A Curious Appetite with Dr Alessandra Pino

Nina Atesh: Dining with the Devil

What happens when history itself becomes a magic trick? In this episode of A Curious Appetite, I am joined by writer, director, and Artistic Director of Pither Productions, Nina Atesh, to discuss In League with the Devil, her fascinating new play inspired by the extraordinary life of Erik Jan Hanussen: illusionist, clairvoyant, celebrity showman, fraudster, political opportunist, and one of the most enigmatic figures of twentieth-century Europe. Together we explore the challenges of researching a man who spent his life reinventing himself, blurring the boundaries between fact, fiction, performance, and belief. We discuss historical truth, psychological horror, charismatic manipulators, cults, scammers, influencers, and why audiences continue to be drawn towards certainty, spectacle, and the promise of hidden knowledge. We also delve into the theatrical process behind the production, including Nina's collaboration with legendary illusionist Simon Drake and mind reader Graham Jolley, whose work helped recreate some of Hanussen's techniques on stage. Along the way we discuss theatre-making, pub theatre culture, the changing economics of performance, and the enduring magic of gathering together in a room to experience a story unfold in real time. Because this is still A Curious Appetite, we also talk food memories, childhood kitchens, Cypriot family meals, smoky bacon crisps, Sunday roasts, and the surprising connections between cooking and theatre. Both rely on ritual, timing, community, and a little bit of everyday magic. We also touch upon horror theatre, GrimFest, Kim Newman, creative collaboration, and the strange power of performance to make us believe, if only for a moment, in something impossible. * Erik Jan Hanussen * Illusion, magic, and performance * Historical research and unreliable sources * Psychological horror and theatrical storytelling * Cult leaders, scammers, and charisma * Simon Drake and stage illusion * Graham Jolley and mind reading * Pither Productions and GrimFest * Kim Newman and horror culture * Pub theatre and creative communities * Cyprus, Canada, and England * Food memories and family kitchens * Smoky bacon crisps * Theatre, ritual, and belief Special thanks to Nina Atesh, Simon Drake, Graham Jolley, Kim Newman, and everyone at Pither Productions for their generosity, creativity, and for helping bring one of the most intriguing theatrical projects I have encountered in recent years to life. Hosted by Dr Alessandra Pino. A podcast exploring how food shapes memory, identity, longing, fear, culture, and storytelling. 📩 Contact: acuriousappetite@gmail.com Artwork: @medusazzz Audio Production: @thedeliciouslegacy Music: @manu_pino_1111 Useful Links * Pither Productions * GrimFest London Horror Theatre Festival * Simon Drake's House of Magic [https://www.simondrake.com/?utm_source=chatgpt.com]

Dorothy Barrick: Feeding the Frame- The Art of Food in Film

What kind of job requires you to carry knives, toothpicks, pastry brushes, chopping boards, glycerine spray, and sometimes half a kitchen in the back of your car? Food styling. In this episode of A Curious Appetite with Dr Alessandra Pino, I’m joined by Dorothy Barrick, known as Dot, a food stylist and home economist whose work brings food to life on screen in ways that are often invisible, but absolutely essential. We talk about what it really means to work behind the scenes on film sets, from preparing edible props to understanding how food behaves under lights, heat, pressure, and repetition. A dish might need to look fresh for hours. It might need to be eaten repeatedly by an actor. It might need to appear identical across multiple takes. And sometimes it needs to do something stranger altogether, like ooze, collapse, bleed, or stand in for something else entirely. I first came across Dot’s work through The Radleys (2024), based on Matt Haig’s novel, where food becomes part of the film’s unsettling emotional atmosphere. We explore how food on screen creates mood, reveals character, and shapes tension, especially in horror and uncanny cinema. We also discuss: • Working on The Roses [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt31973693/]with Olivia Colman and Benedict Cumberbatch • Nicholas Hoult’s enthusiastic eating on The Great [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2235759/] • Horror food styling and beautifully grotesque visual tricks • Cooked watermelon used as tuna sashimi • Pear standing in for delicate raw fish • Continuity, repetition, and the pressure of keeping food camera-ready • Fashion, colour, design, and food as visual storytelling We also spend time discussing Babette’s Feast [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092603/], one of the great films about food, grief, memory, and transformation. Dot reflects beautifully on the meditative power of baking and how repetitive, intricate culinary tasks can help us process difficult moments and sit quietly with ourselves. And of course, because this is A Curious Appetite, we end with food memories: childhood casseroles, the horror of beef tongue, oysters, whelks, seafood towers, and the foods that stay with us. This episode is a deep dive into the mysterious, meticulous, and often under-credited world of food on film. Because next time you watch a scene and think “that food looks incredible,” it is worth asking: who made it look that way? Useful links: Dorothy Barrick / @dotscookin [https://www.instagram.com/dotscookin/] Cherry Bombe interview [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMguduK0buk] with Dorothy Barrick and Olivia Colman Fear Feasts podcast episode on The Radleys [https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-family-that-bloodsucks-together-the-radleys/id1672786626?i=1000688914541] A Curious Appetite Substack [https://substack.com/@dralessandrapino] 📧 acuriousappetite@gmail.com 🎧 Available now on all major podcast platforms. Artwork by @medusazzz Audio by @thedeliciouslegacy Music by @manu_pino_1111

Richard Crampton-Platt: Pasta and Prejudice

This episode was not sponsored by Greggs. But it begins with a sausage roll! I’m joined by Richard Crampton-Platt (you might know him as @thegreedydick). We talk about chicken rolls and why they disappoint. Raw chicken sushi and what “safe” really means. Why Britain trusts takeaways and Italy doesn’t. Food delivery and what it reveals about how we live. The myth of pizza margherita. Carbonara, cream, and the illusion of authenticity. Food smuggling, migration, and adaptation. And why food feels different from art or music.  It starts light It turns philosophical And somewhere along the way it becomes about trust. Because food is the one thing we choose to put inside our bodies. And that always says more than we think. Read more on Substack https://substack.com/@dralessandrapino Email: acuriousappetite@gmail.com Artwork by @medusazzz Audio by @thedeliciouslegacy Music by @manu_pino_1111  Useful links and references Richard Crampton-Platt’ [https://thegreedydick.substack.com/about]s writing, videos and restaurant commentary can be found via The Greedy Dick on Substack [https://thegreedydick.substack.com/?utm_source=mention&utm_content=writes] and his wider online platforms.  Café Britaly, Peckham Richard discusses founding Café Britaly [https://www.instagram.com/cafe.britaly/], a British-Italian café in Peckham, and its playful approach to “Britalian” food, including carbonara with cream and a fried egg [https://www.instagram.com/p/C7WlXtFoRL0/].  Bocca di Lupo, Soho Richard talks about working at Bocca di Lupo [https://www.boccadilupo.com/], the regional Italian restaurant in Soho, which helped shape his understanding of Italian food and food history.  Britalian food and Italian cafés in Britain Topics include British-Italian greasy spoons, post-war Italian café culture in London, and the blending of British and Italian food traditions. Greggs sausage rolls Richard mentions Greggs expanding its sausage roll range, including pork, vegan and chicken [https://www.greggs.com/menu/product/chicken-roll-1003417] sausage rolls. Bovril The conversation touches on Bovril [https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/s2e6-b-is-for-beef-wellington-brains-bovril/id1743840806?i=1000708415574], Bovril on toast, Bovril as stock, Bovril in Arctic contexts, and its role in British food memory. Claude Lévi-Strauss, “The Culinary Triangle [https://miac2fooddesign.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/levi-strauss-and-culinary-triangle1.pdf]” Discussed in relation to broth, boiling, food preparation and social bonding.  Sidney Mintz- Sweetness and Power [https://archive.org/details/sweetnesspowerpl0000mint](1985) Mentioned in relation to industrialisation, sugar, work, pleasure and modern eating habits. Fellini’s Satyricon [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064940/] / Trimalchio’s feast Richard discusses Fellini’s strange, uncanny representation of Roman feasting, excess and food spectacle. Carbonara and authenticity The episode explores carbonara as a contested dish, including cream, pancetta, guanciale, egg, authenticity and cultural negotiation. Zuppa Inglese [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zuppa_inglese] Mentioned as an Italian dessert whose name translates as “English soup”, and as an example of Anglo-Italian culinary overlap. Fagioli all’uccelletto [https://www.lacucinaitaliana.com/italian-food/italian-dishes/fagioli-alluccelletto-tuscan-bean-recipe] Mentioned in relation to beans, sage and their transformation within a British breakfast context. Full English breakfast and global variations The conversation touches on full English breakfasts, British breakfast culture, and variations such as full Turkish, full Greek and other cultural reinterpretations. A Full English on Pizza? [https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/full-english-pizza] La Cucina Italiana [https://www.lacucinaitaliana.com/] Richard mentions looking through La Cucina Italiana for elaborate celebratory dishes, including timbales. Le Gavroche [https://www.le-gavroche.co.uk/]and the Roux family Discussed in relation to French food in Britain, ingredient sourcing and the challenges of early fine dining in the UK. Delivery food and food trust The episode compares British and Italian attitudes to takeaway, delivery apps, trust, ingredients and food safety. Food safety, industrialisation and adulteration Topics include adulterated bread, chalk, alum, salmonella fears, raw chicken in Japan, and different cultural attitudes to risk. Mussolini, rural fantasy and Italian food nostalgia Richard mentions the darker historical roots of certain romanticised images of rural Italian food culture. A is for Apple: Bovril episode Alessandra mentions having discussed Bovril previously on A is for Apple. [https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/s2e6-b-is-for-beef-wellington-brains-bovril/id1743840806?i=1000708415574]

Emiliano Amore: On Love for the Liminal Larder

In this episode, I speak with chef and writer Emiliano Amore, who writes Britalian on Substack, about migration, identity, adaptation, and what he beautifully calls “the liminal larder” that space between cultures where Branston pickle meets pecorino, cheddar finds its way into lasagna, and food becomes a language of belonging. Born in Rome and now based in England, his work emerges directly from this in-between space. We talk about Britalian identity, culinary stereotypes, emotional ingredients, recipes as memory, and the idea that adaptation is not compromise but a form of becoming. Throughout, we return to the idea that food carries emotional weight, that it holds memory, longing, and the quiet traces of where we have been and who we are becoming. I can’t tell you how much I loved this conversation with Emiliano. It is a rich, thoughtful exploration of home, appetite, and the stories we tell through what we eat. Read more on my Substack https://substack.com/@dralessandrapino Artwork by @medusazzz Audio by @thedeliciouslegacy Music by @manu_pino_1111  Useful links/references ⁠Emiliano's substack⁠ [https://emilianochef.substack.com/] an online cookbook and writing project exploring Italian and British food cultures Lou Taylor, [https://blogs.brighton.ac.uk/artsbrighton/2009/07/05/fashion-textiles-and-dress-history-a-personal-perspective-by-lou-taylor/] artist Russell Norman [https://www.curtisbrown.co.uk/client/russell-norman], award-winning restaurateur associated with Polpo and Brutto, often linked to the idea of Britalian cooking styles M. F. K. Fisher [https://mfkfisher.org/], American food writer exploring food, desire, memory, and identity Panikos Panayi [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panikos_Panayi], Spicing Up Britain, a study of migration and the transformation of British food culture Hannah Glasse [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannah_Glasse], The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy (1747), an influential British cookbook including early references to pasta such as vermicelli and macaroni The Grand Tour [https://www.historic-uk.com/CultureUK/Grand-Tour/], eighteenth-century travel tradition through which British elites encountered Italian culture, art, and food The eighteenth-century “macaronis [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macaroni_(fashion)]”, British dandies returning from the Grand Tour associated with cosmopolitan taste and Italian influence Pier Paolo Pasolini [https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001596/], Italian writer and filmmaker associated with representations of marginal, subcultural Italy Anna Magnani, [https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0536167/] Italian actress emblematic of a raw, authentic Italian cultural identity Cesare Pavese [https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/cesare-pavese], Italian writer exploring themes of place, identity, and modernity Vivienne Westwood, [https://www.britannica.com/biography/Vivienne-Westwood] British designer representing alternative and subcultural British identity Nigel Slater, [https://www.nigelslater.com/] British food writer known for intimate, domestic, and reflective food writing Fleabag [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5687612/], British television series exploring contemporary identity and emotional life St John [https://stjohnrestaurant.com/], London restaurant known for nose-to-tail cooking and the use of offal in British cuisine

A is for Apple Podcast is back with Season C

A is for Apple is back with a brand new season. I’m delighted to share that Season C has officially begun. Hosted by me Dr Alessandra Pino, alongside Sam Bilton and Dr Neil Buttery, the podcast returns with more curious ingredients, unexpected histories, and playful explorations of food through the alphabet. https://podcasts.apple.com/it/podcast/s3e1-c-is-for-carbonado-carrot-cabinet-pudding/id1743840806?i=1000756719333 [https://podcasts.apple.com/it/podcast/s3e1-c-is-for-carbonado-carrot-cabinet-pudding/id1743840806?i=1000756719333]