Today we look behind the curtain and discuss how much we hate martinis and if we are actually koalas. Matthew tries to stay cool as we talk to Durand Jones about his Gumbo recipe and new solo album. Eventually our cheerful pessimism shows up and breaks out as we rename our hive mind.
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Durand Jones' Gumbo Recipe
Prep:
1 cup of baked flour
(take your favorite white flour-- place in a pile in the middle of the baking pan, bake at 375 degrees for at least one hour. Stir every 15 to 20 mins. My desired color is a medium-dark caramel). Once done, set aside.
32oz of Okra cut-- not too thin and still round
(spread okra on a baking pan, spread an even amount of olive oil on the okra, place in the oven. Bake at 375 until slime is fully cooked out. This usually takes around 45 minutes to an hour 25. Try to check every fifteen minutes and stir to avoid the okra getting burned). Once done set aside
2 lbs of chicken thighs, boneless and skinless. Season with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and some cajun seasoning like tony's chacherie.
(Once chicken is seasoned, place in a baking pan and let it bake in the oven for 25-30 minutes at 375 degrees). Once done set aside
Gumbo time:
1 large white onion-- chopped
4-6 stalks of celery--chopped
1 large red bell pepper-- chopped
1 large green bell pepper-- chopped
(optional)Smoked Turkey meat with bone still in-- you're looking for a smoked turkey leg, or smoked turkey necks. This will add immense flavor to your broth/roux.
12 ounces of Andouille Sausage-- or closest like sausage
2 lbs of shrimp-- peeled and deveined-- set aside in a container-- keep them cooled or iced.
96 ounces of your favorite stock-- you can make your own, but really no need. A good stock from the grocery store can work, and save you time from this already lengthy preparation
Get a large and deep pot, place a little oil in it and bring it to medium-hot heat.
Once the pot is temp ready-- place onion, celery, and bell peppers in the large and deep pot. Do not add garlic just yet. Monitor the pot and make sure you are not burning the vegetables
Let this cook down for about 12-15 minutes. Keep occasionally stirring until onions began to carmelize. Add garlic now. Keep an eye and occasionally stir for about 7-10 minutes.
Take a cup of your stock and add it to your baked flower in a bowl. Whisk until smooth and without lumps.
Add this mixture into your large pot with veggies.
Stir and mix with the veggies and let this cook for about 5 minutes or so.
Add your smoked turkey leg or turkey necks into the pot.
Add stock until the pot is around 60 percent full-- we don't want to overfill the pot-- because we have a lot more to add into the gumbo.
Stir the pot, get the mixture of the roux to gel smoothly with the water.
Get this to a medium boil.
Add Okra to the pot
Now is a great time to season your gumbo with tony's, garlic powder, pepper, hot sauce, garlic powder, to your preference. Do not add salt yet.
Let this cook-- pot covered preferred, for about 45 minutes to an hour, occasionally stirring and checking in on the pot. Adding in more stock if needed. Keeping your pot a little more than half full.
Bring Pot to a medium to low heat
Add sliced, round andouille sausage to the pot
Chop baked chicken into medium to medium large sized chunks, once done-- add to the pot
Add more stock if needed.
Let this cook for about 30 minutes.
Add your shrimp last. They will not take a very long time to cook in the gumbo. Ten to 15 minutes should be great
Optional, but once shrimp are done, turn off heat, and let the gumbo rest for 10 minutes. Add 16 ounces of ice cold water to the pot. Stir it in and let it sit for another 5 to 10 minutes. Salt to taste.
Serve with steamed rice
At least 5 to 7 cloves of garlic-- chopped
1 cup of stock of your choice
Matthew Amster-Burton 0:00
Hi I'm Matthew and I'm Molly and this is spilled milk, the show where we cook something delicious. Eat it all and you can't have it.
Molly 0:10
Today we are talking about Gumbo and we have a special guest who we are very excited to talk with.
Matthew Amster-Burton 0:16
Yeah, it's we're very excited in part because we know so little about gumbo, but we knew we needed to do an episode on it.
Molly 0:23
This is true. And also this guest I think is the perfect person to talk with us about gumbo because he is from small town Louisiana. Also, Matthew, you and I are both fans of this guy's music.
Matthew Amster-Burton 0:36
Yes. And so yeah, I'll try I'll try not to like detour derail the conversation to just try to talk to him about singing for half an hour.
Molly 0:43
Should I tell the listener who he is fine. Okay, we are going to be bringing on Durant Jones. here soon. We're all gonna learn a lot about gumbo. He has a wonderful gumbo recipe. Yeah, we will be discussing
Matthew Amster-Burton 0:58
okay. I'm really excited for this. Okay, let's start with memory lane. I did not grow up in small town, Louisiana. How about you?
Molly 1:04
I did not. I grew up in a midsize town Oklahoma. I think I went to Louisiana for the first time as like a kid. I went to Baton Rouge, but I really don't remember anything about it. So this is really useful for our memory lane. Okay, and then I do remember going to New Orleans with my dear friend Ben. In 2016. We met up there. We sort of
Matthew Amster-Burton 1:28
ate away in who you ate hot dogs at a Las Vegas buffet with That's right. I do all
Molly 1:33
my best eating. And with you. Anyway. Yeah, Ben and I met up in in New Orleans. And you know, we did all kinds of things like the 25 cent Martini lunch at Commander's Palace. I don't like martinis though.
Matthew Amster-Burton 1:48
I don't either. I ate
Molly 1:50
and what else did we do? Oh, Ben bought some cigars and we well I attempted to smoke a cigar on the stoop of the Airbnb we rented and at some point I Gumbo and I cannot for the life of me remember where it was, but it was delicious.
Matthew Amster-Burton 2:07
Okay, but yeah, like I think I think one of the great things about New Orleans is like you know, there are like special restaurants but also like the base quality of food is so high like I the only gumbos I remember in New Orleans were just like neighborhood places that like if you mentioned the name, no one from outside of town is going to know it.
Molly 2:24
You know what, I feel pretty certain actually that my gumbo was at dooky Chase's Oh, okay, that is a famous place that is a famous place and I feel pretty certain that it was there as part of like their their lunch one day. Yeah, it was epic.
Matthew Amster-Burton 2:40
Can I do a little Martini Memory Lane since you brought it up? Yeah. I have like a memory of going to this place in Portland with some friends when I was maybe just like, senior year of high school. And like one of our friends was 21 and an ordered a martini, and like surreptitiously let me have a taste. And I was like, This is so disgusting. Like, how could anyone like this and like, there are many things like that, that you taste when you're young and then like you get you like, learn to like them via martinis? Nope.
Molly 3:09
You know, it always looks so good in the course. Yeah. Looks god it looks so good in the glass. And I like vermouth. I like gin, I'm fine with vodka. I could take it or leave it. I like olives. I don't really know what my problem is. But you put it all together and it doesn't. You know, I don't put all those things together. We put some of those things together and it makes a martini. And I don't like okay, we
Matthew Amster-Burton 3:34
should probably do a martini episode at some point.
Molly 3:36
Let's do it. Okay, let's do it. Yeah, okay.
Matthew Amster-Burton 3:39
Okay, so as we were like talking about this episode, I remembered that in John thorns book serious pig, he devotes a whole like third of the book to the food of Louisiana, like Cajun and Creole food, not because he's from there, but because he just loves it and has spent time there. And one of the essays in the book, which is like shorter than I remembered is about is about gumbo, and I'm going to be drawing from it a bit. And so like to be clear, Jonathan has a white guy who is not from Louisiana, but he is really careful in the essay to cite primary sources and give credit to the black cooks and writers who invented Gumbo and developed its infinite variations. And like, you know, one thing I realized like like why for the show, Laurie asked me Okay, so what is gumbo? And I like, that's not a super easy question to answer, but we'll try. Okay. So in the John Thorne essay, he quotes William Faulkner rushed in it hold on rate name. Is this different from William Faulkner different from William Faulkner probably named for him. He was a historian. And he wrote a book called the Cajuns that's like a history of Cajun culture and people. And there's this quote from it that goes like this. When Ruth font not sets out to cook a gumbo all the pots and pans and spices in her kitchen sit up and take notice none is certain which one or ones will be used this time around for both the recipe and the size of the Serving will vary from day to day, depending on Ruth's mood and assessments of the tastes of her dinner guests. That really sums up gumbo as much as any like specifics about the dish that we're going to talk about today. Oh, wait
Molly 5:12
a minute. I just remembered somewhere else. I had gumbo. Okay, let's hear Oh, wow. Okay. This time, there was something about like the the pots and pans and the guests. The number of guests varying that made me remember this. Okay, I think, Oh, I can't remember when this was.
Matthew Amster-Burton 5:30
But anyway. Oh, I forgot to do my memory lane.
Molly 5:32
I was lucky enough to have gumbo at the table. Have Pablo Johnson. Oh, yeah. Who is also a white man in Louisiana. Incredible cook. And Pablo made a like his standard gumbo. And then I think he also made a vegetarian version because there was somebody coming to dinner that night. It was vegetarian. But anyway, I had the regular gumbo. And Pablo has a pretty small kitchen. And it was just amazing. Like the heat and humidity in this kitchen. I think it was a spring evening. It was a Monday, Pablo at least at the time that I knew him better. was doing like Monday dinners often and just sort of inviting whoever was around. Anyway, giant pot of gumbo. big ol pot of rice. And it was so hot and yet eating like a hot meaty soup felt like exactly the right thing to do.
Matthew Amster-Burton 6:30
Yeah. Okay. So. Oh, man, I wish I'd been there. Do you?
Molly 6:35
Have you met Pablo?
Matthew Amster-Burton 6:36
I've never met Pablo. But I've I've like read a bunch of his writing. And he's great. Oh, he's
Molly 6:40
fantastic. Yeah. Okay,
Matthew Amster-Burton 6:42
so my memory lane. The only time I have been to Louisiana went to New Orleans with friends in 2002. We ate really well. And yeah, like I know, we did have lunch at Commander's Palace and like we went to at least one other famous famous chef kind of place. But the gumbo I remember having was just just like, you know, this place looks like it might be good for dinner. Let's wander in here. And it was always great. Like I remember having a crawfish a to Fe that was amazing. But also just like several different types of gumbo all of them good. Always serve with rice fan tastic and I've never cooked it where does this word come from? Oh, are you are you summoning Mr. Etymology,
Molly 7:21
I am Is he here? He's here, okay.
Matthew Amster-Burton 7:31
I'm not going to do the voice because I don't remember what it was. Okay, so the the etymology of the word Gumbo is pretty straightforward with one little twist. So we are 99% sure that it comes from the Bantu language family word, King gumbo, which like appears in different forms in different Bantu languages, the Bantu language families from the Niger Congo region in Sub Saharan Africa mainly, and that word means okra in the Bantu language family, and the word, the word gumbo awesome. Also means okra in French Oh, however, SassaFrass in the form of filet powder is a very common ingredient in gumbo. And the Choctaw Native American nation contributed a lot too, to Cajun and Creole cuisine. And the word for SassaFrass in Choctaw is combo we genuinely chances it's like, you know, there there are, you know, there are a lot of words of the world. But there are, are that many different ways you could put together words. And this genuinely seems to be a weird linguistic coincidence, since there is so much evidence linking the word to okra and West Africa. That is why it is it is wild. Like I'm not going to say like I'm 100% sure like I have not an authority on this. Like it is possible that that the Choctaw word contributed but it seems like it's really a West African word.
Molly 8:58
Sure. So so this is the official state food of Louisiana.
Matthew Amster-Burton 9:02
Yep. And I would say Gumbo is a stew both in the literal sense and kind of the figurative multicultural sense because a lot of different cooking traditions went into what it is today. Like which ones Okay, so definitely West African and African American traditions, Choctaw, French, Spanish, like all of the cultures that created what we know is Louisiana today created gumbo.
Molly 9:29
Okay, do you have any sense of how long this stuff has been being made?
Matthew Amster-Burton 9:34
So that is a really good question. Like definitely at least a couple of centuries. Like there are kind of some things about it that are that are relatively modern in terms of like it is a you know there we're going to talk about like country and city gumbo, but especially like the the city style gumbo that people outside Louisiana associated with Gumbo is kind of it's kind of like rich dish, and so Like, you know, it's, it's something that like, you know, requires sort of like modern modern access to like cooking fats. So so he's probably probably in current form dates from the 19th century. Okay.
Molly 10:13
And so there are commonalities though, to the way that they're always made right. There's always a roux.
Matthew Amster-Burton 10:19
Yep. Although when we talk to Duran, we're gonna we're gonna see there's like more than one way to make a route but like gumbo typically starts with a brown roux. So like cooking flower and vegetable oil down in a pot like almost never butter. Unless it's like someone's someone's like fancy recipe that like locals are probably going to make fun of like it is vegetable oil and flour cooked for a long time, like maybe 45 minutes until it's really like brown and toasty. And that that is like why gumbo has like this, this thick brown broth sauce. But there's more to the thickness than that which we'll get Okay.
Molly 10:58
Okay. And then what about like the base vegetables? You know, like, what do you start with?
Matthew Amster-Burton 11:03
Yeah, so always like the the Louisiana Holy Trinity onion, of celery and green bell pepper.
Molly 11:11
I love that. There's like a Holy Trinity. Yes. So many different cuisines.
Matthew Amster-Burton 11:15
Yeah. So So and like the way it usually the miracle usually gets worked in is it's interesting and like having having not made it I didn't know this, like usually you cook down the roux. And then when the roux is ready, then you throw in the miracle and you cook that in the room sort of like using that oily roo as a cooking medium, because it's really hostile.
Molly 11:35
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, this is this is fascinating. So it must be real ugly when you first start out. You got this like brown.
Matthew Amster-Burton 11:42
Oh, fantastic smelling sludge? Yeah, yes. Okay, and then you're going to add stock and unlike long cooking proteins and cook it for like, you know, chicken cook it for up to three hours and the spices like there's going to be some Cajun spices that go in with the I should say not necessarily Cajun, there's going to be Louisiana spices that go in with the mirror plot or at the end or both. Like if you're if you're adding seafood, which many gumbos have that's gonna get added near the end so it doesn't overcook. And you serve it with rice.
Molly 12:14
What could be better? Yeah, so where does okra come into this?
Matthew Amster-Burton 12:17
Okay, so, in addition to the roux, like, you know, because it's made with this, this thick brown roux, like that's going to add some, some textures and like, I don't know, like, you know, when you when you make like a stew that starts with flour, it's got it's got kind of a like a smooth a smooth thickness to it. And then you're probably going to add some other type of thickener, and that's going to be okra or feel a powder or occasionally both. So here comes some sweeping generalizations. Okay, so okra is associated with Citi gumbo, which is most likely to be made in New Orleans and is more likely to include seafood and fresh sausage and feel a powder which is made from dried and ground SassaFrass leaves that goes into country gumbo, which is more likely to be made outside the cities and more likely to include chicken and smoked sausage. So like andouille sausage, for example.
Molly 13:10
Okay, wow. Okay, so I'm guessing I've never had country gumbo.
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:13
I don't think I have either and country gumbo was originally made without a roux I learned because flour was scarce in rural areas, but nowadays is usually made with a roux and filet powder.
Molly 13:24
So we'd have you ever smelled filet powder or you have
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:29
God we're so well you're all ified to
Molly 13:34
it. What is SassaFrass leafs tastes like if you have eaten any of those
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:38
just like right off the tree like like, like a koala or something? Uh huh. Yeah, I'm a koala. Okay, all right, so both both like feel a powder and okra both add like a unique flavor and texture. So feel a powder is added at the end because it gets like gloopy and the flavor cooks out if he added too soon. And like even like places will like put it on the table to like sprinkle on your gumbo and stir in Oh, okay, so SassaFrass is the main flavoring that we think of when you think of like the smell and taste of root beer.
Molly 14:09
Is it poisonous?
Matthew Amster-Burton 14:11
Oh, so like bark. Yeah, the bark has poisonous like you know, it's like carcinogenic in certain forms but like feel a powder is safe and like has been like determined to be safe in labs.
Molly 14:23
Okay, and so Okay, wait hold on. So does the feel a powder taste anything like root beer I know that we're talking about as far
Matthew Amster-Burton 14:30
as my impression from reading up about this is that he does is like a savory Irby root berry flavor and produces like a starch thick in texture. Like if you imagine like a Chinese stir fry with a sauce that's been thickened with corn starch or arrow root that kind of texture and then okra you know you know the texture of okra produces like a slippery Oh Cray e texture. That's right. And like I really tried hard to like like come up with descriptions for okra texture that didn't sound negative and I like it. Oh, I like you, but like describing text yours in general, like the English language feels like it's kind of impoverished with like words for describing food textures.
Molly 15:06
Well, and I know that a couple months ago, we mentioned that was it a Ligaya Miss Shan article where she wrote about sort of the way in which the American palate it like doesn't know how, what sense to make of chewy and slippery
Matthew Amster-Burton 15:23
is such a great article. Yeah, cuz, like, you know, you can tell that we don't have enough experience with it because when you try describe it, it sounds it sounds like you're being negative, even if you're describing something you'd like. Yes. Okay, let's pause here and, and bring our guests into the fold. And we're gonna have we're gonna talk to him about Gumbo and music
Duran Jones grew up in Hilary Ville, Louisiana. He's a saxophonist vocalist and founder of Duran Jones in the indications who've released three critically acclaimed albums. His first solo album, wait till I get over is out now on dead oceans and it's fantastic, deeply personal, full of vocal and instrumental hooks, and so much fun to sing along with while researching for a podcast episode. Duran Jones, thank you so much for joining us on spilled milk.
Unknown Speaker 16:15
Thank you for having me. Super excited to be here.
Matthew Amster-Burton 16:17
All right. So on the album, you have a spoken word interlude about your hometown of Hilary Ville called the place you'd most like to live. Can you start by telling us a little bit about growing up in Hilary Ville like its history like and why you included this interlude on the album? Yeah, who want
Speaker 3 16:33
to feel is a very, very small incorporated town. In the chapel, I have basin of Louisiana, the land was given to a handful of formerly enslaved folks as a form of reparations. These handful of people, about eight or so they came from one of the largest plantations in the country during the time, called the homeless house plantation, or the Burnside Plantation, which had over 500 slaves 10,000 acres of sugarcane and also obtained three sugar mills that they use to process and package the sugar as well. What these formerly enslaved people did was create their own little self sustaining, self sustaining town that is kind of disappearing to this day. So I really felt like it was important for me to highlight how beautiful that place is and the history of it, just to document it. In hopes that it won't disappear. Yeah.
Molly 17:39
Did you grow up eating gumbo there?
Speaker 3 17:41
Oh my gosh, yes. Like, every Thanksgiving every Christmas, even on Easter sometimes. It's always a holiday celebration. Yeah.
Molly 17:56
And who would be the one who made it? It would be
Speaker 3 17:59
my grandmother a good chunk of the time. But my stepmom would make it I mean, everybody it's we have this little joke in Louisiana that everybody loves to cook even the men, even the kids. It's it's a very communal thing. So learning how to make gumbo is almost an essential part of being a Louisiana.
Matthew Amster-Burton 18:19
So do you do you remember like how you learned to make it like, Who taught you like what the process was like?
Speaker 3 18:25
Oh my god, I still remember my first one. I was in college, and I called my grandmother and I was like, I really want to try to make a gumbo. Can you like walk me through this? And it was pretty mid. You know, it wasn't the best.
Matthew Amster-Burton 18:41
Like the first time yeah, of course. The first time doing anything gonna be perfect.
Speaker 3 18:50
But yeah, over the years, I've come up with my own little techniques and tricks. And some of them might you know, raise an eyebrow to Louisiana person. We're
Matthew Amster-Burton 19:04
gonna get into it for sure. Yeah. Oh,
Speaker 3 19:06
yeah. But I believe in it. Tried and true that it works. So
Molly 19:11
Matthew and I have loved reading your recipe, it totally feels like the kind of recipe that you would find on like an index card except in this case, it would be like a really big index card because your recipe is like wonderfully personal and specific to all of your Yeah, all the twists and turns you take with it. So we wanted to ask you a bunch about your recipe. Matthew, do you want to start it off?
Matthew Amster-Burton 19:35
Okay, yeah, so we like before you came on. We've talked about some of like, out of the dividing lines of gumbo and wanted to ask you, where do you come down on them. So okra or filet powder, both or neither?
Speaker 3 19:46
I'm an okra guy. I don't use feel a powder. Okay, I know some people cook with filet powder in their gumbo. But what happens when you add the filet to the actual pot is whenever you call Download Gumbo and it's in the fridge it will Gillette Nice. It'll get really gelatin like so it's really should be used I think as like seasoning condiment like you would use hot sauce. So at the table, yes, you know pour a little bit in your bowl.
Molly 20:16
Okay. Yeah. Okay. And I got a question about the okra. So you mentioned in your recipe, one of the three steps you have the you have us do first is that we cook the okra, right? We roasted in the oven. Yes. Does that actually remove all the slippery stuff? Or do you need the slippery stuff to help do something with the texture of the finished gumbo?
Speaker 3 20:42
It's very unappealing to have a slimy gumbo to a Louisiana person. Okay, and I've definitely have my few outside of Louisiana that will have a slightly
Matthew Amster-Burton 20:53
interesting, okay, it's
Speaker 3 20:55
yeah, it's not the vibe and my grandmother the way that she would always and it's so tried and true the way she would always cook the slime out of her okra is just to bake it in the oven for 45 to an hour. And usually it works failproof you know, staring at every once in a while
Molly 21:15
just the slime like, like, come out. Or, like just disappear.
Unknown Speaker 21:22
disappears. Yeah, just
Molly 21:25
Yeah, okay. Okay. Okay.
Matthew Amster-Burton 21:28
That's great. Okay, seafood or chicken are both
Unknown Speaker 21:30
both. Okay, all the way baby.
Molly 21:35
Tomatoes are no tomatoes.
Speaker 3 21:37
No tomatoes. I know, there's some places that do. Tomatoes. There's so many different gumbos compare. Depending on the region, you are in Louisiana, and there's a red gumbo out there. But for me, I'm just sticking to the rules. No tomatoes.
Matthew Amster-Burton 21:55
Okay. And the thing that I was like most interested in your recipe, which like I can't wait to share this recipe with our with our listeners. You bake the flour rather than cooking the roux down in a pot. Like what? Where did where did that come from? And like and why do you do it that way? It sounds amazing.
Speaker 3 22:12
This is the thing that I debate with so many Louisiana people. If I make gumbo for my family, I don't tell them that I'm going to use big flour because it it makes them mad because making a rule. It's like the the first step. It's like a huge tradition in Louisiana. But I feel like I don't want to use all of that oil. I would rather use the or get the oils from the chicken and the andouille sausage, and a cup of oil or two cups of oil because usually whenever you make a rule that way, a lot of folks have to skim the oil off of the top of their gumbo. You baking your flour, yes, you baking your flour. You avoid all of the oil, you avoid having to skim the oil off the top of your gumbo. And I feel like it's a little healthier for you to so and so
Molly 23:10
then when you do use the baked flour, you I saw that you add stock to the flour and kind of make like a thick slurry. Yeah, okay. This is so cool. I've never heard of doing I mean, I know very little about gumbo, but I've never heard of this, I would have never considered it. Yeah, totally fascinating.
Speaker 3 23:30
Yeah, a good friend of mine shared this idea with me. And after doing a little research I saw that America test kitchen has a great recipe for big flower. You can just bake a bunch of it and just store it in a cool dry place and you'll always have some ready to go root for you. Excellent.
Molly 23:48
Can I ask a question about how big is the pot that you're making this in? Because I fear that that sounds like my largest pot is like maybe a 12 quart stockpot, but I feel like I would need to like I would need to size up for this.
Speaker 3 24:03
Yes, Google magnalite gumbo pot and
Matthew Amster-Burton 24:08
Okay, let's just do that.
Molly 24:11
Gumbo pot.
Speaker 3 24:12
Yes. All right. Louisiana person has a magnet line in there in the kitchen. Sure, Louisiana.
Molly 24:19
Matthew, what are you what are you finding over there
Matthew Amster-Burton 24:21
like this? This is like a whole cookware tradition that I knew nothing about. And now that I'm looking at it like these, these are like beautiful, extremely functional pieces of cookware. Oh, yeah.
Molly 24:33
Very well, you're talking about the ice water step in your gumbo. I want to understand this. So tell us how this how this works when you add it, etcetera.
Speaker 3 24:42
Yeah, you want to have at least about 1612 ounces water while you're cooking your gumbo, have that water in the freezer and make sure it gets really, really cold. And so the last thing you want to put into your gumbo. A lot of folks on Louisiana Feels like this shocks, all of the meat just allows them to just absorb that flavor just a little bit more just a little bit extra. And so shout out to the Cajun ninja because he is someone who's like a big proponent of that. And I am totally convinced I deal with all my combos now, it's always
Matthew Amster-Burton 25:19
the occasion ninja like a YouTuber, or he's like a
Speaker 3 25:22
social media personality guy who just cooks some Cajun food. Yeah, he's really good.
Matthew Amster-Burton 25:28
And may we share your recipe with our listeners on our website? Yeah,
Unknown Speaker 25:32
for sure. Okay.
Molly 25:34
Oh, man. I'm pumped. Okay, Matthew, we also need to like post a link to the magnalite. Gumbo. Yeah, situation. Yes. Okay.
Matthew Amster-Burton 25:41
All right. So let's talk a little bit about your new record, which Molly and I both been listening to all week, and we love it. What what's a song of the record that you're especially excited about? And we'll link to the whole album, of course, I'd love to point listeners to a favorite song,
Speaker 3 25:55
man. Um, I would have to say the title track. Wait till I get over. It's really special to me. I grew up in a backwoods country church. And every Sunday, they would do this style of singing called lining hymns. And as a kid, I hated them so much. I just thought they were so boring. I thought they were like, so old fashioned. But now when I go back to Hillary Ville, and I go back home, they no longer do the lining hymns. And now I realized that the elders were trying to instill a tradition within me. And I really wanted to honor and pay homage to them on my record, so I tried to do a song loosely based in aligning him style.
Matthew Amster-Burton 26:42
Yeah, okay. Yeah, that was one of my favorites, too. I love the fact that verse song, also Jerry Marie's that was called Yeah, so beautiful. Yeah.
Unknown Speaker 26:50
Thank you so much. Yes,
Matthew Amster-Burton 26:51
I told I told Molly. Like, I wouldn't make you geek out on singing the whole time. But I'm a vocalist. Also, I love your voice. And I just want to say you got like the most like, powerful a for that. That just like rings out so perfectly that I wish I could do just like that. Oh, thank
Speaker 3 27:07
you so much. Yeah, this record was all about being free. And I'm allowed belty singer, and I just wanted to lean in on that a lot. Yeah.
Molly 27:18
I also wanted to say congratulations on your first Pride and on coming out. Thank you. Yeah, I am someone who came out. You know it well into adulthood. And it's pretty great.
Speaker 3 27:30
Molly, thank you so much for that. This has been the most freeing year of my life. Yeah. And I've just been having a little hot boy summer here. You know. It's just so awesome. It's so awesome. Pride was so late. It was so great.
Molly 27:46
Congratulations. Oh, so happy for you. And I know that feeling in my own life. So I'm so happy for you.
Matthew Amster-Burton 27:53
Thank you, sir. And is there anything else you would like to plug?
Speaker 3 27:56
I'm going to be on the road for the rest of the year, starting in Japan this week. Oh, wow. And headed to Newport festival later and London and Paris. I'm going to do a whole US tour in September, October in the beginning of November. So check me out the RAND dash jones.com for the dates. I'd love to see some listeners out there.
Matthew Amster-Burton 28:19
One more question now that I know you're heading to Japan, which is one of our favorite places to eat. What's What's something you're looking forward to eating in Japan?
Speaker 3 28:27
Oh my gosh, is so much. I really want to try all the regional Robins. Oh yes. I'm gonna go to Okinawa, Osaka and Tokyo. I'm looking at my suitcase right now I kept the whole empty part of it because I really heard about these like Michelin star. There's a Michelin star restaurant that came out with an instant ramen. Really expensive to get it shipped here but it's super cheap over there. Like it's like, you know, it's only a couple of years or something along those lines. And so I want to pack a bunch of those definitely would love to go get some great
Matthew Amster-Burton 29:02
sushi. You gotta have a wonderful time. Oh my god. I can't wait my god.
Molly 29:05
I can't wait. Amazing. Oh, I have the best time. I will. Congratulations on the new album. Oh, thank you
Unknown Speaker 29:13
so much. Really appreciate you guys.
Matthew Amster-Burton 29:15
Alright, Duran thanks again for being out spilled milk.
Unknown Speaker 29:17
Thank you so much.
Molly 29:21
Oh, man, Durant Jones. Thank you again.
Matthew Amster-Burton 29:24
Yeah, let's, let's see, we can get him back. And you know, Duran Jones is on the same record label as past guests. Michelle's honor, and just just say in if any publicity publicist is listening, some other people on the same label are Phoebe Bridgers and Mitski. Just saying we'd be happy to have him on. I wasn't even gonna say that. I was just gonna like just saying, Okay, that was
Molly 29:46
fantastic. And yeah, we will post Durant's recipe on the website, and we all need to go out and get the appropriate cookware for the occasion.
Matthew Amster-Burton 29:57
magnalite And what This is this is gonna be like a joke for like two people and possibly not even a joke. But another another band that undead oceans is Slowdive whose most famous album was called Super Locky in like 1994. Like classic shoegaze album. What if we got someone from Slowdive on the show to talk about actual souvlaki?
Molly 30:21
I think that would be great.
Matthew Amster-Burton 30:22
Okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna see if we can do this. Okay. They'll say no, but Okay,
Molly 30:27
great. All right, Matthew, do we have any spilled mail today?
Matthew Amster-Burton 30:30
We sure do. And it's, it's very short. So we asked listeners what spilled milks listeners should be called like I made up the term Lily Lister, I'd like to Yum, which you hated but someone one person actually used in an email. And so far we've gotten two responses and so it's not too late to weigh in contact. It's spilled milk podcast.com What do you think has spilled milk listeners should be called so here's what we've got so far. Listener Megan recommends milkmaids or c l o s MP which stands for a collective listeners of spilled milk podcast which is pronounced clump the S is silent. I
Molly 31:08
I really like that
Matthew Amster-Burton 31:09
I kind of do it like like this. This one goes out to the club. Like only only like, you know longtime clubbers are gonna know what we're talking about here. You said there was another one too? Oh, yeah. From listener Dan. spellcasters Spielberg stirs
Molly 31:23
I like it. Yeah.
Matthew Amster-Burton 31:25
Okay. Okay, I like all of these so far. I think I'm gonna like the one I'm gonna actually start saying is clump because it's the most fun to say. Okay, I like the idea that that rather than being a name for an individual Lister, it's more of like a Borg sort of thing. Yes. That our listeners have been assimilated into a collective
Molly 31:45
Yes. A hive hive mind yes. All right. That's they're working hard to bring us our next episode.
Matthew Amster-Burton 31:51
That's right. Oh, wait, the way it works is like listeners listeners are like like our drones.
Molly 31:56
I was just imagining like this buzzing mind out there that's like thinking up our next episodes.
Matthew Amster-Burton 32:02
No, I would love that thinking of episodes is hard. It is really hard.
Molly 32:05
Especially when we are on number.
Matthew Amster-Burton 32:09
Oh 607
Molly 32:15
Like sometimes it feels like a joke how long we've been doing this show it
Matthew Amster-Burton 32:18
does seem like a joke and yet and then like someone will say like you never did an episode on like cereal. I'm like oh my god we never did an episode we did do many episodes on cereal. That was a bad example but like
Molly 32:30
I think we haven't done a spaghetti episode.
Matthew Amster-Burton 32:32
That's right and right yeah for Well,
Molly 32:34
okay. Wow. All right. Matthew
Matthew Amster-Burton 32:36
has spoken no we should do a spaghetti episode Great
Molly 32:39
and Powerful Matthew.
Matthew Amster-Burton 32:41
Yeah, I'm like, like you know Don't look behind the curtain because you'll see my but that's what happens is Wizard of Oz. Right
Molly 32:50
it's right that's that's exactly why you don't look
Matthew Amster-Burton 32:54
at the wizard shower because in the shower Yes. Yeah. Oh, the hive mind is at work here. Okay, okay king of things that buzz? Yeah,
Molly 33:05
do you have a now but wow
Matthew Amster-Burton 33:14
it's called Honey bees and distant thunder by Riku aundha. That that was the best segue we've ever done. Right?
Molly 33:22
That was really good. Wow.
Matthew Amster-Burton 33:25
So this is this is the first the English translation for the first time in English of a book that was a massive bestseller and winner of the now key prize which is a huge literature prize in Japan when it was first published in 2016. And Vico oanda. Like, like I feel like more so in Japan than in the US, like writers often work in like several different genres. And so like the I've read two previous books by Nico Ondine, one of them was like a mystery, like a really interesting, like multiple points of view, like, mystery that was fantastic, called the outsider murders. And this book is completely different. It is about three young people participating in a classical piano competition. And I'm about halfway through and it's not really what I expected in that, like, so far, at least, the drama doesn't really hang on who wins the competition. And like if I was going to describe the book at this point, I would say it's sort of about how music can ruin your life. But if something is gonna ruin your life, which it probably is, music is a pretty good choice.
Molly 34:30
So it's just like a cheerful pessimism.
Matthew Amster-Burton 34:33
It's sort of a cheerful pessimism. Is that a? I don't think I know that term. But I but I immediately get what you mean.
Molly 34:39
Yeah, no, no, I mean, I think I think that Well, I think of you and I have both read 4000 weeks by Oliver Berkman. Right. I think of that as a cheerful, pessimistic Yeah, cheerfully. pessimistic book. That's great.
Matthew Amster-Burton 34:51
Yeah. So it's so it's about like, you know, the these young people and like their relationship with music and like, you know, it's a lot of stuff about Classical music which I don't think of myself as really being interested in, but like this book makes it interesting and really brings it to life. Honeybees and distant thunder. And also like she is just a wildly good writer and like, you know, describes things in very unexpected ways and is just like the way she describes music is extremely vivid and unexpected. And I also like I also read her book night picnic in Japanese, which is also a very unusual book that I hope gets translated next, because it's really good.
Molly 35:28
Wow, okay. This is fantastic. The this sounds really interesting. So that is honeybees and distant thunder by Vico onda. Yep. And it's out now. Great. Well, our producer is Abby circuit tele,
Matthew Amster-Burton 35:42
Molly's got a newsletter that you may have already subscribed to. But if you haven't, you should, because it's called I've got a feeling and it's available at Molly weisenberg.substack.com. And it's I'm always so excited when it lands in my inbox.
Molly 35:54
Thanks. Um, I'm excited that I get to write it. You know, like, I wrote about food for a long time, and I like writing about food. But what I really like about this substack is I kind of get to do whatever I want. Yeah,
Matthew Amster-Burton 36:06
that's what I like about it, too. I never know what I'm gonna get, but I know it's going to be something good. Great. Thanks, Matthew. I mentioned this a while back and may have already plugged it on the show, but it will definitely be out by the time you hear this because I'm like submitting it today. My band early to the airport did a cover of Robin song dancing on my own with that lead vocals by me. And that's wherever you get music.
Molly 36:28
All right, everybody. And yeah, the band name again is early to the airport. Check that out. Okay, you should talk with other spilled milk listeners at everything spilled. milk.reddit.com
Matthew Amster-Burton 36:39
Yep, probably maybe that maybe like a gumbo debate is already breaking out. That would make me so happy while breaking out like pimples. Yeah, maybe maybe like everyone's breaking out and sharing like as remedies. Yeah. Yep. Like someone Someone should start a thread about, like, what should spilled milk listeners be called? That would be a great way to shoot ideas back and forth. On the clump. It's the it's the clump, but I still want more. Okay, yeah, thanks again. Like and we should once again Duran Jones, this album is called wait till I get over and you can you can hear that anywhere you get music and it's fantastic. And till next time. Thank you for listening to spilled milk.
Molly 37:16
The show that's full of SassaFrass dance slime. Yeah, I'm Molly Weissenberg. And
Matthew Amster-Burton 37:23
I'm Matthew Amster-Burton.
Molly 37:30
head to tail.
Matthew Amster-Burton 37:31
Yeah, with their tails. You know, let's let's grab it. Let's do an episode of i Dumbo like an elephant that can fly. You know, we
Molly 37:39
have one of those bumbo seats.
Matthew Amster-Burton 37:41
Oh, is that Yeah. Were you like the you like kind of cram the baby into it? Yeah, so I
Molly 37:45
mean, you know, gumbo mumbo jumbo mumbo jumbo
Matthew Amster-Burton 37:52
Dalton Trumbo. Who's that? Ah, he was like an actor, maybe a screenwriter. Okay,
Molly 38:01
cool. Let's do that too.
Matthew Amster-Burton 38:03
Maybe Maybe he got like embroiled in the, you know, Red Scare, like McCarthyism.
Molly 38:10
Um, Matthew, should we do this? Let's do this. Let's do this.