
and it's been the same.

Speaker 2 (14:11):
But you know, it is a River Cafe classics, so
classic room.

Speaker 4 (14:15):
Yesterday I did a photo shoot yesterday, well actually film
and made the lemon tart in the classic River Cafe
old school method, which was, do you remember how you
bring the lemon juice and the butter and the zest
and the sugar to the boil, then take it off
the heat, and then you stir in the whole eggs
and the egg yolks. Then you put it back in

(14:38):
the pan, cook it out on the heat until it
just starts to bobble around the edges. But you remember
that if it if it starts to boil, you're done,
split done.

Speaker 5 (14:48):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (14:48):
And I was thinking, and the camera was on me,
and I was thinking.

Speaker 3 (14:52):
Hold your nerve. They were right, you've got this.

Speaker 4 (14:55):
You do this all the time, not to make a
lemon tart the river cafe like fifty years ago maybe,
And so I just managed to do that, had some
nice equipment to use, very photogenic, then poured it into
the tartshell and then the moment of truth. I was like,
I'm going to do the real flash version, which is
to brown it in the wood oven, because it's really showy.

(15:15):
It looks like not just a grill. I'm going to
do this in a wood oven. So I had the
flame's going and then I was thinking, this is a
moment of truth, because if it if you haven't made
it correctly, it won't brown. So if you do what
I say, then you put it under a hot grill,
it will work. But if you've gone too far cooking it,
it will just split more and more.

Speaker 1 (15:34):
It's so worth it to take it, yes, because the
difference between a kind of anemic looking lemon tar and
the's tired that we had, you know, And so I
definitely yeah.

Speaker 4 (15:43):
So I put it in the hot oven and then
I was watching it, thinking that cool does that relaxed,
and then and then I noticed a big welts of
brown starting to grow.

Speaker 3 (15:55):
On it, and then it was just bubbling away.

Speaker 4 (15:57):
And then then I turned it and it was so good.

Speaker 5 (16:00):
I was.

Speaker 2 (16:03):
Perfect.

Speaker 4 (16:04):
But the funny thing is it's we used to when
the chefs start at the River Cafe. We used to
do all the desserts and pastry that was part of
our training, whereas now we have a pastry kitchen and
so we we don't. The young chefs don't learn pastry
in the same way that we learned pastry. So I
guess we're nostalgic for it because we used to do
it and it's such a people. Someone sent me a

(16:28):
text the other day saying Lemontat is my absolute weakness
at the River Cafe because.

Speaker 5 (16:32):
It's so yeah, definitely, yeah, it's nice.

Speaker 1 (16:36):
The visuals of the book, you know, it is quite
it is quite joy. I keep using joy when I
see this book.

Speaker 3 (16:45):
You know, how did you come up with the title.
So there was Heather, all right, yeah, there was Heather,
and we thought what should we call the book?

Speaker 1 (16:54):
And she called it squeezed me. And this is a
quote by our brothers. Thinks he's a lemon tree, but
we won't talk him out of it because we.

Speaker 2 (17:06):
Need the lemons.

Speaker 3 (17:08):
And that was oh okay, and that's very.

Speaker 1 (17:11):
Groucha marks and some of them, so some of them
were from lines from songs, from poems, as one by
Pablo Neruda. What I like about this book is the
recipes are almost the size of captions, so there is
a lot of white around the page so that the
images can shine.

Speaker 3 (17:32):
And if you have trouble reading it, then you can
get it from one of our other cookbooks.

Speaker 1 (17:36):
But it's a book that you might want to take
in the kitchen. Somebody told me last night they'd made
a recipe from it. You might want to put it
on your living room table, or you might just want
to put it next to your bed when you're feeling
in these gray winter nights, quite happy by seeing lemon
is it?

Speaker 4 (17:53):
I mean, I love the fact it doesn't have pictures
of food in it, but I know that is a
bit controversial, seemingly.

Speaker 2 (17:59):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (17:59):
Yeah, it's funny that it's been taken out so much
because if you think of the Japanese cookbook, you know,
there were no photographs of plates. If you think about
I think Alice be told, because I think there are
cookbooks without they're more like maybe memoirs or the more stories,
but with illustrations, line illustrations, So maybe they are you know,

(18:23):
people are missing because our books have always been so photographic.

Speaker 2 (18:26):
But it gives it to the imagination, and.

Speaker 4 (18:29):
There's some fun Resci with the spaghetti with parmesan. It's
also absolutely delicious. I made that yesterday for the film
as well. I didn't feel so nervous making it because
but it's also you wouldn't think spaghetti with parmesan lemon juice.

Speaker 1 (18:44):
Someone who's here today talked about milan, and when I
saw the photograph was rather like I zucchini one. There's
definitely parmesan, and it's quite cheesy.

Speaker 4 (18:52):
Yeah, yesterday when I was doing it for the film,
they kept making me squeeze more and more lemon in
it for visuals and I was a bit like you
might want to be for eating that, because that's kind.

Speaker 5 (19:04):
I've never had limon pass till I A.

Speaker 2 (19:06):
It's really nice and people really really enjoy it.

Speaker 5 (19:12):
So one of those things I fancy like once a
year is the recipe in the book is lemon cello. Yeah,
you know, you know, I know it's a very sweet,
kind of slightly naff thing too, but I think it's
when it's good, you know, home, I really enjoy it.

Speaker 1 (19:28):
It's a really competitive thing and to make your own
lemon cello. Remember remember reading that Big families.

Speaker 2 (19:35):
Want to know how was your limon cello and MUD's.

Speaker 3 (19:38):
Wine and how many lemons?

Speaker 2 (19:40):
So here we are.

Speaker 1 (19:41):
Squeeze Me a book by Edrew Recipes from the River
Cafe and out now published by.

Speaker 2 (19:49):
Rid Thank You.

Speaker 5 (19:56):
Ruthie's Table for was produced by Alex Belle and Zad Rogers, Susannahlop,
Andrew Sang, and Bella Selini.

Speaker 1 (20:03):
This has been an atomized production for iHeartMedia.