#5 Penne For Your Thoughts

Welcome back to Flour Power for Episode 5! 
After a brief hiatus due to some pretty huge changes behind the camera - a dog and a flat, respectively - Hannah and Lotty are back! 
This episode we’re making pasta from scratch and our favourite sauces - pesto and spicy tomato sauce, and we’ve got some Spicy Hot Takes to serve up alongside our pasta! This episode we’re diving into gender dynamics, politics, and dog ownership - including a debut cameo from Olly, Hannah’s adorable greyhound, so buckle up because we have Opinions! 

This Episode's Recipes:

Hannah's Spicy Tomato Sauce: https://www.flour-power-podcast.com/recipes/tomato-pasta-sauce
Lotty's Nut-Free Pistou (Pesto):  https://www.flour-power-podcast.com/recipes/pistou-nut-free

Featured in the episode:
 Blue Cross' Greyhound Campaign

Wilbur Smith Adventure Writing Prize

Matter of Mind

Follow along for delicious recipes and thought-provoking conversations - You can find us on Instagram @flour_power_podcast, and listen across Spotify, YouTube, Samsung Podcasts and the RSS Feed on our website https://www.flour-power-podcast.com/ 

Happy Making!

Transcript

[INTRO MUSIC]

LOTTY: Welcome back to the fifth episode of Flour Power, a baking podcast with two 20 somethings just waffling through our twenties together!

HANNAH: Each episode we choose a recipe to make together, despite being over 150 miles away from one another. In this episode, we're making pasta and two different sauces. We'll get into that. This episode, we have some like hot takes for you. So, we've been considering all of our opinions that other people might not agree with and decided what, what better time than to get it out in the open than on the internet.

LOTTY: The perfect place to shout out all of our big slightly polarizing opinions, isn't it? That's what everyone else seems to like doing.

HANNAH: And one of the best things was that we had a conversation with my boyfriend and he's got some interesting opinions. And, you know, he -

LOTTY: I wouldn't say they’re... Yeah, I wouldn't say, honestly, I don't necessarily disagree with any of your partner's opinions, but they're kind of fresh outlooks on things I hadn't considered before.

HANNAH: I Dunno, I disagree with him on a lot! [LAUGHS]

LOTTY: So hopefully… I mean, I wouldn't say I disagree with him on all of them, but I don't know, I can see the points that he's making on a couple of them. So hopefully with this episode, I mean, if you agree with us, awesome. If you disagree with us, we would love to know why, because I think it could be the start of some very fun, fun conversations.

HANNAH: Oh, it's always nice to get a fresh opinion on something, and getting to discuss things that you maybe are a bit set in your ways about. And then somebody comes up with something and you're like, “Oh, I never really thought about it like that. That's, that's new.  Maybe I'm wrong, or maybe I can think about this slightly differently.” I just think everybody needs to open their eyes a little bit.  And so that's what we're trying to do.

LOTTY: Yeah.

HANNAH: So, we have all our ingredients out. You can't see all of mine, but you can see some of them., are you ready to make?

LOTTY: Yeah, I'm, I'm ready to make. So today, today we're making pasta and yeah, that can sound a bit daunting. Like pasta is the kind of thing you can just get off the shelves in the supermarket. Somehow tastes magical in restaurants.  That's impossible to make at home, right? Wrong! You need literally two ingredients. I kid you not.  It's a bit time consuming, but it's also very fun. It does get a bit messy -

HANNAH: [OVERLAPPING VOICES] Wearing black was an interesting choice.

LOTTY: Yeah, we… There were choices made this morning! [LAUGHS] Anyway, we'll see if by the end of the episode we're still wearing black. Or whether we've turned head to toe in white flour.  Watch along to find out.

HANNAH: I know that this is quite a time-consuming process, but we did a practice run and, in our practice, run, we both managed to make pasta in just over an hour - So actually, I don't think it's as time consuming as my first impression was. So, it'll be very good. So, I'm making a spicy tomato sauce to go alongside my pasta, I’ve, I've diced up everything very nicely in a container. Makes me look like a… home cooking show.  Made me feel like a pro

LOTTY: Yeah, you look very professional!

HANNAH: And I did it with my chili plant.  Popping off screen.  This is my chili plant, I’m incredibly proud. She's just been watered so she's peeing all over the floor, but I'm using my own chilies. So, that's exciting. You can't have any of this, Olly.

LOTTY: No, I don't think chilies are very good for dog somehow.

HANNAH: Definitely not. Right, so the first thing we're going to do is make a well. I've done it in a bowl because I have a dog who will put his snoot on the counter if not stopped.

LOTTY: I, I have done it on the counter because I am clearly inviting agents of chaos to interfere. You can do it on your counter, you can do it in a bowl I've done two practice runs with this: Did it on the counter the first time and the egg did in fact go everywhere, so it'd make it a pretty sturdy well. The second time I did it in a bowl and it was a lot neater. But really, it's up to you. What I am going to do just for personal preference is I'm going to grab a knife so I can open my eggs without breaking the shell everywhere.

HANNAH: So, it depends on, obviously, the weight of the flour, but it's flour and eggs and then a bit of water if you need a bit of water for it to come together. [HIGH PITCHED, OFF SCREEN] Hi there! Can you come to join us?  It's lovely that you've come to join us. I appreciate your attention! [NORMAL VOICE] And then I'm just going to use a fork.

LOTTY: For those wondering, Where Hannah just went, we have a new member of Flour Power if you haven't been following us on Instagram first of all, go follow us on Instagram! Second of all Olly, Hannah's new greyhound, is somewhere off camera, being very adorable, I'm sure.

HANNAH: he's looking at me with longing eyes going “Mummy, I want some. Mummy, I want some.  But mummy please…?”

LOTTY: I don’t think pasta is good for dogs.

HANNAH: he can have pasta, because he can have eggs

LOTTY: Oh, can he? Okay. 

HANNAH: He just definitely can't have the spicy tomato part.  And I also don't think he really wants it to be honest. 

LOTTY: No.

HANNAH: He’s curled up on the sofa again, so he's definitely not that interested.

LOTTY: Right. As I feared my hubris has got the better of me, I do have a bit of an egg avalanche happening.  Yeah, no for next time use a bowl. For the sake of your kitchen counters use a bowl. This is going really well over here! [LAUGHS]

HANNAH: It's quite the role reversal that you're the one making the mess.

LOTTY: Yeah, what can I say? I'm learning from the best.

HANNAH: I mean, don't get it twisted, I'm about to make mess, but -

LOTTY: Yeah, I just managed to get ahead of you in this one, so I've abandoned the fork. I'm just going in with my hands. Because yeah, your hands are going to get messy when you make pasta. It's –

HANNAH: Inevitable.

LOTTY: if you have textural issues, you might not enjoy this process so much, but like, think of it like playing with Play Doh, except you get to eat it at the end, which I'm sure every toddler always secretly wanted to do, and several tried.

HANNAH: I was going to say, I definitely ate it.

LOTTY: i definitely tried to once and I think I was rapidly stopped by my freaked out Nana who was like, “no, no, no, that's not food! That's definitely not food. Get away from that.” Very sensible Nana. Thank you.  But yeah, so if you ever wanted to make Play Doh and then like eat the Play Doh, make pasta and fulfill your toddler dreams.

HANNAH: You can also make edible Play Doh. My nan used to do that for us because then if we ate it, the world wouldn't end. It's just flour, salt, water, equal measures of each.

LOTTY: That's pretty smart actually. That's freaked-out a great way of keeping them entertained while minimising a little bit of the chaos.

HANNAH: Oh yeah. And you know, because it’s a third salt, it's not very nice. So, you'd eat it once you’d never do it again.

LOTTY: That's a pretty good deterrent.

HANNAH: It was a very good deterrent! She'd only ever make us one colour at a time though. I used to complain about that quite profusely.  

LOTTY: To be fair, like, you try and make some Play Doh, whatever you do to it, it will end up brown.

HANNAH: I think that's why she only let us play with one colour at a time.  Didn't stop me from being annoyed by it.

LOTTY: Oh, no. So, once things start coming together it's time for your arm workout. You've got to knead this for, I'd say, about eight to ten minutes, until it's all one combined dough. If you’re a weakling like me, who needs to go to the gym more often, this may be kind of difficult, but you know, persevere, and you will be rewarded.

HANNAH: It's not as easy to do as bread. Because bread is a bit of a softer dough. 

LOTTY: Yeah, bread's a lot more forgiving. But like, you're not expecting it to be super stretchy, that's what the pasta machine is for.  Although, if you don't have a pasta machine, you can still roll it out by hand. In my practice session when we were doing our pre-record, I rolled it out with a rolling pin by hand, and yeah, it took a while, it was definitely not as thin as if you had a pasta machine, but it still turned out really nicely, and it's quite nice if you just want like, you know, rustic shapes or you're not too fussed about like uniformity, which honestly, I'm not really.

HANNAH: I'm not either.

LOTTY: Using the pasta machine is very satisfying though.

HANNAH: Oh, it's very satisfying. I have had a pasta machine for 10 years.  I would say, when do you think that birthday party was 13, 14?

LOTTY: it was for your 13th. So, the birthday party Hannah's talking about was, you got to hire out a cookery school for the day, and it was honestly the best, best party I've ever gone to, because we got to make Rainbow pasta, which was really fun. and then we also got to make profiteroles. Profiteroles are one of my kryptonite’s. I love profiteroles. If I ever were to get married, I would have a croquembouche instead of a wedding cake. Because croquembouche is just a tower of profiteroles.

HANNAH: And that's what I want. So, you know, I would be at your wedding anyway, but you've definitely just sold me on coming [BOTH LAUGH] So I've had my, my trusty pasta machine for about 12 years now. And at the time when I got it, it can't have been more than 12, 15 pounds. I know that Charlotte bought one the other day for, what was it, 25?

LOTTY: Yeah, 25 from Sainsbury's. I'm not saying it's like the best pasta machine in the world, but it does the job.

HANNAH: Mine can't have been more than that.  It's been around for a long time. It still works. It's a bit rusty in places.  But it still works. So, you know, even if it's something that you're like, Ah, it's a bit of money. They don't expire. It will still work for a very, very long time. And if you're lucky, you can find one in a charity shop.

LOTTY: I mean, just as a testament to the longevity of these things, my folks got married in 1997 and one of their wedding gifts happened to be a pasta maker, which made my dad very happy because he loves everything to do with like Italian food, Italian culture. This pasta machine has been going for 27 years. It works really beautifully. The tagliatelle bit does get a bit stuck, but if you want to just roll out normal pasta sheets, then it works like a dream. It also came with a ravioli extra, which is really cool, and I kind of want to borrow that just so I can learn how to make ravioli at some point.

HANNAH: Which as soon as Charlotte does, we’ll be turning that into a YouTube short - As we're going to try and use a bit more of all of the platforms that we have available. So, if you want to see more from just Charlotte, or just me, or Oli's going to have his own little segment coming soon: “Oli tries…”, because I'm trying to make my dog homemade dog treats because I'm a dog mum in her twenties and that's what we do.

LOTTY: yeah, we are currently, like, we already have a YouTube channel, it is Flour Power Podcast. Flour as in Plain flour like we're using here.  And we are currently working on growing that and figuring out how on earth all of this works because if you guys hadn't realized by now, we are amateurs. We love what we do, but we are also at the very beginning of our filming and recording and creating journey.  And to me, I'm so excited about that, I love learning new things.  So yeah, you know, watch this space, like, more, more amazing things are coming.

HANNAH: We are growing and learning from everything that we're doing and we really enjoy it. Like we're, we genuinely are best friends. We've been best friends for a very, very long time and we don't do this for any reason other than the fact that we really enjoy it. It's just a passion project of ours. So, every bit of support that we get really means a lot. Whenever we get a new follower on Instagram, we send each other a message.  Like, “Oh my God, have you seen?!”  we get so excited. It's a passion project for us. So, we really hope you'll follow along and enjoy it with us.

LOTTY: Exactly, because like, it's, it's so lovely being at the start of building a brand-new community, really.  we don't Know where this is going to take us, that's the cool thing. and while I personally quite like certainties a lot of times, I like the unknown in this aspect, because there is endless possibility here.

HANNAH: Exactly.

LOTTY: [beat] Endless pasta-bility, I might say.

HANNAH: Hehehehe. Very fun.

LOTTY: Anyway, going back to the pasta, this, as you can see, is getting more like dough like, so I'm pretty happy with that so far. Yours is looking pretty good too, Hannah.

HANNAH: Mine, I think mine is ready to rock and roll.  So,

LOTTY: I think mine is too. What I might do is, give it a little bit of a helping hand with a rolling pin just so I'm not wedging it into my machine straight off the bat.

HANNAH: I will not be doing that because I am a creature of chaos!

LOTTY: I think we've established we both are just like in slightly, slightly different aspects?  So, when we're together, the chaos either cancels each other out and we're just chill, or we are just harbingers of chaos in both directions and it's just absolute ... To me, I absolutely love it.

HANNAH: Oh yeah, me too.

LOTTY: We just feed off each other's chaotic energy.  Always have. It's great.

HANNAH: So, we are 16 minutes into recording and we have our pasta dough ready to roll out. Just to give you an idea of the fact that it doesn't actually take as long as you think it's going to. Let me just attach this to the side…

LOTTY: The past machine obviously isn't the only new thing around here. People who've watched Literally any episode before this one, this is a whole new kitchen. There are a lot of things I'm still getting used to. I have space for once! however, I also have so much more stuff than I thought. This is one of three rolling pins I seem to have acquired in the past three weeks. I have multiples of everything that I do not need! Which a lot of it is really nice, like it's things that I've been gifted by family or that's been handed down to me, and part of it is like, why do I need three oven cleaners? It's just things like this that sort of seem to keep accumulating. If anyone's moved house and tried to like downsize or tried to sort through like family stuff, you know what I'm on about. It's, it can be kind of overwhelming sometimes.  yeah, I mean sometimes you find some absolute gems while you're doing that but sometimes it's just chaos and not in the fun way. So, I've just started rolling one out, how's yours coming along?

HANNAH: Mine's getting a little bit stuck. So, I'm just put it through and I'm putting it through again. I'm just giving it another go.

LOTTY: So, if anyone hasn't used a pasta machine before, you don't really go just one and done, it's a very incremental process. It's also, you know, kind of a manual process, what you do is you have this knob on the side or dial, whatever you want to call it, and as you go through the, the process, you narrow the space between the two rollers. I'm sure in the behind the scenes we'll show a close up of what these actually look like. Anyway, so this is the first pass.  That's a very interesting shape. I think to make it more manageable for myself, I'm going to cut this in half. Just so I'm not trying to force too much dough through in one go!  And I'm going to go in for my second pass.

HANNAH: So, for me, I will be doing it to number five, and then I do have the bit that goes on for you to use it to make Tagliatelle. I find that it gets stuck and I think that's especially just because the age of my machine. So, I'm going to be doing… a little bit of hack where you just, just cut it with a knife.  I'm just going to dust it with some flour so it doesn't all get stuck to itself. Fold it up several times over so I've got a nice little rectangle here, and use a very going to sharp knife and just cut into ribbons and those ribbons will make my tagliatelle.  So, when I pull these apart Should have got my baking sheet ready.  I have little weirdly shaped ribbons,

LOTTY: They look lovely.

HANNAH: which I'm just going to place on my baking tray so that they don't stick together.

LOTTY: I should probably have also got a baking tray out at some point while prepping.  There we go. And I'm just going to dust that in flour just to keep it from sticking.  I think you're a little bit ahead of me, Hannah, because I'm still on level two.

HANNAH: I'm a bit of a speedy Gonzales, aren't I? [LAUGHS]

LOTTY: To be fair, I think you're also a lot more used to the machine, like this thing I've only used twice, so.  I'm just going to turn the light on. I don't know if that's made any difference, I just thought it's surprisingly grim for July out there, so I thought I'd add a bit of light to the subject. That's the wrong piece of pasta.

HANNAH: These are long bits of tagliatelle.  Very, very long ribbons.

LOTTY: They're Long Bois.

HANNAH: Oh, definitely, like my dog.

HANNAH: So, I think while we are making, we usually share. Some of our favorite things that have come up recently. 

[MUSIC] 

HANNAH: And I know Charlotte had a really interesting one to tell you, so I was going to tee her up and say that she's got a really interesting thing that's been going on. Other than moving house, that is!

LOTTY: So, I have been part of my local book club for some time and this month's book club was super exciting on several accounts because we got brand new books. One of which hasn't even been released yet, like this is a proof copy. And I've never been so excited about books. I get excited about books a lot. I have been a massive bookworm my whole life. But these two books in particular have really intrigued me because first of all I get to actually share them with other people! My book club is a wonderful collection of books. really like lovely individuals and I love getting to meet up with them. And secondly, well, both of these are really intriguing. So, I will start with this one. This is The Curse of Pietro Houdini. I've not started either book yet.  Have a look at this cover, isn't it gorgeous? This is, this has been gifted to my book club as part of a writing prize where we all get to collectively make a review of this book. And other book clubs up and down the country are doing the same thing with other books that are part of this shortlist.  And whichever book has the best review gets this this writing prize which encourages new authors.  Particularly in the in the historical or in the sort of semi nonfiction side of things. A lot of it is to do with, like, adventure and daring do, things like that. So, it's a way of encouraging new authors to get started with this. So, The Curse of Pietro Houdini is set in Italy during the World Wars and it is, I mean I don't really know much about it apart from the fact that it's about a little boy who steals some paintings before the Nazis can steal the paintings and

HANNAH: Well, that sounds fun!

LOTTY: sort of follows that journey. I'm really excited by this. I, I love a good historical fiction. So, really, really intrigued by this.  Second of all, this, I know is already dear to my heart. Because it is a story about, well, it's called The Instrumentalist. It doesn't come out until August this year. I'm probably spoiling it a little bit, but Harriet Constable ever listens to this, Harriet, I am so excited for your book I can't wait to read it. So, this is about a violin prodigy called Ana Maria de la Pieta, who was a student of Vivaldi - who is one of the most well-known baroque violinists and violin composers. I used to play violin. I used to be part of an orchestra. And so, to be able to read about a woman in history who not only was a student of Vivaldi, but also created her own compositions and who's been forgotten by history.  Like this? This excites me so much. I wish I had this book growing up. So, I'm, I'm so intrigued by this. So, these are my two very fresh finds and I will keep you updated in the next episode about how the books are going, how I'm finding them, and what happens with the writing prize. So yeah, over to you, Hannah.

HANNAH: So, my favorite at the moment has got to be what I’ve done recently, so as you know I recently got a dog!

Lotty: Woo!

HANNAH: - who is asleep on the sofa, paying zero attention to me. So, I'd love to show you him, but he's not interested, which is good, cause we've done a lot of training to get to this point. Cause he was a; he was a counter surfer when he first came here. And I was really worried about how we were going to do the podcast if I couldn't cook. He’s come a long way. My, my favorite is that between me and my partner, we took our dog down to my like childhood holiday home in West Sussex, and we spent some time there and it was absolutely lovely to have walks on the beach and go to the, the bakers that I went to as a child, and. See my nephew, and do everything that I don't usually get to do and see all the people I don't usually get to see. It was just, I can't even really describe how wonderful of a feeling it is to watch your dog run across a field that you lend. To ride a bike on. It was like a full circle moment where I was like, “Oh my God, I learned how to ride a bike here, and now I'm watching my dog play.”  It was just,

LOTTY: And not only that, like he's learning to play for the first time, in the same space that you did.

HANNAH: yeah. If you're, if you're not from the UK or you're not from a place where greyhounds are still raced fabulous for starters that's great. Can you help sort it out in this country? One of the things that I am going to link in this episode is that the Blue Cross is currently running a petition to end greyhound racing in the UK. I was passionate about this before having a greyhound, but now that I have the sweetest little baby, I just, I don't understand why it's still legal to treat animals in the way that they are treated.  So, Olly's a rescue. He's about four years old. He came to us when he was.  Pretty much for we celebrate his birthday together.  And we don't know much about his history other than his race history. So, I know that his mom had 10 or 12 letters. I'm not going to be sharing

LOTTY: That's a lot of pups, that is a lot…

HANNAH: His dad's only two years older than him. And they're just kind of overbred and then sent to China as dog meat. They also are raced against their will. They are underfed and overfed to be in different categories: They can be underfed so that they run faster, because if they're really hungry, they'll chase. So, our lovable little boy, he’s just learning at the moment how to be a dog, and learning how to not be kept in a kennel he’s the sweetest boy ever, and this kind of leads on to one of the hot takes we have, we've got the same opinion, and because of the size of him, you know, grey hounds are not little dogs. they're very, very big dogs.  are expected to behave - Olly is expected to be a much gentler, calmer animal and less excitement than a little dog who can wheel over the floor when it sees you or can yap and yap and yap at you and it doesn't matter because they've got little teeth? I just think all dogs should be held to the same standard and, you know, you have to be a responsible dog owner and a dog, responsible dog parent, but all dogs, regardless of their size, should be held to the same accountability, the same amount of training. It's not fair that you can have no control over your dog and my dog, because he's a big dog, has to just stand there and let another dog growl at him. It's just wrong.  It's just wrong.

LOTTY: I completely agree. I've, I've never had dogs myself. I mean, I've been with partners who have, like, who are dog owners. I've, my current partner has two Vizslas and again, they're big dogs. They're not as big as greyhounds. They're not quite as powerful, but they were still bred for like hunting.  And then an ex of mine had a Chihuahua.  And the level of behavioral expectations between Like, my current partner's family, and their dogs, and my ex's family, and their dog, is so vastly different. So, my ex's chihuahua was, I think, just the best way to describe it, was a menace. He'd clearly been spoiled, and was spoiled.  Because he was essentially bred to be a lap dog, which, you know, that's not the dog's fault, that's what's been bred into him.  But every mealtime he would demand Dog Tax, so, you know, you'd have to scrape off the best bit of your meal to give to the dog, like he was some kind of deity! And I just found that kind of absurd, because, you know, larger dogs are kind of generally trained not to do that, because that can be considered scary. Whereas, like, a tiny little yappy thing…  Maybe that's not considered scary because they're pretty small. I mean, he'd still try to go for my ankles several times. But, it's just, it's interesting how the two, like, to contrast them together, it’s interesting how different the approach is to them. Like, when you see a little fluffy dog, the general consensus is, “Oh, look how cute!” The general consensus for a big dog is, “Should I run or are they going to chase me?” That's not how I feel, but that's what the general, like, opinion seems to be, is people are scared of big dogs, even though every big dog I've met is really soppy, and really lovely, and really gentle.

HANNAH:  yeah, they have to be.

LOTTY:  I mean, I have met lovely chihuahuas since, to be honest. Like, my cousin has a chihuahua who is very sweet, but is also very territorial and very protective.  And so, like, that’s, you know, that's doable.  But that means that, like, you know, when the Chihuahua gets protective, it's seen as cute. But when, like, you know, when the Vizsla gets protective, it's seen as scary.

HANNAH: Yeah, there's a big difference in how dogs are treated, depending on their size. My mum and dad have a Springer Spaniel. He's absolutely gorgeous, I love him. He's a bit of a maniac, he's a bit mad, and probably needs a bit more help and support in the training department. He's a rescue as well. He's not very well socialized. He kind of struggles in new situations. But because he's little, it doesn't seem to matter as much. And if I'm walking my spaniel, I have to stop people from touching him.  he doesn't like being touched.  Whereas, walking my greyhound, people cross the street to get away from him. And I understand being afraid, but that's fine. I mean, he's not going to do anything, he's on the lead. I'm not going to let him get close to you if you look uncomfortable. He only wants love. He is the soppiest thing going! But you know, I’m responsible, I'm not going to let that happen. And it's just, it's kind of wild how the little dog is seen as, “oh yeah, I want to give that a cuddle,” and he really doesn't want it. And the big dog just wants to be endlessly loved and doted on. And people cross the other side of the road to not touch him and not see him. And a lot of people just want to know about his race history. 

HANNAH: He’s a race dog anymore. He's my dog and we love him.

LOTTY: I understand, I do understand why people get scared of dogs though, to be fair, like I wasn't super keen on dogs for a long time just because I wasn't growing up socialized with them. My dad's scared of dogs because there was some, like, there was some dogs living next door to him when he was little that weren't very well trained, and so they would get quite aggressive.  And, yeah, like, I completely understand how people would be scared of dogs, I completely understand that. I'm glad that I'm no longer scared of dogs, that I completely sympathize with that, but the best way to, like, the best way to make dogs less scary is good training and being a responsible pet owner. Yeah.  And that, that's regardless of how, like, how big your dog is. You know, you need to be able to be responsible and look after the dog. Maybe I'm preaching a bit, because I don't have a dog. But, from being around people who have dogs, who love their dogs with all their heart, I, I get it, you know? You want the best for your pet, you want the best for your animal, your loved one.

HANNAH: Olly’s part of the family. He's not just the dog.  He's our third member of our little, little family over here. And you know, whenever we go out the house and we go do something scary for any one of us, we, we all sit there and we put our hands and paws in the middle and we say, go team.

LOTTY: Aww!

HANNAH: It's very cute. I love it.

LOTTY: That is the most adorable thing I've had all day. I love that.

HANNAH: He is. A very sweet boy.  I just, I don't think that little dogs need to be held to a different standard, or need, like, Again, it doesn't apply to all dog owners. It doesn't apply to all dogs. I've met some lovely, well behaved little dogs, 100 %

LOTTY: Oh, yeah.

HANNAH: But you definitely get away with being a more neglectful dog owner If you've got a little dog because you can just pick them up if they're being a little shit My dog is like 32 kilos! I can't just pick him up if he's being a little shit He needs to learn to not be a little shit in certain scenarios He you know, he’s allowed to play and have fun and I know that's all I want for him but he does also need to know when to behave and that should be You a universal thing and not just apply to my big greyhound and other big dogs, obviously.

LOTTY: Yeah. I, I completely agree.  I mean, I'd love, I'd love to have a dog one day. That'd be really fun… actually. I'm still figuring out how to look after one person.  So, one person plus an animal is bit much.  You know, in the future, I, I would, it would be really nice, actually, to have that companion.

HANNAH: I don't think that I could do it without my partner. We are quite compatible “paw-rents” because he does different things than I do and he enjoys different things than I do. I’m not wholly interested on going on the same walk every morning at 6:00 AM I just, I just don’t, I like doing it, but it's just, it doesn't, it doesn't fill me with joy. It kind of fills me with dread.

LOTTY: It's the whole repetitive nature of it, isn't it?

HANNAH:  It doesn’t stop me from doing it. You know, the dog's needs will always come above what I want. But he does it definitely more than I do by significant bounds. I am not going to oversell it He is a fantastic dog dad and does so much for me and Olly and So, you know we make it work. But then I do a lot more training. I do enrichment. I do a lot of research on what food he needs to eat.  You know, we, we take on different elements of it and it's much easier in a partnership than it ever would have been on my own. And I'm a very independent person! who is like, “I don't need no man. I don't need no this. I can do everything by myself. I don't need anybody to help me. I can do everything on my own!” and I can do that on my own, but honestly, I don't want to. It's really nice, having us as a little family in a little group and we, we work very well together, all three of us. Olly calms me down but he also motivates me and helps with my mental health. And obviously it's not like I've not got a dog.  To help with my mental health because that would never work. We have the dog because my partner met Olly on a work excursion where they were donating to an animal shelter - Met him walked him came home and never stopped thinking about him.  So talked about it. I would say every day for three months and then eventually I said, “well let's talk to the landlord, let's figure everything out, let's see if we can do it.” So, we talked to the landlord, she said yes.  We had to figure everything out, get all our ducks in a row, figure out how we would do it. Could we afford it? Can we give him a life that he deserves? Because he deserves the best life ever, and that is the same for every animal.  And we came to the conclusion that we can, and now, six weeks later, we have a very, very adorable pup, who's loving life. 

LOTTY: I got to meet Oli properly for the first time a couple weeks ago, I think, or last week? Time doesn't mean anything to me.  like, the three of you came down here and gave me a little housewarming, it was so sweet. And Olly was the biggest sweetheart I have ever had the joy of meeting. I, fell in love with him as soon as I saw him nestled in the back of the car.  Like, I'd already fallen in love with him, but like,

HANNAH: when he decided he didn't want to get out?

LOTTY: Yeah, but he is impossible not to love. I have just chopped up this garlic. I realized I was about to mince the garlic. My garlic masher. Oh well, one less thing to wash up. Never mind.  I don't think that counts as a fudge up, actually!  So, I can see you're still rolling out your pasta. I have managed to rocket through that. And I have all of my spaghetti laid out here. I'm holding it at this angle so it doesn't fall down! So that's my spaghetti. Very exciting. And what I've just done is I've grabbed a whole load of basil… Probably too much, but there's no such thing as too much basil in my book. And a clove of garlic. And I've just roughly chopped the basil to give it a head start. And what I'm going to be doing is quite possibly my, my favorite like sauce or garnish or thing ever which is pesto! Except I can't have pesto because it has nuts in most of the time - Usually it has pine nuts or cashew nuts, I've seen one with walnuts before.  Naturally that would, that wouldn't do good things for me, that would leave me incredibly uncomfortable. And I've talked about my allergies before on this, on this podcast, so I won't go into detail this time. But yeah, so I found a variant of pesto that I can actually eat and it's the best thing ever. So, it's a French / Provencal variant called pistou, P-I-S-T-O-U, or variant thereof, which is very similar, but doesn't contain nuts.  And I would, quite honestly, just eat the stuff with a spoon!  So, that's what I'm doing for my sauce. I got my little pestle and mortar here. You can do it in a food processor, it's a lot quicker. (It's also probably a lot less messy.) But I quite like doing it the old-fashioned way. I found this in a charity shop for two quid. It’s I love this little thing.  So, I've got my pestle and mortar, I've got basil, garlic, lemon juice, you can use fresh lemon of course, I've just, this is what I have to hand, and olive oil. (Yeah, I know, this is the good stuff, it's… I have a rule, I don't skimp on olive oil.) And salt and pepper.  So, I'm going to start putting all these things together. So, I, I'm sure I'll get a proper recipe written down for the blog, so that you guys can actually follow along. But, as with a lot of my cooking, I kind of just eyeball it and I measure it with my heart. Which is kind of our a little, like, tertiary tagline on this, aside from the whole “Waffling Through Our 20’s” thing: We measure things with our hearts. We measure chocolate chips with our heart. We measure the amount of lemon juice and basil leaves that we need for a pesto with our heart.  So, I know off the top of my head, a teaspoon of lemon juice is a pretty good way to start.  And then you want about half your olive oil in first, and then you add your basil and your garlic.  There's a pretty good basic recipe for this on a website called The Spruce Eats and they call for like a third of a cup of olive oil for those Americans out there...  I don't know if any Americans actually follow the show. I hope they do. Anyway, I, I will probably link to that in the description box because that's where I found this, like, alternate pesto. (I also found it in a book of mine called Love in Paris which is my favourite book of all time.)  But anyway, there are millions of variants on there. Some of them use parmesan, some of them use breadcrumbs, some of them use neither, some of them use both.  So, I've got my olive oil and my lemon juice in here. I'm going to just add some basil and the garlic.  And I'm just going to muddle that a bit together, just so it goes down a bit.  You can see this looks quite full. I know this is quite a small pot of water. But trust me, this will go into a paste. 

HANNAH: I'm going to be doing my spicy tomato sauce.  I've just about finished cutting my pasta, and I'm just checking in on the Greyhound.  Oh, we've got Snoot incoming, incoming! Oh, no, you can't quite see him. He's still off frame. I’m going to invite him over because I don't want him to think that he can come up to the kitchen counters when I'm cooking. I don't mind if he comes over of his own accord, but I'm not going to encourage it.

LOTTY: I think that's very wise.

HANNAH: [HIGH VOICE] That's a big stretch! That's a big stretch!  Hi, baby!  [NORMAL VOICE] You can just about see his snoot. Just about. It's…

LOTTY: Oh, just, there he is! Hello, Olly!  We should start doing like a bingo card, where it's like, you know, check it off your bingo cards if you see an Olly Snoot.

HANNAH: Who spots the Olly Snoot first? Charlotte? or the audience? Cause it won't be me, cause I, I, I will see him first. But that's – [TO OLLY] Why are you trying to stick your head in the baking cupboard? You can't have it.  You also only like oats that's in that cupboard and I'm not making you biscuits today.  I know that's very disappointing.

LOTTY: Right, so that is all of my basil. I may have overdone it on the basil. 

HANNAH: Oh, he's having another snooze. He's going to lay down on the floor exactly where I need to be because he wants to be right next to me.

LOTTY: He's so helpful.

HANNAH: Is he? [LAUGHS]

LOTTY: yeah, he's your little shadow hound.

HANNAH: So that’s my tray of tagliatelle. I'm going to try and hold it like this a little bit so you can actually see it - I'm going to just try and dust off some of the flour off my pits

LOTTY: [LAUGHS] That's a sentence.

HANNAH: and I’m going to get started on my Sauce. So, for my sauce, it's the “Fuck It” method, as per usual. A little bit of oil olive oil would be even better but we'd run out.  And I'm not going to the shop just for olive oil, use what you have.  So, there we are. [TO OLLY] Hi there, would you like some attention?  Let mummy wash her hands and then you can have a little bit of attention. [TO CAMERA] So I'm just heating up the oil and washing my hands off screen. [TO OLLY] Who's a good boy?  Who's a good boy? Hey, who's mummy's good boy? [TO CAMERA] Right, now that's heated up, in this container I've got peppers, chilies, So, I'm just going to put the chilli garlic mixture and some of the peppers, I'm not trying to put the peppers in, but they're in there anyway.  With the oil, a bit of salt and pepper, and let this sort of fry away.  I'm also going to add salt to my other pot which will have my pasta in it.  The best thing about fresh pasta is that it takes hardly any time at all to actually cook it.

LOTTY: Oh, yeah, it this sort gets cooked in about, I think, three minutes, not even that.

HANNAH: While we’re at this bit there's no best time than the present:

[MUSIC]

HANNAH: So, my fudge up of the month is that when ordering something for the dog, I didn't check what was in my Amazon basket.  And so, I just clicked Buy Now. And all the things that I've been looking at for a very, very long time, but never would've spent the money on,

LOTTY: Oh no.

HANNAH: didn’t realize until it was delivered.  So, I now have a clicker for my Kindle page turner thing and this weird, like, arm thing. So, I can stick my Kindle onto the headrest of the bed, lay in bed, and lay there and turn the pages of my Kindle without dropping it on my face.  Absolute game changer. Oh, Jesus. Spicy.  changer, but my God, did I not realise I was doing that.

LOTTY: The dangers of online shopping. I mean, at least they're things that, like, you know will come in handy, and there, like, things you, like, you wanted.  You know, the little key you wanted, at least, already, so that's quite good.

HANNAH: I have a feeling this sauce is going to be incredibly spicy.

LOTTY: if it's too spicy, you can temper it with a little bit of sugar. And that just tones down a bit of the acidity as well of the tomatoes.

HANNAH: I will definitely be doing that.  I'm probably adding more tomato.

LOTTY: Yeah.

HANNAH: Because it's so spicy that my nose is running. And I'm not eating it, I'm just smelling it. Yeah, [COUGHS] Alright, there we go, that is nearly there. 

LOTTY: So, it’s looking good though, I wish I could smell it.  Seriously, why are we spending all this money on AI when we should be spending money so that I can smell my best friend's cooking from 150 miles away?

HANNAH: I wholeheartedly agree with that statement.

LOTTY: Like, how have we not invented Smell-O-Vision yet?

HANNAH: [COUGHS] Oh my god!

LOTTY: You good?

HANNAH: Whoo! Spicy!

LOTTY: Is this the first time you're using one of your chilies?

HANNAH: I used three of them!

LOTTY: Did you remove the seeds?

HANNAH: no…? [COUGHS]  

LOTTY: That's probably why it's very, very spicy.  That might do it.

HANNAH: Right. that's brilliant. while I'm being killed by spice, let's get some spicy hot takes! So, a very quick one for me is that if you don't vote, you don't get a say in any political things. So, we had a general election in the UK on the 4th of July. [COUGHS] Oh my God.

LOTTY: Do you want to take five?

HANNAH: Nope.  I'm all right. And a lot of young people, we actually had a 60 percent voter turnout in the UK. [COUGH]

LOTTY: Definitely. We could have done with more than 60 percent of people - Like, I think I don't want to go too political here? This is, You know, but  of what could have happened and what did happen, I think we did get, you know, a net, generally better outcome. [HANNAH BLOWS NOSE] we could have had a better, better outcome if more people had voted! But we'll just have to see what, you know, where we go from here, really. No, I'm, I'm in complete agreement with Hannah here. Like, I, I'm of the opinion that the voting age should be lowered to 16 because I think more, like, you know, teenagers have a lot of thoughts and a lot of opinions, and they're trying to find their way in the world.  And a lot of older generations seem to see this as, “oh, well, that means they don't know enough to vote.”  Okay, well give them the option anyway, give them the resources that means that they can make informed decisions. And you know, what I can tell from like teens nowadays is a lot of them are really disillusioned with everything and they feel like they don't have any power. So why, you know, what can they do to change that? I mean, I think back to like when I was sort of 18 or so Greta Thunberg at that point, I think it was 15 and she decided to take things into her own hands and. Become, like, an environmental activist.  And that’s sort of the only power that teenagers sometimes feel like they have. So, I think we should be giving more of a voice to them.  I also… this is going to be a spicy follow on from this!  So, Australia has compulsory voting. I think we should have –

HANNAH: What?

LOTTY: Australia has compulsory voting. You have to vote.

HANNAH: Why is that not a thing everywhere?

LOTTY: Yeah, exactly! Like, it doesn't mean you have to vote for a specific person, it just means you have to put a ballot in. It doesn't matter what you do on the ballot, but you have to at least show up.  And, you know, you can spoil your ballot, you can put a cross over all of them. That's fine. In fact, I'd encourage doing that more than just not voting, because at least then you've made your voice heard and said, “I don't like any of this!” By not voting, you're basically saying, “I don't care.” When, if you're going to complain about it, clearly you do care, so why not vote? Like, even, hell, even if you vote for the Monster Raving Loony Party, at least you vote. That's my opinion.

HANNAH:  I fully agree.

LOTTY: What's very funny about that in fact, is I know someone who was in our former Prime Minister's constituency, and he was running against Count Binface, in that constituency.

HANNAH: Love that.

LOTTY: That was, that was phenomenal. And my friend sent me, like, footage of, like, all of these political candidates on, like, election night.  And you've just got Rishi Sunak standing next to Count Binface and another guy who's dressed up looking like a baked bean, deliberately - This is the guy from the Monster Raving Loony Party.  And you just think, what the fuck is the state of politics? But also… it's good that we have parties like the Monster Raving Loony Party. I'm not saying vote for them necessarily! But, like, they're there to prove a point that the current system kind of sucks.  But at least if you're if you want to waste your vote, waste it on a political party that's a bit stupid rather than just not going. That's my opinion. Anyway, I think that's probably spicier than Hannah's pasta sauce!  But anyway, it's now out on the internet. You're welcome.

HANNAH: I just don't think if you, like my brother for example didn't vote and I think if you're not going to vote then you've decided that politics don't matter to you and if politics don't matter to you, which is fine, that's a fine opinion to have!  I mean it's not necessarily true because politics affect your everyday life.

LOTTY: It affects everyone

HANNAH: If you believe that politics don't matter then, you know, whatever.  Live your life.  But you don't get to then say, “Oh, they didn't do this and they didn't do that.” If you vote and your party gets in and they don't do what they said they'd do, then you get to be pissed off. “I voted for you and you haven't done what you said you would.” If the party you didn't get in, you voted for didn't get in, didn't get their seat, then you get to be like, “oh, for fuck's sake, this is why they shouldn't have been elected again,” you know, you get to win either way here,

LOTTY: and also, you can still like lobby the MPs in your constituency if you want things to be changed like they're there to Represent you even if they don't align with your views. You still, you know, you can still call them and email them and be a general menace until they listen to you.  In fact, I'd encourage that.

HANNAH: we pay for them. Just like, put that in context for a minute, they are public service, that we pay for them. So, in the same way that you get pissed off about NHS waiting times, or ambulances, or the police service.  Take that same level of frustration, if not more, out on the people who make the decisions! Because it's not the police force itself and the individuals within it. It's not the ambulance service or 111 who are the problem. They are massively underfunded and under supported.

LOTTY: and over stretched and over stress.

HANNAH: And that has happened as a result of the government. So, use your MPs to your advantage. That's what they're there for.

LOTTY: I think as a little follow up I've got another hot take that's, I think we will, we will go away from the political in a minute, bear with us, but - Follow up to the hot take. I think that political manifestos should be legally binding.  Like, if you put something in your manifesto, you have to be willing to and able to at least put steps towards it, and be able to demonstrate that you put steps towards it, rather than just offering a promise, and then completely ignoring it, doing a, U turn, and just, you know, failing to deliver. Why did you fail? You promised that you would deliver something.  Where is it? If you don't have a good reason for it, I don't think that should be legal. Legally binding.  That's, you know, manifestos are just like, it's saying, it's ideas. They're good ideas in some cases. They're really stupid ideas in other cases. I'm not going to say which cases.  But generally (you know, you can probably infer) but I think they should be legally binding. say you're going to, let's say for example, this is something that I'm very salty about. So, in…was it 2015 or 2010? Anyway, we got a coalition government. And one of those parties said that they would lower the tuition fees for universities because they were at 3, 000 a year.  Guess what happened? They raised them to 9, 000 a year and then 9, 250 and now there are millions of people who are in more debt to the government because the political party actually actively went back on their promise.  And then you wonder why people don't vote.

HANNAH: I don't wonder why people won’t vote; I just wish they did.

Oh, yeah, me too. Me too. Absolutely. But like, I think probably my spiciest take is I think if you're going to promise something and then you get elected into power That's because people expect you to then do the thing. But yeah, that's, that's my very spicy take, jeez whiz. Shall we move on from politics?

Let's move on to another hot take. I've just added some oregano to my garden. I bought a tiny, tiny little pot of it, and it is now gigantic. I didn't think it was going to thrive. It is not only thriving; it is starting to take over other pots in my garden!

LOTTY: jeez, I thought that only happened to mint. It

HANNAH: No, so since getting my four-legged friend, my garden has been a little bit neglected unintentionally, it's just, you know, walking the dog is a priority over propagating my plants nowadays.

LOTTY: It happens.

HANNAH: The next one I’ve got is age: so, I’ve just left a work environment where age has been a significant factor in how I have been treated. And you can say that you don’t think it is, but I’m a very driven young woman and I think that I have been negatively treated and maybe misjudged and believed to be less capable by both men and women. This is not just like a, an older man.  thing. It's both genders. As a result, I think I've been undercut in my abilities. And I, I just, I think that that should stop.  I'm a very capable driven young person and the attitude of, “Oh, but I've been doing this for 30 years. What do you know?” Okay. You've been doing it for 30 years and the company's not making money. Don't do it that way anymore! And things have developed and there's new technology now, and I don't have to sit here with a piece of pencil, a pencil, and go out and write down things on a piece of paper and then fax it to the company that needs that information. I don't have to do that anymore. So, to

LOTTY: People still fax? 

HANNAH: yeah, faxes were used

LOTTY: People still fax?! 

HANNAH: oh yeah, we still had one at my previous role.

LOTTY: I haven't seen a fax machine for 20 years. Dad used to have one in his own home office and I think I saw him use it about five times. When I was really, really little and I never knew how it worked.  I genuinely thought they were obsolete... That's… I'm having to rethink my worldview a bit. Well anyway.

HANNAH: So, there’s things like faxes and doing things on pieces of paper that can be lost.  But I just think we don't need to do that anymore. There are better alternatives.  Let's get with the, get with the picture, get with the time frame and try and use some new developed technology. And even if it's not technology, a new person with fresh eyes, young, old, man, woman, you know, will just see things in a different way than you. And that is an incredibly valuable experience. I have learned so much from working with people who are older than me. I can't understate how much they've taught me,  but equally  I've taught them just as much, if not more,  because I've come to the plate with: “I know you don't really like doing it this way because you normally just call them, but instead of calling them and sitting on the phone for an hour, they have this online chat thing and you can just speak to them for five minutes and you can print out the transcript, Keep a copy of it, and if they go back on their word, you've got evidence.  You know?”

LOTTY: I'm, very middle of the road in that where like, I do see exactly like people's point if they've been in the industry for a long time of like, you know, “the old way is the best way” because that's what they used to. I do get that. And sometimes it is like sometimes. That is the best way of doing it, but then equally the whole point of innovation is to try and make things a bit easier for other people and make things like more smooth, more streamlined.  Like I am steadily learning in my current role that sometimes it is better to just pick up the phone because otherwise you will be engaged in an email ping pong for what feels like decades.  But equally, you want that written confirmation at the end. You want like Hannah says, like a transcript. So, both is good. Maybe that's just the bisexual in me, but like, Both Is Good. I think older people do understate how much they can learn from the newer generations coming up. I think there is, there is definitely, like, a nuance and a middle ground to be found here. Where, like, yes, innovation is fantastic! And yes, keeping things, like, succinct and traditional for people who've been doing this a long time and who might struggle with the new technology is also a really good thing to do. Like, you can have both, in my opinion.

HANNAH: A hundred percent.  And I'm not saying that I'm not willing to do things the way they've always been done. And I'm also willing to see how they've always been done, and if that works better than any idea that I have, I'm not going to implement it.

LOTTY: oh yeah, exactly.

HANNAH: my drive and my motivation and my age, and I believe at least a little bit my gender contributing factors to how I've been treated in the workplace because I'm seen sort of as a little girl. I go into the office, I don't really wear makeup, so that probably doesn't really help, but I don't see why I should have to.

LOTTY: Oh, agreed.

HANNAH: I turn up and I do my work and I go, because quite frankly, you don't pay me enough to give more of my life than I have to. You pay me to do things for you. In this time period, and that is what my contract says, and if you want me to stay later, you're going to have to amend my contract. And I think a lot of, again, not all, none of this applies to everybody.  There's a bit of a, “oh, but your job is to do this and you're salaried, so you just have to stay until you've done it”

LOTTY: No, you have contracted hours, so that's not how it works.

HANNAH: because if that's how it works, which I would be fine with if that's how it works, but that means that Tuesday on Tuesday at two o'clock when I have nothing to do, I could log off and I can’t, so

LOTTY: I’d love that. My, my work is all go, go, go. But anyway, I do think like I, so I went into my current industry. I've always wanted to be in the vicinity of my current industry and it has historically been an incredibly male dominated industry. Like the construction industry is… I don't know the actual statistic, but it is mostly masculine, it's mostly male, and so, like, when I was sort of growing up, you wouldn't really see female architects, for example, or female project managers, or female plumbers, for example. I remember going to a site visit when I was, like, in my very early twenties with my dad, (so, you know, yes, I've got an extra foot in the door, I'm very lucky in that respect.) But I went to a site with my dad and there was an electrician there who happened to be female. It was my first time seeing a female electrician. I was 21 and I thought, “oh my goodness, this is really exciting.”  In my opinion, I don't think that should have to be exciting. I think, like, we are far enough into what we consider the modern age that that should be normal, that that should be, like, you know, I don't think we should be, like, I think trying to aim for a quota of 50 percent of each is, frankly, counterproductive because sometimes that's not what people want to do. And sometimes that's, there's not space perhaps,  but I think we should be aiming for more balance and I think we should also be rather than trying to do it as a tick box exercise,  the people who want to be there, the people who are actively engaged in the role, if you want to learn, if you want to do the best job, they can  regardless of gender, that's what we should be going for. Like I shouldn't be excited to see a female electrician. Right now. I am. Right now, I think that's fantastic. I want to see more of them so that I'm not surprised by it!  If that makes sense?

HANNAH: it makes perfect sense. You don't want it to be exciting -

LOTTY: it shouldn't be a novelty, right? Like, talking to, you know, talking to a female site manager, for example, should not be a novelty.

HANNAH: I think a 50:50 quota for anything is just not really the way to do it. I mean, my partner was talking to us about music festivals -

LOTTY: Oh, we were, we were talking - Yeah.

HANNAH: and how there's a lot of them now have a 50:50 quota on gender split for headliners, but obviously it depends on the kind of music. If you're going to a metal festival like Download, there is not a There just aren't as many all-female rock bands as there are male. And that’s not a negative comment on women, but you couldn't do a 50 50 quota because there's not the same calibre of artist.  Not as in talent and ability, but in popularity, which is where it gets muddled,

LOTTY: Yeah, I think you get a lot more, like, folk artists who are female, for example or a lot of pop music is more female dominated and so you want to take a more nuanced depiction,  and I think that's a lot of the things that, like, get our hot takes going, is where is the nuance in general opinions? like, you can, you can say a hot take, but, like, there's always There's always more behind it. Like, you can say, oh, there shouldn't be 50:50 of gender in a music festival.  Which, agreed. Let's expand on that! You know, we shouldn't be surprised to see a female plumber. Agreed. Let's expand on that.  Like,

HANNAH: Diversity and inclusion should not begin at the top.  So, you should not be aiming for a quota of 50 percent in anything if you're not then putting the same amount of funding and education and training on both genders at the bottom. Because you're never going to meet that 50 percent until you change the bottom of the rung. You're not going to have female plumbers if the entire class at college is men, because it's intimidating. I did science. I did physics. It is intimidating. You have to be quite a stern woman to continue to study something where you are one of the only women in the room.

LOTTY: It’s a very similar thing with architecture. I studied architecture. My cohort when I joined was pretty like equal, I think, like there was slightly more boys than girls, but the number of girls who went to different subjects, because most of the tutors were male. Not because most of the tutors were male, but like, you could see that when you went up the rungs, the further up you went, the less equal the genders became.  Like when you get to management level in architectural firms, I think a couple of years ago, the top 10 companies in the UK, I think only like architectural firms, this is only one of them was run by a woman, for example. I don't know what the statistics are now. But like a couple of years ago when I graduated, that was the case in the UK. Like, the bottom rung, like the, you know, the architectural assistants, were starting to be more diverse. You started to have more people from diverse backgrounds. You started to have more women, more queer people, for example, at the bottom rung. But the further up you went, the whiter, the more male.  That's just how the pyramid worked. And I think it will take a lot of time before those rungs start getting a bit more even. I would love to be a lot further along than we are, and I'd love to know why we're not further along than we are. That's like, you know, that's my motivation is, okay, why haven't we had this change before? How can we implement it better? Because it's clearly not for lack of trying. Like, there are people who are trying to get into these fields from diverse backgrounds.  So, it's not for lack of trying, but what's, you know, what's the hold up at the top?  Like, we had, so again, talking about architecture a couple of years ago, we, the RIBA, Royal Institute of British Architects, elected its first black president. I might need to collect that, correct that in post. But anyway, we, there was a huge outpouring of support from the younger cohorts who wanted change. And so, we elected a younger, more like upwardly mobile president, and the amount of change that the RIBA has seen in the years since has skyrocketed. It's not perfect. There's so much more that still needs doing, but like, by choosing a younger, also diverse person, by having this huge motivation behind them, it’s, it's caused a lot of change to start happening, that I hope will keep happening. Because the RIBA is traditionally seen as an old white man's club, and so to have that change start from the bottom, I think that's really exciting.

HANNAH: A hundred percent.  My pasta is done as I Speedy Gonzalez'd my way through it.

LOTTY: my pasta is probably done, but I forgot about it for a second. I'm saving this half. I'm going to, I'm going to dry this once I've separated it off camera. Cause I made two portions for this so I can have fresh pasta whenever I want. That's probably done-ish. And the great thing with pesto is you can just dollop it straight on top!

HANNAH: So, my sauce is done, my pasta is done. It's absolutely delicious.

LOTTY: I’M looking forward to trying this.  Right, I'm going to go drain this over the sink…

HANNAH: while you do that, I’m going to go over my fresh find.

LOTTY: Yeah, because we did, we did mine, I guess, but we haven't done yours.

[MUSIC]

HANNAH: so, my fresh find. Is a camp snap camera.

LOTTY: A what?

HANNAH: So, a camp snap camera.  I'll go grab it in a second I can't go while the food's out because the dog will have it!

LOTTY: Oh, yeah.

HANNAH: so, one of our friends Jordan, lead of Matter of Mind the band. (That's the band that my fellas in if you're interested, please listen to their stuff - They're very of cool. - I’m not saying that just because I’m sleeping with him [LOTTY LAUGHS] I genuinely think them looks really cool and you can attest to that because you're not sleeping with any of them!

LOTTY: Agreed! Exactly. But no, they're genuinely, genuinely a really cool band. Ash actually did the scene music for us. His normal style is not funky 70s. It's very, like, just go give them a listen. I think they're really cool. I think they've got a really raw, emotional sound.  They are so amazing to watch live. What we'll do, actually, is we'll link to Matter of Mind in the description box. For this episode, because I think both of us could attest to saying you should listen to these guys. They are, they're like, just something really cool.

HANNAH: And again, I'm not saying it just because I'm sleeping with him. I thought that anyway! So, it's an old-fashioned style, digital camera, a bit like a disposable camera. It has no screen, so you just take photos and you can't actually see what those photos are until you develop it by plugging the SD card into your computer. So, the only reason I know about this is because Jordan, at Download, had one.  And it was so cool! to be able to like, take photos while you're doing things and whatever, and you're not distracted by looking through them. You just take photos of the moments, and then you can look back on it later. It was so much fun that I had to order myself one. So, thanks J, that was a great recommendation, and I got the white one. [LAUGHS] And I will link that, because I think it's really nice to not be on your phone when you are somewhere, but you still want to have the photos and the memories from it. So, I think it's really nice to have the option.

LOTTY: I completely agree with that. I think, like… I do think we are getting quite reliant on technology nowadays. And sometimes that means we do forget to be in the moment and…  I mean, Hannah and I grew up in a time where it was quite common to take a disposable camera with you on holiday and send the photos off. Like, I remember some of my school trips, I'd have, like, a really shitty Kodak and I'd take pictures. You wouldn't know what the pictures were going to be like. You'd come back and you'd have, like, your thumb over the screen, or it was blurry, or, like, someone was blinking. You could never take those pictures again, but there was something so, like, so raw about them. But I think when you can just take and edit pictures, Y’know, in the moment, you, you do kind of lose that. Like there's something really… I'm not saying that the modern technology is bad, honestly, like it's amazing what you can do with photos nowadays, even as an amateur.  But sometimes it's so much more exciting to just be in the moment.  So, speaking of being in the moment, I can see you've started your pasta. How's, how's the spice level going over there?

HANNAH: I took out most of the spice.  So

LOTTY: That’s quite good.

HANNAH: this was what I was frying, and I took all of this out.  So, I have about a third of what was originally in there, because this smells… intense.  So, I'm going to now freeze this in ice cubes, and then use it when I make tomato sauce.

LOTTY: Oh, that's neat. I like that.

HANNAH: We love a zero-waste queen.

LOTTY: I imagine for people, for people who like their sauces, this probably looks ridiculously plain.  Trust me, you don't need a lot of sauce with this because the pasta does a lot of the talking.  And this is, like, it's so simple, but it's just really nice. I'm going to add a tiny bit more pepper.

HANNAH: Fresh pasta is amazing, and as you know if you've been following us a while, we don't really cut our podcasts for time. We do cut out bits of us being really silly, or dropping things, or, or, If I stub my toe and go “Fuck shit, fuck!” I will cut that out. I don't really feel like that needs to be on the internet despite me repeating it so that's kind of the things that we cut out for the most part. We don't edit our podcast for time at all and the

LOTTY: The point of it was basically, like, if you want to cook along with us, then you can, like, we would love to keep you company.  One of the reasons that we started Flour Power and decided on this particular format was so that it would be essentially like having two very chatty best mates in your kitchen with you while you cooked.  Because that's what we are, so... that's, our core raison d'etre for why we present the show in the way we do, where you see our kitchens in full chaos mode (to be fair, mine's better than it was this morning) and you see us, making things in real time and walking you through how to do it, because we want to share this with you in real time cause to me,  if there are such things as love languages, cooking is my love language. And Like I think that sharing food is one of the fundamental parts of being human, just to get philosophical for a second.

HANNAH: I think it's one of the parts of being, I mean, my dog, who is currently asleep, absolutely loves his food. And once I've finished a bit more of this pasta, I’ll change the camera angle so you can all meet him.  I just don't want to teach him to climb up on the counters for obvious reasons.  As, when you saw his snoot earlier, you can see that he doesn't have to go very far to put his face on the counter!  So, we're trying to teach him too not.

LOTTY: Like when he came over here for the first time and he was inspecting everything. Like, you could see his nose, like, just popping up over the counter, about where my hand is, actually.  Just sniffing along. It was very cute! Not the kind of thing you want to have out while you're, like, while you're cooking, or while you're cooking and filming at the same time.  So, yeah.

HANNAH: Especially with the kind of things that I really enjoy. This is spicy garlic pasta.  Dogs shouldn't have spice because it'll make them really ill. And they're allergic to garlic, so this is a recipe for disaster. But it's absolutely delicious and I'm not going to not eat it just because my dog can't have it.

LOTTY: And I think as long as, like, as long as you tidy up later, which you will, then it's all good.

HANNAH: Oh yeah, this is so good.

LOTTY: This afternoon I'm going to try doing a bit of house stuff, house shopping. God, I looked at sofas yesterday, and I found one for 10, 000.

HANNAH: Jesus Christ.

LOTTY: And it was the ugliest effing sofa that I've ever seen in my life. I will show you a picture. Like, it was, jeez. I think it's the kind of thing that influencers buy, because they think it looks cool and vintage and hip.  And to be fair, it does look kind of comfy. But also, it looks ugly as hell!

HANNAH: And this is staying in. That is staying in, because that is a hot, spicy take, if I've ever heard one.

LOTTY: [LAUGHS] Alrighty. I mean, I was, I was talking to my friends about said sofa. And my friend said like the whole concept of Money doesn't buy sense or like the more money you have less sense you have?  Agreed. That's not my take that, is my friend's take - I don't take credit for that, but I do agree with them, where every purchase has to have a purpose when you have more money You don't necessarily have to say it, you can just go, “Oh, I can afford that, it looks neat, I want that.” Or, “This is dumb, I want to buy it.” And sometimes, you know, more power to you. That's fun.  Sometimes you just think, there are so many other things you could spend that money on. Sensible things. Things that could help people, you know. Ah!  It's an Olly! Everyone look!

HANNAH: [TO OLLY] Touch. Yes, good boy. Ooh, what's on the floor?  Can I get a spin?  Yes, that's a very good boy. [TO CAMERA] For anyone interested, this is smoked ham. [TO OLLY] Can I have a paw? Oh, that's so good. That is so good.  Touch?  Yes.  And we're learning a new one, aren't we?  Down.  Down. Good boy.  Sit? Just a bit more. Good boy. Good sit. Good boy.  [TO CAMERA] So, this is my lovable greyhound, Olly. He's a fond member of the family. And his snoot will be seen in many a video.  From now on.

LOTTY: I love him so much.

HANNAH: [AS OLLY] Where's the ham, mum? I want the ham. Oh, I can smell it. It's up here. [TO OLLY] Hi.  You've been very good. Yes, you've been such a good boy! May I have your paw, please? Yes, good boy! One more, and then we're all done. Mwah. No more. I know, you're very cute. That's very cute. But just because I said no more.  All done.  All done.  All done! [TO CAMERA] I'm, I'm wrapped around his little, little paw.

LOTTY: it's very cute. I love how, like, he puts his paw up, going like, oh, mummy likes it when I put my paw up, that's when I get my treat. So, he just keeps putting his paw up.

HANNAH: Yeah, he's starting doing that all the time now. [TO OLLY] You're very cheeky. You know you can't have that. That's going back in the fridge. All done.  He's a good boy.  You didn't see that, but he put his paw up. All done. All done. No more. Good boy.  Right.  And then let me just turn this back around. You can see my messy ass kitchen.  But you know, a messy kitchen is a loved one. You can find us on Instagram at flour_power_podcast, with dashes in between, or our website, flower power podcast. com, where you can find episode transcripts, recipes, and bonus content.

LOTTY: Our episodes are released monthly by Spotify, YouTube, Samsung Podcasts, and on the Flour Power website itself where you can also find transcripts for each episode, recipes, and fun bonus content.

HANNAH: Thanks for listening and happy making!

[OUTRO MUSIC]