Bron Lewis, comedian and former high-school teacher

"We thought Nan was a millionaire because she had an electric frypan" - Bron Lewis 

On comedian Bron Lewis's menu: Nan's crumbed lamb chops, Babcia's cabbage rolls, and the best frozen custard you could ever imagine. 

Sides include: extremely disappointing Polish donuts, living with four siblings and a mum with “the menopause”, and a good wallop of post-natal anxiety and depression.  

Her social cause is PANDA (Perinatal Anxiety & Depression Australia) - panda.org.au – who support the mental health of parents and families during pregnancy and in their first year of parenthood. Check out their website, or you can call: 1300 726 306

Bron's most excellent book I'm Not Mad (Anymore) is out now. You can catch her on tour around Australia until October 2026 -  more details here: https://www.livenation.com.au/bron-lewis-tickets-adp1446629

To find out more about the project and Savva - head to threefoodmemories.com
Insta - @savvasavas @threefoodmemories

Email us at threefoodmemories@plated.com.au, we'd love to hear from you! 

TFM is produced and edited by Lauren McWhirter with original music by Russell Torrance. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:23

Microsoft episode of Three Food Memories. She's a woman who can turn chaos into comedy and motherhood into the highest of art comics, a former teacher and mother of three. She's one of Australia's fastest rising comics. She's also just released her new book, I'm Not Mad in Brackets anymore. From the list, welcome to Three Food Memories.

SPEAKER_00 0:46

Thank you so much for having me. It's lovely to be here.

SPEAKER_04 0:50

I want to talk about this hair of yours, this majestic hair that is it's almost Amazonian and armor-ish-like. And it was one of the first things that struck me to you and was like, my God, not only is it colour, it's body, but it's strength. And then I read this, this battle book, Your Very Own War and Peace. And the hair made complete sense.

SPEAKER_00 1:23

Well, thank you so much. Yeah, I my hair is arguably the most interesting thing about me. And I uh I did I've dyed my hair red I think over 20 years now. And I just I think I had maybe six months where I thought, oh, maybe I could be my natural colour, which is like a mousy brown, maybe I could do that. And I tried it and I just disappeared. I just couldn't, I just disappeared into the mist. No one could see me anymore, and I couldn't even recognise myself in the mirror. I felt grey, I felt sad. And then when I re-dyed it red, I was like, oh, that's what was missing. I thought I was just depressed. I wasn't, it was just my hair colour, it brings me so much life. And uh sometimes I'll get people comment on some of my YouTube clips, they'll say, She's funny, I'm just not sure why she's wearing a wig. And yes, and one time I went to a uh really fancy lunch with Joel Crasy. This was a couple of years ago now. I'd never been to into anything fancy. It was at the Australian Open, there was a sit-down three-course meal, very fancy. Elle McPherson was there. I had absolutely no right to be there, but I was there.

SPEAKER_04 2:31

Your hair had a right to be there.

SPEAKER_00 2:32

That's right. I should have just stepped that in. But I was sitting at this table, I was sitting next to like Jackie O and Joel Creasy the whole time thinking, I hope no one asks me why I'm here. But as the drinks were flowing, after a while, I had more ladies, like what initially it was just one lady came over to me, very, very fancy lady, came over to me and trying to just grabbed the back of my head and just smiled at me and said, You've got lovely hair, and then kept walking. And I thought, that was weird. That's a strange thing to do. And then another lady shortly later came over and again grabbed the back of my hair and just said, Oh, it is your hair, that's lovely, and then kept walking. And then another lady did it, and Joel had to explain to me, they're trying to see if it's your hair or not. And I thought I was blown away because once I've never been in any circle that has any money. I grew up in a very like like in government housing, and there was no flash things ever. And I thought, oh, this is so bizarre that rich people think they're allowed to just grab your head and it's a wig or not. It's not a wig, but it has, and many people have checked. If you've got enough money, you're allowed to check.

SPEAKER_04 3:45

Well, I don't have to check because it's it's like I said, as soon as I saw it, I was like, wow, this is this is this woman's Samson moment. This it's really big. And then you you you get into this book now. So I'm not mad in brackets anymore. Can we just define this mad? Is it gr mad or ah mad?

SPEAKER_00 4:06

Mad are we talking? Great question. It is both. So after I had my first child of three, after I forgot my first child, I got postnatal anxiety and I was undiagnosed for four years. So within those four years, I just became madder and madder, unbeknownst to me. And this madness or this anxiety uh kind of presented itself with um just rage. I was so angry because I was the sounds were too loud and the lights were too bright, and there was always something to do, and there was always a new failure to experience every single day. And so I was kind of on the back foot all of the time. It didn't matter how much I rushed, and that's all I did in that time, as I rushed and I rushed and I rushed and I rushed, and I put more things on my plate because if I thought if I was even busier, eventually I would achieve some sense of accomplishment. And so I was going to the gym sometimes twice a day, and I was uh, you know, the girls had my two had two daughters by this stage, both girls had lots of things happening, lots of play dates, lots of lots of extracurricular things, if you could even imagine what a four and two year old could be doing. And I uh and I just filled my days with noise and things, and I spoke to the city.

SPEAKER_04 5:25

So noise on top of noise, noise on top of noise. This is like a a cake.

SPEAKER_00 5:31

Yeah, an awful cake that no one wants, exactly. And uh a cake that no one wants at their party, and I was that and I was at teaching at the time, and I remember being in my staff room and just speaking so loudly to fill any space or any silence. So pe teachers were trying to get class plans done or write reports, and I just saw that silence as like my enemy. So I would be, I would just be saying just word salad basically. Oh, I saw a kid go to the canteen before and he got a sausage roll, and I thought, oh my god, I can't believe they have sausage rolls here. I had no idea. Did you guys know they had sausage rolls here? That is wild. It's wild. I when I go to the shops, if you could choose a sausage roll or a meat pie, what would you guys choose? What would you let's do a quick poll? That was my energy I brought to school. And absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 6:18

Oh my god, you are the WhatsApp group in person.

SPEAKER_00 6:20

Exactly, exactly. And in the classroom, that's okay because I was teaching them things and I knew what I was teaching. I I will uh there's heaps of things I'm not very good at, but teaching I was I really was good at. I was not a great person to have in a staff room, I will admit that. But I uh so if I wasn't talking and if I couldn't kind of get on top of the noise that I felt was I was drowning in, then I would feel furious. So I was mad in the sense that I was unaware of what was going on with me and I was not myself, but I was also furious, so mad was as in furious because I couldn't. It's like having a ringing in your ear and um no one else can hear it. And when you say, Can you guys hear that? And they go, No, it's are you are you all right? And it became you're kind of being gaslit all day, every day, even though no one else could hear it. And I so I was angry. Oh I was angry, so it's both. And then uh uh and then when my son was born, so my third, you'd I know what you're thinking, like if you weren't mad after one, why did you just keep going? Because I was mad, and so I have my third baby, and I was expecting the noise to come back. I by this stage I I'd sorted out my postnatal anxiety. I was like, I'm okay, I'm alright now, we've got it. And everyone was like, Were you are you sure? Because you're pretty you were pretty mad there for a bit, Bronn. And I was like, thanks for telling me after the fact. Okay. Uh so I was nervous my son was going to be the catalyst of uh my second bout of postnatal anxiety, but he wasn't. And it was so it's like short-lived relief because then I developed postnatal depression, which is the exact opposite. So postnatal anxiety was just noise, noise, noise, noise, noise, noise, noise, speed, speed, speed, everything, everything, everything, everything, everything. Really bad sleep, uh just because there's so much to do, and you're the only one who can do it, and when you do it, you'll do it so bad, and then then you'll feel awful for days, but you'll keep doing things. That's postnatal anxiety for me. And then postnatal depression was the opposite, where it was just darkness and silence, and the days were really long, and I just wanted to go to bed all of the time, even though sleep again wasn't very good, and I was probably a little bit less furious in that regard.

SPEAKER_04 8:50

You must have been exhausted.

SPEAKER_00 8:52

Yeah, yeah, I was really exhausted, but that's what we allow women to feel all of the time when they've had a baby, they're like, Yeah, you've had a baby, of course you're tired. You're like, Yeah, but this feels harder.

SPEAKER_04 9:06

So, what's the age difference between the the the first child and the and and and the last one?

SPEAKER_00 9:10

When my son was born, the girls were seven and five. So it was a uh the girls I had them 20 months apart, which I guess is pretty normal, but it's also really hard to having two uh like a one-year-old and a newborn because they're like different species.

SPEAKER_04 9:27

So this has been going on for you, or had been going on for you for a good uh eight years.

SPEAKER_00 9:32

So I got on top of the postnatal anxiety, I reckon four or five years, five years in, and then that's when I had a couple of years, yeah, a couple of years where I was like, oh I think I'm okay now. Let's have another baby. And um and then it was a com a a new beast I had to fight. The reason why I wrote this book is because I searched every day uh almost every day, or at least every second day, I would go into a bookstore and I would search the mothers, the motherhood section or the parenting section for a book that I could relate to. And I didn't necessarily need answers because I knew that no one could tell me exactly what was what I was experiencing, or no one could say your baby needs this because no one knew my baby. Uh I just wanted to read a story that was of a of a mother that had uh experienced some honest and humiliating moments, which I had in abundance and survived it. That's all I wanted.

SPEAKER_04 10:43

You say this is a book that you wish you'd written when you first became a mother, but what's the benefit of writing it at the end of your baby making days?

SPEAKER_00 10:52

I think it's what it has provided me is with a new level of forgiveness, which I don't even think I've got to that point yet. I think that is going to be a lifelong um journey. Who are you forgiving? Myself. I was so I was so hard on myself in those days. Also at and and also to another degree is my mother. I this book deals with not only just like what it what it means to be an early uh a mother of small children, but my mum, when she hit her menopausal years, I'm one of five, and she lost her mind. So the hormones just really um made her lose her footing, and she became a stranger in our house uh who would kind of walk around uh muttering and yelling, and her she had such a short fuse, an explosive temper, which was not the woman who raised us, but it's because she couldn't she couldn't deal with her uh her moods anymore, like she couldn't understand what was happening to her. No one had explained this to her. We don't speak very candidly about um mental health now, but 50 years ago we certainly didn't. When my mum's when my nan was going through menopause, she wouldn't have spoken to my mum about it. So my mum was in a a new level of like of of uh foreign territory, and if she was in a foreign territory, then we were certainly in a foreign territory because we were watching our maternal, warm, loving mother turn into this unfamiliar monster that um would have wild explosions. And one night I remember she threw the casserole dish full of pasta bake through the glass dining table because no one helped her make it. And up until that moment, we we had no idea she wanted us to help her make it. Like she'd made it herself up hundreds of times, thousands of times, but it was a her mental health wasn't in a good place.

SPEAKER_04 12:59

So after all of this experience, what does one do? One packs it up and takes it to the stage and tours it around Australia as a comedy act. Congratulations on your tour as well. That's just started.

SPEAKER_00 13:12

Thank you. Yes, it has started just in Perth, Adelaide, next, and then obviously the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, which is my which is my favourite one. Don't tell any of the others.

SPEAKER_04 13:22

Before you were the funny lady with great hair, you were a school teacher, which we touched on earlier. You said you chose to be a school teacher because you hated learning. So you what's what's that about? Is that about you kind of wanting to redefine learning or give it another go? You know, like how grandparents get a second chance of being a parent? Was it your grandparent teaching thing coming?

SPEAKER_00 13:45

Yeah. No, I don't I wish it was that. I wish it was that noble.

SPEAKER_04 13:50

Yeah, nah.

SPEAKER_00 13:51

No, I wish it were that noble, but it was not. I my theory is that uh, you know, chefs never eat their own food and um carpenters never finish their houses. So teachers surely don't have to have to learn. I've I just have to be in, I just have to be one step ahead of the children, and then I'm and I'm fine. They're not going to force me to learn anything. So it was kind of a a way, and I'm very I'm very good at uh making things up. So part of teaching is just and parenting for that matter, and comedy is just faking it till you make it. So I could go into a classroom and have read the book, sure. I always read the book. I make jokes on stage that I didn't read the book, and the tech kids just hint at what it's about. And at the end of the class, I go, gosh, that does sound good. But I I did always read the book, uh, and I would, yeah, I would uh just create discussions and then by the end of the discussion, they we'd come up with a theory or maybe some level of analysis that they're like, wow, oh okay, we get it now. And in my head, I'm like, so do I, you know, I we've all done it together. It's like you just have to have an air of confidence, especially as an English teacher, it's just an air of confidence, and you are you are gonna be fine.

SPEAKER_04 15:15

What's it like being these on this side of the years of teaching?

SPEAKER_00 15:20

Would you go back to it? Uh no, never in a million years. Never in a million. It's such a hard job. It's really hard. And I know that a lot of people say, I wouldn't do it for that money. It's not even the money. It's just not even, it's not even the poor pay. Even though I think the pay is fine, and I know that any teacher listening to this will go, how dare you? And people there's a lot, there's a narrative that people love to, people, non-teachers love to throw in teachers' faces. Well, you got 10 weeks' holidays. They don't holidays are the least you can give teachers because the days uh and people think the teaching is nine till three, then you go home and you do nothing. But it is absolutely not nine till three. It is not only the c the work that you have to do inside outside the classroom, the class plans, the marking. Oh my gosh, so much marking. It's the sitting at home staring into space, trying to think about what you should have said to that kid that told you that you're an ugly mole. You go, I should have said, you know what? I should have said this. Next time when he says that to me, I'm gonna say this. Or replaying something that happened in the staff room when the PE teacher made fun of you, and you go, Well, next time I'm gonna tell him he's illiterate. Yeah, I should have said that. I should have said that. So it's the mind the actual taxing mind toll that teaching has, and the holidays are are truly just there to recover. And then as soon as they're over, you go, okay, I guess I'll go back and do that again. And then you go back and then you're the whole year again. I I the last my last, my final straw, my final straw in teaching is I was teaching year 12 English again for my tenth year in a row, and a boy at the end of the first class of the year came over to me and said, Hey, I just had this question about the rubric. And he asked me a question, and I said, I answered. I you literally just asked me that n in the class and I I answered it. And he said, No, I no, I didn't. And I said, Yes, you did. And I was getting quite annoyed by him. I was like, What's going on here? You you just asked me that. And he said, No, I really didn't. And then I realized that all of the the past decade had just melded into one student who stood in front of me and it was all I could hear him saying really was, This is the only question that you will receive for the rest of your life. And I I could I couldn't even answer it. I said, I can't, I I'll just I'll I'll email you about it. And I he left the classroom and I went, I've got to quit. This is I've got to find a way out of here. This has to this can't be my forever. And then it in Jul June that year, this is 2019, June that year, I started my I did my first stand-up spot and it was it it went well. And then I the very next night I was like, I'll just go do that again because it's easy. I don't know why everyone says it's hard, it's so easy. And I went and did it again and I bombed so badly. And then the next gig I bombed badly, and then fourth, fifth, sixth. But because I knew what it was supposed to feel like from the first gig, I was like, This, I'll just make this work. I'll just work out. It's like maybe the only time I've ever been willing to learn something. I was like, I'll just I will learn how to crack this riddle, and this will be my life, because I cannot be asked that question ever again.

SPEAKER_04 18:50

Well, we're about to crack the riddle on your food memories, but before we do, your food memories, two nans and a capital city. That's what your food memories are about. What kind of kick did the recalling these memories give you when you were penning them down?

SPEAKER_00 19:06

Well, it was it was really n obviously very nostalgic. My Nan was a real pivotal character in my life. Uh she she was the one who lived in just outside of Waggar, a place called Coolerman in the Riverina. And that's where my mum and dad are from as well. And I would spend every single school holidays there. And I Nan was always a really maternal woman. I loved her grandkids. And it's interesting that you say when grandkid grandparents get a second chance. I think from what my mum and my uncles have said that she was quite a strict mother and cared a lot about what other the town thought about her. Like it was a very proud woman. But as a as a grandmother, uh she was the most loving and warm and she woman ever. She just giggled at everything, loved feeding us, just you it would tell us the same stories every night. Every night one of the grandkids slept with her, and we would fight over it. We would sleep next to her in a king-sized single bed, and she would tell us the same stories over and over. And she would giggle at the funny parts, which we didn't even understand. We could have uh this was started when we were three and four. We didn't really understand the stories very well, but because Nan was laughing and she'd hold her mouth because she her dentures were out by this uh point of the night, she would hold her mouth so we couldn't see in her mouth, and she would laugh and tears would stream down her wrinkly face, and we would laugh. And just the joy that these stories brought her made us so happy, and her house was really warm and cozy, and it always smelt like food, delicious food.

SPEAKER_04 20:58

Well, the first memory is hers, it's the crumbed lamb chops.

SPEAKER_00 21:03

Crumb lamb chops, she would cook them in the electric fry pan. Uh, and because we thought she was a millionaire because she had one of those, and she would cook those and they would be so juicy. And I remember when we'd get to we'd we'd go to the pool and we'd come home, and if you could smell that, you think, wow, life does not get any better than this. And she knew how much we loved them, so she would, and even though they did get more expensive as time went on, um, she would still find a way in her pension to to to buy them for us. My mum never really liked lamb chops because they she associated them when sh from when she was a child as being uh poor people's food. Because this was in the 50s and the 60s. It was uh humans didn't eat lamb. It was uh this this is mum's story, anyhow. In the riverina, that was for animals and their you know, I guess beef was. Was the what was what rich people ate. But Nan would send mum to the shops when Nan mum was about seven years old, and she'd go to the butcher and she'd have her money and she'd say, I just need to get some lamb chops for the dog. And even though every single person in the town, a tiny little town of a couple of hundred people, everyone in the town knew that the Armstrongs did not have a dog. The man would wrap up these lamb chops and give them to her and say, Hope the dog likes it. And mum would pay the money bright red in the face, wouldn't look him in the eye, and then take these home. And Nan would crumb them, fry them, and mum was just had mum had deep shame around eating that. But uh me as a kid, I had no negative connection with them. All they reminded me of is uh just Nan's love, and they were delicious. And still to this day, if I see a crumb lamb chop on the menu, I will order it. But it is never, never as good as Nan's.

SPEAKER_04 22:54

Do you think it's the fry pan? Do you think it's the fruit?

SPEAKER_00 22:56

I think it must be. Must be. It must be, but usually there's too much crumb on it or something. This one was, yeah, they've just they've everything's just a bit too overcooked. Nan's were yeah, homemade. And yeah, this is an electric fry pan, I think you're right.

SPEAKER_04 23:12

It's that but let's look at the electric fry pan as a sort of a marker in our life in our childhood. It's this thing that sits on the bench top, it actually makes if you've got a stovetop and you've got a fry pan, it actually does the same thing. But this was a contraption that just existed and there it was, and you'd see the cord, and it'd be ours was always tucked away so it wouldn't burn or catch on fire, we wouldn't get electrocuted. But then after the cooking was done, the bugger was cleaning the thing.

SPEAKER_00 23:39

I know, I know. I it also seems wild that it's like it's electric, put it in the sink. You're like, Pudding? Yeah, it seems I'm amazed at no more death, like not very many deaths, or if there have been any deaths from these.

SPEAKER_04 23:52

So let's go back to the lamb for a second. Every January, Meat and Lifestock Australia run those lamb commercials. What do you think of them?

SPEAKER_00 24:00

I think they're wonderful. I love that Sam Neil gets involved, in you know, it does feel very it feels very patriotic, you know, and also very to the point. What I love about those commercials is it if it does feel very Australian. Just eat lamb. Oh, okay, Sam Neil. No problem. Happily. Thank you. Did my nan direct this? My partner Lucas, he did not grow up with lamb because his parents are first generation, or they're immigrants. They came over in their twenties from Poland, uh though escaped the civil war there. They came over and uh the own they were in the camp at the oh what is the the refugee camp that they were in. They were only fed mutton and they can't go near any kind of any meat that comes from a lamb or a sheep ever again. So Lucas didn't grow up with it, and he's I guess he absorbed this um this idea from his parents that it's just not it's just not edible. You just don't eat it. So uh if lamb is cooked at at my house now, it will have to be something it usually is uh when I go and buy it, because Lucas is like, I'm just I'm I feel it doesn't feel very Polish of me to cook that.

SPEAKER_04 25:18

Second food memory. Now here we go. It's another Nan Gran Yanana memory. This is Polish cabbage rolls. How do you pronounce them?

SPEAKER_00 25:29

Guompki.

SPEAKER_04 25:30

Guomki.

SPEAKER_00 25:31

Guomki, yes. So my mum uh married, her second marriage was to a Polish man, and his mother lived in Australia as well, and we would go visit her, and there were some things that we couldn't understand. So I think uh my stepdad came into my life when I was seven, and we'd grown up with just you know, meat and three veg. That was always what mum served, or spaghetti bolognese. That was about as exotic as it got at our house. And then when we went to my Polish grandmother's house, my babcha's house, she had quite a lot of Polish food, which is largely kids love. Like it's a lot of beige food, not a lot of veggies. They don't know a lot of veggies, lots of beige food, very starchy and stodgy food, usually fine for kids. There's some that we couldn't get our head around. For example, one day Bapcha said, I've got some donuts in a very thick Polish accent. I've made some donuts. And we were over the moon. Me and my siblings were we thought this is gonna be the this is gonna be like a party. We've never we never have donuts at our house. Mum never has donuts in the pantry. And then she brought out, we were expecting donut king ones, like the brightly coloured topping, like icing, the sprinkles. Then she brought out what looked like jam donuts, just no hole in them, just look like jam, jam donuts with icing sugar on top. And we're like, okay, we've had jam donuts before, this will be fine. And still so excited, we all took a big bite out of this. Um, it's called Ponchki, their donuts. They're called Ponchke. Took a big bite, and immediately we all kind of looked at each other. It's kind of like you know that moment where you see a glass and you think, oh, that's my that's my own lemonade, and you take a big sip, but someone has refilled it with water, and you're like, oh, this is awful. If you prepared for water, you would have been fine. Because you prepared for sweet, sweet, delicious lemonade, you think this is like I can't get back, I can't move on from this. So when we had this big bite out of this ponchkey, which is not very sweet, they're not that sweet. I think the sweetest part is the actual icing sugar on top. The rest is there's very little sugar in it, and the jam, it's this plum preserve, which again is quite it's quite tart and not sweet. We jam, the only jam donuts we knew were sickly sweet with that like bright, like almost fluorescent like strawberry jam in the middle that burnt the hell out of your mouth, ripped all the skin off the top of your uh of your mouth, but it was worth it because of the sugar hit. You think that's okay, it's an injury that will take two weeks for recovery. But for right now, I've got so much sugar in my system, I'm gonna be all right. But with Ponchke, no, like very little sugar, so unsatisfying. My older sister, who's never been very polite, she just um put the jam donut down on mum's plate and said to mum, that's disgusting, I'm not gonna eat that. And my mum, my mum, who was new to this family, was like, shh, shh, shh, shush. But because we saw Amy, my sister, get rid of her donut, her disgusting donuts so easily, we then all gave our donuts to mum. So it meant that mum had five donuts on her plate and she didn't want to see her new mother-in-law uh um see this. So mum was shoveling donuts into her mouth every time she turned around. And uh so not all polished food is very good for kids, but we were surprised because the guamke is this cabbage roll that is filled with basically just with pork, and it's got this tomato sauce that goes over the top, and it is delicious, absolutely delicious. And when I turned 10 years old, I some my dad who worked at an abattoir, he told me too many stories about um about how they kill animals, and I got when I was 10 years old and I'd lived 10 years of a uh meat-eating life where I love nan's um lamb chops, but dad told me just enough stories to make me think, okay, I I can't do it anymore. So at 10 years old, I decided to be a vegetarian, which almost which was such an insult to my nan. And then and it was also so hard to visit a house and not eat the lamb chops. But then at when I was 21, my stepdad, uh, he died, and we all went to my Bapcha's house to I guess like after the the wake, and when we were there, Bapcha had made Guamke, and in my I guess my grief, I thought I just need something that feels nostalgic right now. I need something to honour him, and I ate I think three Guamki, they're quite big. I ate three, I wasn't even thinking, I don't think I was breathing or blinking, it would have been quite a spectacle. And after it, about six hours later, I was so violently ill because I'd been 11 years since I'd eaten meat. And uh yeah, I think I was sick for about 48 hours, but at the end my sister said, Are you proud of yourself? Would you do that again? I was like, Yeah, I would. Yes, I would.

SPEAKER_04 30:54

It's just a sister that was not too terribly polite. Yeah, we're exactly come to any party. You fell in love with Polish food, but you also fell in love with a Polish man. Your husband is Polish.

SPEAKER_00 31:10

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 31:11

So let's talk about Lucas. Am I pronouncing that correctly?

SPEAKER_00 31:14

It's just Lucas, yeah. Lucas. In Polish it's wulkash, but in the wulkash, but in English is just Lucas. It's just spell funny, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 31:22

So three kids later, and you've only been married in recent years, you still love Polish food, and he still is the best person you've ever met. Where did you meet Lucas?

SPEAKER_00 31:35

I met Lucas at our 30th birthday party that I almost didn't go to. And I was 25, I think, 25 or 26, and I yeah, I didn't, I wasn't gonna go. And then I went along and I thought, gosh, he's handsome, and I talked to him, and he had the worst onion breath I think I've ever experienced in my life, and I thought, okay, that's enough talking to him. And then the next time I saw him at a different party, I thought, if he's handsome enough for me to want to talk to him at the risk of the terrible breath that I experienced last time, then that's pretty powerful. So I went over and I talked to him, and he thankfully his breath didn't smell as bad that time, and then we just never left each other's side.

SPEAKER_04 32:24

So, what did he say to you next? Hi, my name is Lucas. Come back to my place for a mug of cabbage rolls.

SPEAKER_00 32:29

Like what well, it's funny, the polls are I I love the polls, I love them so much. They are such a huge part of my life, and they have been since I was seven. But uh, I'm I'd met Lucas at this party, and um he said, Oh, I'm I'm uh he he mentioned his name is spelt differently, and he said how it's spelt L-U-K-A-S-Z. And I said, Oh wow, okay, that's strange. And he said, Oh, it's because I'm Polish. And I thought, oh, there we go, another Polish person. I said, I love the polls, and I just to try and keep conversation going, um, and perhaps I'd had a couple of wines, I said, Oh my god, I've got a babsha, and it's just Polish for grandma. And he said, uh he said, Oh, that's wonderful. How is she? And the polls are very different to Australians. I think Europeans are very different to Australians in regards to death.

SPEAKER_04 33:22

I think Australians are a little bit more um I think there's not so much emotion type to it.

SPEAKER_00 33:31

Yes, we are like the same, we are kind of like, oh, they lived a good life and then we focus on how the life they lived. Whereas I think in European culture, especially Polish culture, it's just devastation when someone dies. It's devastation.

SPEAKER_04 33:45

You say that, and I'm I'm actually thinking aloud that that is because uh Europeans really believe in that community, you know, they're really part, the older generation are still part of the nucleus, they don't go anywhere. So pretty much like your Nan, you know, when you all went there for school holidays, you know, being in that bad. I can just imagine that the day after Nan died when you probably would have realized I'm never gonna sleep in her king single again.

SPEAKER_00 34:13

I can't even remember her funeral. I can't because I apparently what happened is I got to Nan's house and she wasn't there, and we're funerals around the corner from her house. And I I said, I can't go. I refuse to go, but I can't remember any of that at all. My sister was saying, Do you remember you said I'm not going, this is too sad, I can't do this. I said, I can't remember that at all. So I understand what it it feels like to lose someone that I love or that you love with all your heart. But I also have we've there's been quite a few like great aunties that have died that I've been like, Oh, that's sad. I loved Auntie Lynn. Oh, okay. Well, she lived a good life, and then just kicking into gear as what how we've been taught to deal with death. But when I said to Lucas at this party, I said, I've got a bub shirt, and he said, Oh, that's great. How is she? And I said, Oh, she just actually she just died two weeks ago. And for me, she was she was old and she'd lived a good life, and he he stopped in his tracks and his eyes welled up and he said, I'm so sorry. I said, That's a oh that's okay. She was she was old and she lived a good life, and he said, Oh my god. And then he had to sit down. He was like, I can't believe it. I'm so so I had to kind of console him over my bhapsha's death, and he'd never met her, but it's just I guess that culture divide, which comes up every now and then, even still 14 years later, he's quite astounded by how brash um Australians can be. And at the same time, I I can find I find his mother who I love with all my heart. I find her to be to have no filter, and um that that is something that I forever will have to deal with. Um first time I did first time she came and saw me do comedy, she said to me, Yeah, she appears in your material. Yeah, exactly. She does, she came along. I thought, oh gosh, I'll see how it goes. But she came along and she said, uh first time she saw my comedy, she saw a whole hour and she came over to me in front of all the people in the foyer and she said, Bron, you are good. I am surprised. Yeah, I know that you're trying to say a compliment. I know that's what you're trying to do, but it's not. By that stage I've been doing comedy, I think, for four years. And uh so she so she just from what I can gather, for four years, she just thought I was wasting my time doing some silly little hobby like tap dancing for the masses or something. Uh so and so yeah, I'm I've loved the Polish culture. I love Polish food. There's one, there's one dish that I haven't been able to wrap my head around. It's called Galiletka, and it's just savory jelly. So it's jelly, gelatin, but inside, and I think Australia had uh this in the 80s, but inside is just like uh pork and boiled eggs and boiled carrots, and um that sits on the table at Easter and Christmas, and usually the older generation gobble it up, uh, but then perhaps my my generation are like just kind of look at it, and then the young kids are like, if that's jelly, why is there peas in it? And then what they do is they slice it up and then they put it on a plate and it's wobbling everywhere. And I said to Lucas, I don't think I can. I'm you know I'm happy to try everything, but even that I don't think I can. I think the texture of that will make me very ill. And he said, No, no, no, it's it's really good. Yeah, he and then he said, Oh, you've not seen what you put on it. I went, Oh, you put something on it. Okay, thinking, what could you put on that to make it nice? And he goes, You just put you pour vinegar all over it. And I thought, yeah, uh, you don't know what nice is.

SPEAKER_04 37:52

That's disgusting.

SPEAKER_00 37:54

That is disgusting.

SPEAKER_04 37:55

So your mother-in-law has appeared, uh appears in your material. Your children have.

SPEAKER_00 38:00

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 38:01

And Lucas, you joke saying that you're the woman that birthed his children. Did he how does he see you?

SPEAKER_00 38:11

Oh, he he's been so supportive of my career. I remember telling him I wanted to try comedy, and that's a very embarrassing thing to admit, because you're effectively saying, I think I'm funny enough to stand on a stage with a microphone and tell my stories to people who've paid to see them. I think that I think that's how funny I am. And so I was really embarrassed to tell him, and I when I did tell him, he said, Oh no, I think you'd be fantastic at that. You definitely should do it. Absolutely, you definitely should do it. And I said, Well, I also think I want to quit teaching, and that was, you know, half our income. And he said, That's okay, you're starting comedy, so we'll just wait to that for that to make money and it'll be great. And there was a good few years there where I was making, oh yeah, I reckon there was two years where I was making tight, like oh, because mostly when you start comedy, you get paid in beer. Um, so I was then that's really hard to put in this kid's school lunches. So I would it was really, it was really just Lucas uh and believing in it. And I'm sure he had moments where he was like, Is this is she ever gonna bring home like$20? Like, is anything gonna become out of this? And eventually it has, and now I I now thankfully this is far more successful than teaching ever was, but he's never wavered, from what I can see. He's never wavered, and he he he has been I'm not always the butt of my jokes. Lucas is Lucas is as well, and I don't tell him what I'm gonna say until he only finds out with the audience. So he will come to a show and he'll be there with his friends, and then I will tell a story, and I can see him just get smaller and smaller and smaller in the audience, and then at the end he la he goes, I can't believe you told that story about like our son's birth because he fell asleep. I can't believe you told that. That's so embarrassing. I'm like, Well, you shouldn't have fallen asleep. So he understands that nothing in our life is is really sacred enough that it won't hit the stage. He understands that, and I think he li he does love it, but there are moments where he's like, Could you give me one thing that is a secret, please? I'm like, no. But he's wonderful, he's such a good man.

SPEAKER_04 40:39

In the book, there were some really dark moments um that you speak of. How did Lucas show up for you then?

SPEAKER_00 40:47

Oh so when I was when I had postnatal anxiety with the girls, he I think he just held on for dear life. And in hindsight, logically, I I know that I I say like I wish someone had said, like I say in the book, I wish someone had said, Bron, you're not well. This is not this is not normal behaviour. But I also know that if someone said that to me when I was in that frame of mind, I would have just cut them out. I would have been like, well, you don't this is this is obviously you don't understand what it's like to have two small children, but please uh don't patronize me. And I know that if Lucas said that to me, I it would I think I wouldn't have responded well to it. So he just waited and was there like a safety net. And that's all I needed from him at that time. And then when my son was born, he when Ari was born, at when he was three days old, he wouldn't wake up. Like he just would he we just couldn't get him to wake up. And we went to the hospital and this was during COVID, so there was all these extra obstacles for us, just even just to get in there. There's a security guard at the at the at the um emergency that you have to explain why you're there. And when you've got a sick baby in your hand and no words to explain what's going on, that was awful. And then the triage nurse and try and explain to them, and then and then we went in finally into the hospital part to the ward, and the doctors are trying to talk to me about ask me what's happened, and I just didn't have the words. And Lucas, in all of this chaos and terrifying, uh terrifying situations that just kept folding in on me. Lucas was like this stoic like rock that that was just so calm and just kept saying to me, you know, from we've got this. The doctors, the doctors are gonna fix him and we're here, we've done all the right things, we've got this, we've got this. And if he'd said anything different, if he had in that time in that awful morning that we had, which ended up being an awful week where he didn't wake up, if Lucas had said to me, I don't I don't think he's gonna survive, or I think we've done something wrong, or what did you do during the pregnancy, um, I don't think I would have recovered. So his strength when I was when I was the weakest I'd ever been probably saved my life.

SPEAKER_04 43:35

Were there moments where you realised that perhaps you were being an oxygen thief, or his oxygen thief, and you thought, shit, I better show up for him so he can show up for me.

SPEAKER_00 43:47

Yes, yes. So, but this didn't happen during the hospital stay. So it was a week where Ari wouldn't wake up and they weren't sure why. The doctors were like, We've done all the we're doing tests, we're slowly doing tests, we're not really sure. And he was getting fed through a nasal tube and uh Lucas had to s keep going home because we had a five and a seven year old daughters that he had to keep going home and putting on a hap a brave face for them saying, Yeah, it's normal for babies to have to go back to hospital for a week. So the girls were like, Oh okay, yeah, no problem. And eventually after a week, a nightmare week of silence in the hospital, Ari slowly woke up and the doctor said, Okay, well we he's awake now so we don't know what happened, but you can go home now. And I said, Well is that gonna happen again? They're like, we don't know. I hope not. And so we just went home with this tiny baby and had to well I 100% had PTSD from that experience. But when I got home I looked at Lucas and he l was like a shell of a man at this point. And I thought oh he's held the entire family up for a whole week all the while his brain his Polish brain that loved his the Polish people love to catastrophize his brain would have been terrified beyond measure. And so he had the weight of the world, the weight of the family the weight of uh the most the biggest disaster he could have possibly faced and he held it up and he smiled and he told everyone that he was fine and that everything's gonna be fine. And then when I got home and I started to feel a bit better because my son was awake I noticed that I we needed to swap spots. It was time it was we we I he tapped out and I stepped up and he could crumble for a bit. And he did for a bit. I think it was a couple of days where he was uh grieving whatever the hell he was grieving and then he came good but we both from that experience I think we both have PTSD from and when I wrote about it in my book I a couple of times he came into he came into the dining room at five in the morning when I was in there writing he came in he said are you alright? I said yeah and I was wiping tears away and he said what are you writing about I said oh uh the Ari's stay at the hospital and he goes oh you're writing about that oh okay all right and then we'd carry on with our days and then when I'd finished the book I said you want to read it and he said yeah I'll read it soon I'll read it really soon he just kept putting it off and putting it off and I said you've only got a week left to read it because then then that's the deadline and they that goes to print. So there might be something in there that you want me to change. And he left it and he left it and anyway the deadline came back and went and we it went off to print and I said just so you know that I can't change anything if you don't so you've missed them you've missed the deadline. He said he said I'm sure I'll be fine and it was only up until two days ago that he read it and he called me and he was really emotional and he was like I had no idea that what you were thinking in that time because we I didn't let him in. I didn't say this is how I was feeling I just shut down and because he knows me so well he knew that not to not to poke the bear not to pry not to ask any questions he just knows to coast along and to remind me that he is there and uh yeah it's been this book has uh been very emotional and uh has forced us both to reflect on uh how we were during that nightmare and also how we didn't need any words for each other. We just know each other well enough to be like I know you need two days now or I know you need this or I know you need me to be like that. I hope that makes sense.

SPEAKER_04 47:46

Perfect sense.

SPEAKER_00 47:47

Okay great yeah I haven't absolutely I said that stuff out loud before so yeah it's been yeah it has been an interesting because Lucas doesn't come up very often in any interviews but it's been it's been heavy for him.

SPEAKER_04 48:00

It would I it was impossible to not to not talk about him in this chat because he appears so much in the book and he is so much part of you and I think it's because of him you can do the things that you do and you can come up and show up for us as an audience with these life lessons. You've got a good piece of scaffolding there. So it was I I felt very it felt very natural to talk about him. So thank you for sharing.

SPEAKER_00 48:24

Oh my gosh my pleasure he would love to know that yeah I couldn't if you're right I couldn't do I couldn't do anything if it if he if he decided he wouldn't leave me which he would never how dare you even suggested but if we're that it would be I couldn't do it I'd have to stop comedy for a while. I just could it's such a demanding job there's so much travel it's so many nighttime issues Lucas is not going anywhere.

SPEAKER_04 48:51

He's not going anywhere that the tour's gonna happen there's gonna be another tour possibly another book but before all of that happens let's get into your third food I know I love this one.

SPEAKER_00 49:00

It's the Canberra memory it's caramel and macadamia ice cream yes and uh to clarify it is uh frozen custard in Canberra they love custard they love custard so much I don't know what it is but there is a frozen custard place it tastes it all it is is ice cream but I think that to try to be different God bless them is that said it's frozen custard and there's a place called gooseberries it's near Belcon Mall and uh I think it's still there but it was definitely there when I was in high school and we would catch the bus from school to the interchange then cross this big bridge trudge along you have to go through this industrial part like you really need you really have to devote your time to get this frozen custard and I turned in there was two options you get uh chocolate custard or vanilla custard again it's just ice cream and then you choose your flavours and so I would go with my friends from high school and they would choose MMs and you know something sickly sweet and something else something else and I would I thought I was a chef I was like no you guys it's too much you guys are going over the top it's just vanilla with caramel sauce and macadamia and that's it and they're like that's boring bronze but in my head I was the most sophisticated woman that's ever graced this earth and since then and since then it's it's still my favorite ice cream ever it's the only ice cream I'll ever buy which is in the fridge the connoisseur one is caramel and macadamia ice cream the kids now unfortunately have such expensive palettes because of this when it comes to ice cream that we'll uh yeah if we if someone has like a chocolate paddle pop they're like what is that I'm so sorry we're rich well thank god the shows are selling out that you can afford to board this expensive ice cream habit now you've been you you you've after all these years you're still on the same flavour it's your go-to what would you know 75 year old Nana Bronn be eating at the ice cream shop do you think? Yeah I think it's still it's gotta still be that it's gotta I can't imagine some there's an ice cream shop near my house in Brunswick called Fluffy Torpedo and they have wild flavours like that for example they've got like iceberg lettuce and green apple and like some like saffron and something quite savory like there's like cheeseburger one or something like there's some really wacky flavours and we go there and we you know we'll have a a crazy one the whole time I just keep thinking this is nothing on my on my caramel and macadamia ice cream I know what I like I like crumbed lamb chops I like caramel macadamia ice cream you can't take the riverina out of me yeah or the Canberra by the sound of it see it's exactly right yeah I totally sometimes in my comedy I'll say I'm from Canberra and sometimes in my comedy I'll say from I'm from Wagga and some people the people who are like die hard whichever one like certain diehard Wagga people will be like no you're not from here didn't go to school here I'm like well okay sorry sorry about that and then if I say I'm from Canberra Canberra people go well you're born here I'm like well no I was born in Wagga but I'll just forget it. I don't think either of you can be that proud of the towns guys now as for social cause you've chosen something that kept you going you've chosen panda yeah what do panda do they are a uh charity or non-for-profit uh that help new mums uh with postnatal anxiety and depression and I learned about them after I needed them and they are so wonderful and they save lives they have the right language they have the right tools they have all the right resources to offer support to women who are struggling through the most terrifying times of their life where they not only don't know how to handle their own life but they have got a tiny baby to keep alive as well. So it is an organization which I would love to keep supporting and um is paramount to young mums.

SPEAKER_04 53:22

The um the the unique thing and probably one of the things that saves um well makes Panda so worthwhile is its strong peer support volunteer program. So mums who have you know managed to get on and dads who have managed to get on the other side of difficult parenting can step in and mentor parents well that's well and that's all for me that's all I want is just someone who has had some experience.

SPEAKER_00 53:47

So what when I was having my I had to go in to have a baby if I got a midwife who was 21 called you know Charlotte I'd be like this is not I need a six year old woman called Beverly that's all I need please can you send Beverly in I don't need you Charlotte I will never need you and I'm sure Charlotte would be great at her job I'm sure she was so good at she knew everything she was fresh out of uni I bet she was great but I needed a woman who's seen some things who's experienced some things to tell me to calm down that's all I needed. That's all yeah so I needed your nan you needed my that would have been so nice but yeah I think that when with Panda offering uh having this uh really powerful volunteer program I think that's wonderful because it's all you need in that time is for someone to be like I've seen this I've experienced this and you'll be fine and that's partly why I wrote the book that as well is like there is there is a a light at the end of the tunnel and some days you don't think there is but there definitely is in the spirit of Martha Stewart and her kitchen meets life wisdom we have a tradition here at Free Food Memories where our previous guest passes their kitchen life guidance to you.

SPEAKER_04 55:03

Now our previous guest was Giorgio Bagiani he's the assistant director of mixology oh it gets fancy assistant director of mixology at the Connort Bar in London. His advice to you is be curious and kind you're not there to judge you're there to host in a stand-up comic way you are curious about your audiences aren't you absolutely I think we yeah I I some some comedians can get quite offended if the audience isn't on their side or if they feel if they feel like the audience is a bit rowdy.

SPEAKER_00 55:37

But we what we forget is that we don't know what the audience has been through that day. They're just it's just you know perhaps a hundred individuals that maybe one of them got fired that day. Maybe one of them is didn't want to come out maybe one of them is struggling with it. We have no idea what anyone else's struggles are but we can show up and try and if they don't love it then perhaps it you just can't take it personally. Okay well that's all right.

SPEAKER_04 56:01

So what's one piece of kitchen or life wisdom you've learnt from living in the thick of it that you'd like to share with our next guest?

SPEAKER_00 56:08

Oh okay is that you can there's always a second chance there's always a second chance so this is with with food as well if it's if you stuff it up just order something in there's always it's not the end it's nothing is the end of the of the road and all this is exactly my experience with with life it's always something else I started teaching it wasn't all for me comedy came afterwards I had uh my daughters I had an awful time I thought I'll give it another go have my son had had a different kind of awful time but after that I was fine. As soon as I gave myself enough forgiveness to try again or to to move past that awful bit everything was great.

SPEAKER_04 56:57

I've so loved spending time with you and your hair thank you for not being mad in brackets anymore.

SPEAKER_00 57:04

Oh thank you so much for having me.

SPEAKER_04 57:06

I've loved this chat so much so beautiful that's it for this episode of Three Food Memories be sure to spread the plated love and check out our 100 plus back episodes you can catch them on YouTube as well just search for Three Food Memories. For all things TFM head to the socials at Free Food Memories and attack suffer. For more info, send us a message head to threefoodmemories.com Three Food Memories is produced and edited by Lauren McQuer with original music by Russell Torrent Nastika Lastly and Buffalo Podcast