TV Quick
10-16 January 2004

Me and my food - Adrian Edmondson

The Yum Ones?

Although comic Ade Edmondson, who stars in new BBC1 sitcom Doctors And Nurses, loves his food, there are a few things he wishes he hadn’t eaten in the past...

There were three boys and a girl in my family when I was growing up. I was known as the dustbin. If any food was left over, I'd eat it.

Dad was a teacher with the British Forces and we lived in Cyprus, Bahrain and Uganda. We went to all these foreign places and we'd eat English food. My dad Fred eventually thought he could make curry but it was really English stew with curry powder, desiccated coconut, sultanas and pineapple.

I went back to boarding school in England when I was 12, and the food was bloody desperate. There used to be this stuff called Welsh rarebit which nobody could face - it was gunk. For breakfast once we had baked beans and just hot boiled tomatoes. There used to be a punishment called 'toast' where you had to get up early to make toast for 128 boys' breakfasts. I was a good toaster.

I started cooking at university, things like spag bol. I learnt to cook from books, my mum didn't really teach me. She was quite old-fashioned and beef was always well done. When you eventually find out the joys of rare beef it seems a shame you've spent years eating lumps of charcoal.

When Jennifer [Saunders] and I decided to get married we'd already booked a holiday, so we called it the honeymoon. There are two volcanic hills in St Lucia that look like breasts called The Pitons. Our hotel was just nestled inside them, and I had a Piton burger with Thousand Island dressing. I got food poisoning and thought I was going to die. I was in the toilet for three days. It was coming out of every orifice!

We eat a mixture of English and Mediterranean food - lots of roast meats and roast vegetables. I don’t really like Chinese or Indian food.

At home I had been doing all the cooking because I was competent and liked it. But when you've got three kids, what used to be a joy becomes a chore. So I suggested to Jennifer that she started cooking, and of course she does it better than I do.

She can cook anything and she's very good with meat. We've got this farm with sheep and cows. We haven't eaten any of our own animals yet. But I've got some lambs which I'm going to slaughter. The calves may be harder to do because cows are gorgeous.

Doctors And Nurses,
BBC1 Tuesday

No-velle cuisine
Nouvelle cuisine is really pointless. It's like someone has spat on a plate. With any cuisine that they have had to carve vegetables, think about how many fingers have touched your food and for how long!

Balls up
In Paris when I was a student I ordered what I thought was rice with veal, but someone told me they were calves' testicles and looked like it! I ate one then was told it was offal. A few years ago I was in Paris again and thought I was ordering offal because I recognised the word. But it was a steamed lump of brain. There was no gravy and it was a bit rubbery.

Telling porkies
I once worked in a pork pie factory and every week there was a list posted on the notice board of what had been found in the pies during that week. There were about 30 categories, and one at the bottom that said 'miscellaneous'. I don't eat pork pies any more. When it says 100 per cent pork, it means the bones, the skin, hairs, eyeballs, everything. Nice.

The world's my oyster
I used to love oysters. Then once I had a bad one on Christmas Day. I missed my lunch because of it. Now I can't face one because I remember how ill it made me.

Large on Little
Alistair Little has two London restaurants - one in Notting Hill and one in Soho. He cooks great food and is a nice bloke. I met him once in the toilet and he was very jolly. I like people who like their food.