Protect your collars and don't crowd the meatballs because its time for Turmeric Talk! We're inspired by milk and soup as we enter a postmodern firestorm discussing everything from shoots, roots and rhizomes, the haunting presence of silent letters and the potential sales figures for a flip book of gifs. Whatever you do, don't call it a root!
Yasmin Fahr’s Lemony Chicken-Feta Meatball Soup with Spinach
Molly also likes the Turmeric Ginger tea from Rishi
Golden milk from Swasthi’s Recipes website
Matthew Amster-Burton 0:04
Hi, I'm Molly, and I'm Matthew, and
Molly 0:06
this is spilled milk, the show where we cook something delicious, eat it all, and you can't have any.
Speaker 1 0:10
And today we're talking about turmeric, yeah, or some people say turmeric. Some people say turmeric. I think I say turmeric. I realize as it came out of my mouth, yeah? Like, like the word, not the stuff. I tend to, yeah. I tend to pronounce all the letters in the word. Do you do that for every word, every word, that's right. So I remember at one point as a kid thinking like, the fact that the B is silent and the word subtle is like the most bonkers shit I'd ever heard. You
Molly 0:37
know what I still find perplexing, and sometimes, like, I can't think too much about it, or I get myself sort of turned around. Is how salmon became salmon and not salmon? Yeah, when we call salmonella, salmonella and we call Salmon Rushdie, Salmon Rushdie, that's right, not salmon, that's not Salmon Rushdie, right? Now we're talking about turmeric, talking turmeric. This is turmeric talk with Molly and Matthew. You know, strangely, this one was suggested by me. Okay,
Matthew Amster-Burton 1:04
host Molly, thanks for coming on the show again. Let me start by asking you, why did you select turmeric for this week's episode? And was soup involved? There
Molly 1:15
was a soup involved. Okay, so I'm going through a period where I'm subscribing to New York Times cooking again, okay, as I believe I've mentioned, I cancel and rejoin frequently. So I went through the New York Times cooking website recently, and was just sort of listening through the whole thing, the whole thing hours I spent days on there. Yeah, no, I was looking for just some new recipes. And I love meatballs, and I really like meatballs in soup. And I came upon this recipe that was called, like, lemony chicken feta meatball soup with spinach. It has a lot of turmeric in it, like, a lot of turmeric. Like, there's a little bit in the meatballs, but then there's a lot in the broth. So it is a kind of lovely, like, cloudy, turmeric colored broth.
Matthew Amster-Burton 1:58
Yeah, I would say this made like, three hearty servings of soup and had a tablespoon plus half a teaspoon of turmeric, I think at least a tablespoon. Yeah, it could have been more a tablespoon for the broth, and then more than one meatballs. Yeah, that's exactly
Molly 2:15
right. Okay, that sounds right. A spoiler alert, it was really delicious. We'll talk more about it, and we'll link to it in the show notes. But it made me think, Ah, I think this is the topic we haven't done yet. Correct episode 696,
Matthew Amster-Burton 2:30
yeah. So all right, we should talk about we'll talk about turmeric, and then we'll talk about soup, and then we'll put them, those things together. Great. Okay, have we done an episode? It's just about soup? No, I don't think we should. It's too broad a topic, but I realized when you said, like, you love meatballs in soup, I feel like I've almost never made a meatball soup, and I have no good reason, because it is delicious.
Molly 2:50
It's delicious. And I mean, like, what about Italian wedding soup? That's a meatball. I've eaten it, but I've never made it. I don't know. I think the other thing about it is, I don't know. I'm pretty iffy on meat, but ground meat, when
Matthew Amster-Burton 3:04
I was like, You really, like, like, you got more up close and personal with this ground chicken that I think of you being comfortable with. No, no.
Molly 3:11
I mean, I'm fine with it, but, but like, meatballs and ground beef or something, I'm always game for making Okay, so anyway, yeah, I love a good meatball and soup. All right, let's go down memory lane. I have not much memory lane here. Yeah, I think that maybe if I had grown up outside of the Center of America, maybe I would, or maybe not, with like, white American parents, right?
Matthew Amster-Burton 3:35
I have a little bit of turmeric memory lane. One time we spilled turmeric on like a white painted shelf, and it turned into a yellow shelf. Forever, forever more. It's a natural dye.
Molly 3:47
It is a natural dye. It's not light fast I learned so, you know, maybe, maybe you should. We
Matthew Amster-Burton 3:52
should have taken our this was in an old apartment, so it's no we foisted the problem onto someone else. Okay, well, yeah, when people came to like, look at the apartment, we kept the cupboard closed. We didn't own it or anything, just, we were just embarrassed. I've used turmeric in making Thai curry paste. And, like, I've made homemade cow soy a couple times, which has turmeric in the in the curry paste. And otherwise, mostly I've used it in Indian cooking. Like, my favorite Chana Masala recipe has quite a bit of turmeric in it.
Molly 4:23
You know, you're mentioning cow soy reminds me that there was a Thai place that my dad especially loved in Oklahoma City, and he would always order cow soy, and he was always wearing, my dad wasn't like a T shirt, man, okay, he was always wearing, like, a shirt with a collar, yeah, that checks out. If you're gonna eat cow soy, you need, like, either a bib or no shirt maybe, yeah,
Matthew Amster-Burton 4:49
like, turn it in, like, tuck it in somehow, anyway,
Molly 4:53
he would always get cow soy on his clothing. Yeah, always. That was the end of that. That's adorable.
Matthew Amster-Burton 4:59
No, I love. It Okay, so turmeric. What is this stuff? You did the research? Yeah.
Molly 5:05
So I want to say right off the bat that, like, it's really difficult to talk about turmeric or read anything without someone interrupting you, right? Or read anything about turmeric without getting into, like, a whole lot of claims about health benefits, sure, and certainly, I mean, I mean, I want to say that it's been used medicinally in India for at least 5000 years, and it's a big part of a lot of folk medicine traditions, but we today, disclaimer are not going to be either affirming or debunking any health claims today.
Matthew Amster-Burton 5:35
Yeah, one, one thing I did want to say about that, though, is that the fact that it's become like a health food among people outside of those traditions, there is one, like, nice benefit from that, which is that it's very easy to find in like, average Western grocery stores now fresh turmeric, which, which was definitely not the case when I started getting interested in Thai and Indian cooking. That is a good point. Yeah, that's a very good point. So, yeah. So I have like, a little, a little nub of fresh turmeric here that I got at the co op that even at the co op they wouldn't have had, like, 15 years ago.
Molly 6:05
Yeah. I mean, I wonder if people like juice that stuff. Oh, I think they juice the shit out of it. Probably, yeah. Okay, so what is this stuff? Matthew, we're gonna do a little botany.
Matthew Amster-Burton 6:16
Okay, okay, yeah, there's a word you're gonna say that I was afraid you were gonna say, because last, last time it set off some sort of Firestorm.
Molly 6:22
Oh, not really. Post Modern fire. Post Modern Firestorm,
Matthew Amster-Burton 6:27
okay? And post modern Firestorm for something,
Molly 6:31
okay, that's what I wrote my my master's thesis on. Okay, sure is modern Firestorm. Yep.
Matthew Amster-Burton 6:36
No. Okay, so you mean the professional wrestler. So
Molly 6:39
turmeric is a perennial
Matthew Amster-Burton 6:43
plant matching post modern Firestorm. Like, I don't know what their outfit is, yet, we'll workshop that. But they like, they come into the ring, and they like, give one of these speeches, but the speech is like, am I here, or am I not here? Like, are any of us really
Molly 6:56
here? Like, an existential Firestorm? No. Like,
Matthew Amster-Burton 7:00
I think, I think like, post modernism is more about the nature of reality, and existentialism is about like, the the like nature of existence. Okay, like, like, are those different things? There's a lot of overlap.
Molly 7:15
Whatever. It's been a long time since I was in grad school, 20 years this. Wow. How are you
Matthew Amster-Burton 7:22
celebrating your 2020, year anniversary of not having to be in grad school by
Molly 7:27
doing this show? Great. All right, so this stuff, what we call turmeric. It is a plant in the ginger family, which I would like you to pronounce. Zinjiber AC Zinga, baracie, wow. Okay, the genus is curcuma, which is a word that you will also see, like often on labels of term related things, and we'll talk more about that in a minute. But Okay, so basically, this is a perennial plant, and it is rhizomatous, rhizomatous, rhizomatous. And so just as a reminder, rhizomes everyone. So you know how most plants that that we might picture? Let's picture a daisy, for instance. All right, I'm doing it. It's got a stem. The main stem of it is above the ground, yeah, it goes perpendicular to the ground, right? Yeah. Okay, so rhizomes are these root like stems that grow underground, yeah, I've heard them called lateral stems, yeah, that makes sense. So they kind of look like roots, but they're technically stems. They grow horizontally, underground, and they have all these nodes on them from which shoots and roots can grow, can
Matthew Amster-Burton 8:35
ladders grow from them, shoots and ladders. Oh, boy. Okay, I think I just got turmeric on my rug. A single
Molly 8:42
section of a rhizome can grow into a new plant. So, like, if you've ever grown irises, bearded irises, I think these are rhizomes. Okay, sure. I'm pretty darn sure I grow them and anyway, they spread like crazy through these, like, horizontal tuber type things. Okay, so that's what
Matthew Amster-Burton 8:58
we've got. That's what I've got in my hand here. I just, like, like, peeled this with a spoon and, like, and it's the color of a carrot. Oh, it's very much the color of carrot. Smells really good. Okay, can I smell it? Yeah, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna, like, just taste a little right off of this rhizome, right
Molly 9:11
off of the rhizome. Oh, it smells quite ginger. It smells like a cross between ginger and a carrot.
Matthew Amster-Burton 9:16
So it's much milder than ginger or galangal. It's very good. Wow,
Molly 9:21
interesting. Okay, there are like, 40 different species of the plant we call turmeric. Okay, I didn't know that, and it's native to the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia, because, fittingly, it requires warm temperatures and a lot of moisture. It's the rhizomes that are used. I mean, it produces these lovely flowers, but it's the rhizomes that are used both for propagation and for consumption. So we refer to turmeric root, but it's really a rhizome.
Matthew Amster-Burton 9:51
Okay? So we will, we will never again say turmeric root. We will only say rhizome. Turmeric
Molly 9:55
rhizome. So what else do we need to know about this? So. Turmeric rhizomes can be used fresh, like this one we've got here, or you can boil them in water and dry them and then grind them. And that is how most turmeric is, you know, used these days, all right. It's used, of course, in cooking, which we're going to talk about more. It's also used as a coloring, and the color comes from curcumin, right, which is the name of a chemical that the plant produces, yeah,
Matthew Amster-Burton 10:24
can we, can we, like, name a class of chemicals that it's, that it's part of, I don't, I'm not trying to
Molly 10:30
set you up here. No, I deleted that part, okay, from Wikipedia. Okay, wow,
Matthew Amster-Burton 10:34
okay, yeah. I just No, no one is allowed to know. No,
Molly 10:39
no, no. I mean, like, sometimes I will take whole chunks from Wikipedia, paste them into the agenda, and then, you know, use whatever I want from it, and cut away the rest, sure, and I cut away the chemical stuff. That's fine. Yeah. I thought this was kind of interesting. So turmeric has spread along with, like, human migration. And the thing is, is unlike seeds or whatever turmeric requires human migration for it to spread, right? Because you got to carry the rhizome,
Matthew Amster-Burton 11:07
hmm, but, like, but it covered, like, before that it covered some ground, like, like, it spreads very slowly. That's
Molly 11:14
true. I mean, I think it, the thing with a rhizome, is it, it continually grows, seeking, like, nutrients and moisture. So yeah, rhizomes inherently will continue spreading underground. They could be under us right now, that's right. But for instance, this stuff was used a lot by Austronesian peoples, so kind of around what what is today Indonesia. And they took turmeric with them throughout the Pacific Islands, like to Hawaii all the way to Madagascar, okay. Anyway, yeah, Matthew, there's like, not a lot of interesting stuff for Mr. Etymology to tell us, but maybe you could tell us, like some of these. All
Matthew Amster-Burton 11:55
right. Well, the name derived from from Middle English or early modern English as turmeride or tarmaret. It may be of Latin origin from Terra Marita, meritorious Earth. Maybe, I don't know that sounds like kind of too good a story. Well.
Molly 12:11
And also, if this stuff was on like the Indian subcontinent for so long, Wikipedia, why didn't you have anything about the Indian name, yeah.
Matthew Amster-Burton 12:20
So I suspect let's, let's look this up. Mr. Etymology is going to do some research right here on the show.
Matthew Amster-Burton 12:35
Okay, so I want to, I want to translate, like, from English to Hindi Haldi.
Molly 12:41
This makes a lot of sense, because in a minute, we're gonna talk about golden milk. Okay? And golden milk is called Haldi something, or something Haldi in Hindu, right? I think
Matthew Amster-Burton 12:52
we're gonna make it. Oh, great. Okay, we'll see. I forgot about that until now, but let's do it. Okay, cool. I
Molly 12:58
mean, this stuff is used in lots of different places, all over the place. But I hadn't it's used in lots of different ways all over the place. Sorry,
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:08
laughing because I just noticed a really funny auto correct. Oh, let me
Molly 13:11
see this list. Where is it? Okay, okay, I'm looking for it.
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:16
It's the first line of the list of application, list of culinary uses. It is used in the Moroccan spice blend, Rosal hangout. I
Molly 13:30
don't think that's auto cook. I think that's my Okay, yeah, because I typed these out.
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:36
Okay, all right. So, yeah, you're welcome. I mean, like, if you're gonna have a Hangout, like, why wouldn't you want something Ras Al Hanu spiced? Why not? Absolutely.
Molly 13:45
So, yeah, if you've ever used Ras Al hanut, there's some turmeric in there. It's used in South Africa to color white rice. It's also used in in the Philippines in their yellow rice.
Matthew Amster-Burton 13:59
Yeah. And it's used, like, I there's like, a Trader Joe's, like, chicken vindaloo that I eat often that has, that has turmeric rice that's just, like basmati rice, that's, that's turmeric. I like thrown turmeric in when making rice, just in my rice cooker at home. It just looks nice. I
Molly 14:16
think that a lot that in many different places, it's used to color things in place of saffron, because it's Sure, right? Satay, I don't know if you've ever noticed, like in satay, yeah, that that there's like a yellow color to it to the marinade. Some variants of Adobo have turmeric in them. The leaves of turmeric are sometimes used to steam, like sweet things the way that, the way that, like banana leaves, might be used in Thailand. Do you know what the leaves look like? I don't know what the grapes look like. Ban Shao in Vietnam.
Matthew Amster-Burton 14:50
I have used it in making this. Like, I haven't made buns in a long time, but I should, because it is so good and it's kind of fun to make, although, like the first the first one, you're like. Like, Oh, no, I've completely forgotten how to make this. And then, like the second one, it kind of comes together, like any crepes, yes, yeah, yeah.
Molly 15:06
But anyway, yeah, they get it gets its yellow color from that is such a good dish. Then, of course, like yellow curries, uh, turmeric soup in Southern Thai cuisine, shows them a lot in Southern Thai cuisine, yes. So it's used as a food color, and it's been assigned the code e1, 100. Yeah,
Matthew Amster-Burton 15:23
that's a UK thing, I think. Oh, it is e numbers, yeah, oh, okay, okay.
Molly 15:26
And of course, it's used to color, like, things that we think of as being naturally yellow, but maybe it's they're made more yellow mustard, like yellow mustard, yep, sometimes canned chicken broth. That
Matthew Amster-Burton 15:38
makes sense. Yeah?
Matthew Amster-Burton 15:49
So where do you use this stuff? I think, pretty much in like, like the things I described in memory lane and that you would remind me of so buns out, which I haven't made in a while, chana masala, which we'll link to, my favorite recipe, again, that's, that's a real family favorite, an instant pot recipe I made cow soy in too long. Also, like, I used it more like, like before, before becoming a parent, when I had, like, you know, apparently more time to cook. And now, like, you know, we're empty nesters, and I have time to cook again. So maybe turmeric is coming back into my heart. How have we described the flavor and the aroma.
Molly 16:22
I want to talk about that because can we
Matthew Amster-Burton 16:24
crack it up? So I got some pensies ground turmeric here, and we've got some fresh turmeric.
Molly 16:29
So I've never spent much time like just sniffing turmeric out of the jar. It smells really good. It's really, really good. It smells to me like, like a more mild and complex version of ginger, a little bit. Yeah, it's got,
Matthew Amster-Burton 16:44
it's got, like, a throatiness, and to be kind of a butteriness to it, I almost get
Molly 16:49
like a citrusy thing. Yeah, I don't know. It's got a smell that, yeah, goes to the back of my throat. Yeah, it's earthier smell than ginger, yeah, for sure, but it shows up a lot with ginger in various preparations,
Matthew Amster-Burton 17:05
like, go, go, like, back and forth between the the ground and the fresh, because there's, like, there's a lot of overlap, but also some differences, okay,
Molly 17:12
I'm amazed at how fresh this root smells, yeah, like it really smells like, it smells like this would make A delicious tea, yes. Oh, we should talk about that. Okay, let's talk about tea.
Matthew Amster-Burton 17:24
Because I, I've not, like made Turmeric Tea myself, but there's a there's a tea that I like to order at one of my local coffee shops. And I was actually planning to buy a box, even though it's like, expensive, fancy herbal tea, but it's Malabar tea from the Spirit Tea Company, okay? And it's made with ginger, lemongrass, turmeric, black peppercorn and licorice root. Like a really, like, you know, I'm feeling a little sniffly, like, it's a great tea for that. I
Molly 17:48
was gonna say, I know that turmeric is often used in concert with black pepper, oh, yeah, black peppers as part of, like, you know, a medicinal preparation or whatever, yeah.
Matthew Amster-Burton 18:01
But also, like two, two ingredients that just go really well together. Flavor wise. Looks
Molly 18:06
like licorice root often shows up with turmeric. So does lemongrass. Seems like we can't get away from licorice. It does seem like we can't get away from licorice. I've got here a tea that I had this morning. It's Reishi brand, turmeric, ginger. Very expensive stuff, probably not as expensive as the Malabar from spirit tea. But anyway, yeah, this one has ginger root, turmeric root, licorice root, lemon grass, orange peel, lemon peel, and essential oils of orange and lemon. Nice. Sounds good, delicious.
Matthew Amster-Burton 18:39
Okay, let's talk about turmeric milk, and then let's make some and try it. Okay,
Molly 18:43
so this stuff is also known as golden milk, and it's a traditional Indian beverage that has gotten very popular in Western countries in the last decade or so. Originally, it was made by taking fresh turmeric root and crushed a crushed long pepper called pipli. I'm not sure if I'm saying that right, and I guess steeping them in warm or hot whole milk. But now these days, they tend to use ground turmeric and black pepper often. They add other spices like cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger and yeah, it's supposed to have all kinds of health benefits, plus be tasty. All right,
Matthew Amster-Burton 19:19
so I'm gonna, I'm gonna pause this and make some golden milk, and then we're gonna taste it when we come back. Great. Okay, so, okay, golden, golden milk here from, from swasti's recipes. It's called Haldi, dude. I like it. It's a little strong for Molly, so I made it like, what, what the author says, is the classic style with just turmeric and black pepper and no sweetening or sweetener or other spices. And
Molly 19:47
how much milk did you use to how much turmeric and pepper?
Speaker 1 19:50
So it was almost a teaspoon of turmeric to a cup of milk, and like a quarter teaspoon of black pepper. Oh, wow, the pepper. I'm getting a lot of pepper. Almost really strong, yeah, oh yeah. Like, it is, like, there is, like
Molly 20:04
some pepper, so it's so much more of a flavor than I thought it would be, yeah, and
Matthew Amster-Burton 20:09
that, like, a lot of bitterness does come through from the turmeric. So, like, I think I might want a little bit of simple syrup in here if I was gonna drink it as, like, a, like, pleasure beverage. I do like it, though. Like, if you really want to know, like, what does turmeric taste like? Yes, like, you don't want to, like, put, like, a ground spice right in your mouth, unless you're doing some sort of Tiktok challenge. But like, this would be a good way to do it. There
Molly 20:30
is an ice cream flavor at Frankie and Joe's here in Seattle, and it is a golden milk flavor. Oh, nice. And it must have a lot of ginger in it. In addition to the turmeric, I don't think it has much black pepper. And if you are golden milk, curious, but not sure how you feel about the flavor of these kinds of warm spices together, that's a really good gateway. Yeah,
Matthew Amster-Burton 20:53
this is interesting. Like, take a sip. Like, that's good, but it's really strong. And they're like, I keep reaching for more. Like, so, yeah, I'm kind of, I'm kind of into this.
Molly 21:01
Well, Matthew, thank you for indulging my curiosity about turmeric. Well, I
Matthew Amster-Burton 21:05
mean, Thanks for, thanks for doing the research. So I kind of had no choice. That's true. You didn't, you didn't. Okay, and you're wearing that apron that just says, indulge the cook.
Unknown Speaker 21:16
That's right. And, yeah, anything
Matthew Amster-Burton 21:17
else about turmeric? Like, I feel like I'm actually gonna, like, use this more because of this episode. Like, I'm certainly gonna make. Wait, we didn't talk about the soup. Oh, well,
Molly 21:26
okay, we kind of talked about the soup. I mean, did we it's really fast to make.
Matthew Amster-Burton 21:31
This is, like, a really, like, intensely flavored soup, like, so it's, you make these meatballs with ground chicken feta. Did we already say all of this, and I just wasn't paying attention? Yeah. But we didn't really get into it. Let's get into this. Get into it. So you It smells so good while you're when you're making and
Molly 21:47
it's really, it's got a couple, like, unusual twists to it. So the filler, or the sort of binding of the meatball is oatmeal. Binding of the meatball, it's rolled oats, yeah, like old fashioned oats. And there is also a bunch of crumbled feta in there. You should use dark meat, ground chicken. You should use dark meat feta. That's right, fresh dill, right? Quite a bit of fresh parsley, because I hate dill. Okay, all right, so you make these meatballs, you chop up some onion, and you cook the onion in, let's say, like a Dutch oven, and then you kind of scoot it over to the side, and you brown the meatballs in the pan with the onions still in there, but off to the side. And I was kind of like, oh, man, you don't want to crowd meatballs. These are not going to brown. No. It worked. Yeah. It worked. Great. It worked totally fine. Sure, you don't want
Matthew Amster-Burton 22:36
to crowd meatballs. That has always been, like, one of your mottos, it's true. Then you when's your book, of like, yeah, it's gonna be like, one of those books where it like, looks like a real book, but it's just one quote on every page. That's, right, you don't want to crowd meatballs. That's, that's one of them.
Molly 22:54
I like, I like phrasing it that way too, because it really, it gives, it gives agency to you. Like, you don't want to crowd them. Don't want to, yeah,
Speaker 1 23:04
but the good thing is, like, it makes it sound like you're giving agencies to us for really, you're just telling us That's right, but yeah, that's who I am. Okay? And then you, you put in some, some chicken broth, and some more, some more oatmeal with with some more oats, and the than the turmeric, and then, like, a whole tub of baby spinach. That's
Molly 23:23
right, yeah. And so you wind up with, I think, just the right amount of broth to
Matthew Amster-Burton 23:29
meatball, yeah. And the broth gets pretty thick from those oats. I forgot. It's
Molly 23:33
got like half a teaspoon of crushed red pepper in with the onion, yep. And more turmeric. We forgot about the turmeric. There's like a tablespoon of turmeric in with the onions, right? Okay, so the
Matthew Amster-Burton 23:44
broad so the which one goes into the meatballs, like that, like
Molly 23:48
teaspoon or half teaspoon, and then, yeah. So the broth is mostly, like flavored with turmeric and and, you know, the good brown stuff from the meatballs and onions, and then it's got heat from red pepper flakes. Oh, we forgot the most important thing, it gets the juice of an entire lemon, yes. So it is quite a tangy soup. It's, it's sour, yeah? So good,
Matthew Amster-Burton 24:16
yeah. I would never have made this if you hadn't told me to that's, that's also like, like, that's another page from your book of mottos, Matthew, make this soup. It's more general. Now, it's not just directed me, no, but you,
Molly 24:30
you would have never made this. This is, this is one of those, like, sort of, you can't quite pinpoint it to any culture, and it's, but
Matthew Amster-Burton 24:38
it's kind of Mediterranean in a way that is not really my thing. No, in your in your motto book, it just says, I know which soup you should make.
Speaker 1 24:51
But so, yeah, so I never would have picked out this recipe if I, if I, like, went through all the recipes on the New York Times cooking like you did. I wouldn't have picked this one. Okay, but. I'm really glad I made it and we'll make
Molly 25:01
it again. Yeah, I thought it was phenomenal. June has already asked me to make it again. Sweet. We ate it less than a week ago, yeah, and
Matthew Amster-Burton 25:07
we had some leftover, like, enough leftovers that I had most of the leftovers for lunch. And then Laurie took a couple of the meatballs and, like, tossed him with some, tossed him on some egg noodles. Yeah, you
Molly 25:20
know, I should also say that the oats in it do a really interesting thing in the broth. They kind of soften, they thicken the broth a little bit, and then they kind of fall apart, so they're almost indistinguishable from, I don't know, some sort of rice or other grain, yeah. Anyway, it's great. Okay, what will they post in the show notes? I think we can post a gift link in there. Oh, nice. Okay, anyway, all right, can we post a GIF? Sure, sure. You know, we should make some gifts. You should, you should make some gifts
Matthew Amster-Burton 25:48
of you and me, like I hear a lot of podcasts, are getting into video, a trend that I hate, but we should make, we should make gifts, and you should then release a book of your, of your gifts. Okay, cool. We've like one, one gift per page, okay?
Molly 26:00
Or like a flip book, yeah? So you know you flip it quickly. You can see one GIF, Man, I miss flip books, all right, Matthew, we have some spilled mail. We do. This
Speaker 1 26:16
is from listener Talia, who says, I just listened to your Gouda episode from a few weeks ago. And why don't you share something very fun with you based on your side conversation about which countries you could identify just based on their shape. This, I don't remember this, but this sure sounds like something we would have talked to. Yeah, it does okay. If you follow this link, which we'll put in the show notes, you will discover a game called World doll, not to be confused with Wordle every day. This game presents you with a new country. You would think they would run out after 200 or so, but no, they kept going new one every day. And it is your job to guess what it is in six guesses. Once you make your first guess, you can set it to either tell you how close your guest country is to the answer country, or how much bigger small or smaller your guest country is in size than the answer country. Wait,
Molly 27:02
wait, I wonder when she says, how close your guest country is to the answer country? Is it like in miles or kilometers? Or it's
Matthew Amster-Burton 27:10
probably one of those, okay? I mean, probably not feet. Or it could be like a big number, okay, I usually get about three guesses in, and then look at a map to see if I can find it based on shape and what I know, very fun, regardless of your level of geography knowledge, enjoy. Oh, wow. Mr. Natalia, I played this. It was really fun. I correctly identified Belgium, and I found fan. I felt really smart, and then I forgot to do it again the next day. But, oh, I have no idea what shape Belgium is. Yeah. It's kind of Belgian. Belgium shaped approximately, okay, okay, was it like waffle shaped? It's kind of waffle shaped, yeah, okay. Like indentations. It's got indentations. And do they put syrup on waffles in Bell, no pearl sugar? Yeah. And where do they have stroopwafels, Denmark, that's in the Netherlands. The Netherlands, right. Okay, so Netherlands, more Stroopwafel shaped? Yeah. Okay, all right. We're killing
Molly 28:00
it caramel kind of oozing out the edges when it gets hot there. And
Matthew Amster-Burton 28:04
those, and those two countries are approximately 34 million feet apart.
Molly 28:09
Is that like halfway at the moon or something? Oh, you have turmeric on your nose.
Speaker 1 28:15
Okay, here we go. Wait. No, we can't. We can't move on. And just until I finish thinking about is 34 million feet halfway to the moon? I don't think so. No, I think it might be, because like five, like 5000 feet ish is a mile a mile. So like, if you do I 34 million by 5000 that's like six, no, okay, no, it's nowhere. It's absolutely nowhere, near halfway to the moon. It's much less. Okay,
Molly 28:39
all right. Well, Matthew, I love this show, to the moon and back. Oh, yeah,
Matthew Amster-Burton 28:44
me too, and to infinity and beyond, because, because this show is now hosted by Buzz Lightyear. Oh, we forgot to thank Abby. Oh, that was, Oh, I didn't even realize we were finishing the show. Okay, thanks, Abby. Our producer is Abby cercatella, you.
Molly 28:58
You can chat with other spilled milk listeners and Buzz Lightyear at everything spilled milk.reddit.com.
Matthew Amster-Burton 29:04
Yeah. Like, what's buzz? Light years? User, day, credit, like you, you slash, no, it's year. It's, yeah, okay, anything for the light
Molly 29:18
year? Oh, right. It's, you know, it's like a, you know, abbreviated, L, T, Y, R, yeah.
Matthew Amster-Burton 29:26
Okay, great, yeah. So I'm Z year, and you're in your woody. Is that a character from Toy Story? Okay, yeah, I'm the cowboy. You're the cowboy. Be the cowboy. Bye. You
Molly 29:45
I got the ground, I'm on the ground. I'm
Matthew Amster-Burton 29:47
on the ground, and in the air, you can
Molly 29:51
find me everywhere I Molly,
Matthew Amster-Burton 29:58
let's get away with that. You. No, no, no, Abby. Abby requires our show to be very serious. Yeah, at all times. Okay. I.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai