Stranger Kitchens: The Secret Ingredient is Not Confidence // Izzy Woods Contrary to every phone/zoom call Olivia and I have ever had, this one actually started on topic; we were talking about Pringles. Joining us were Ed and Hal, two cousins who together have a cooking show called Stranger Kitchens. The format is simple: they choose an area of London, knock on the doors of strangers (as many doors as they need before someone lets them in), and offer to cook them lunch in the stranger’s home. Yes, you heard correctly. Ed and Hal bring the food, the stranger brings the kitchen. We just get to see the magic. When I discovered their channel I was around three G&Ts in, I was alone in the house, and I was just wandering around laughing hysterically to myself. I’m not sure how much the G&Ts had to do with it, but what I do know is that it is comedy gold like no other. There was definitely some tension when it came to the Pringles issue. Olivia would go for original, I’d go for BBQ, and both Ed and Hal opted for sour cream and chive. Thankfully we could all agree that you must steer clear of salt and vinegar Pringles. Those things will burn a hole right through your tongue. I would say you have to be as brave to eat a salt and vinegar Pringle as you would to go and knock on a stranger’s door. But that’s just me. Ed and Hal feel otherwise. Hal: We’ve had days where it’s the second door. We’ve had days where we just don’t get in and we end up going back to one of our houses and quite solemnly cooking what we were planning on cooking for someone else. I’d say it probably averages out to 40 doors before someone lets us in. There was this one door, it was reinforced steel and had four locks on it. It looked very off. E: Yeah, yeah! A big thick metal door that
was painted to look like wood, with a bolt and four locks. And there was a dog… so we just left. H: We can sort of tell from the outside. We’re like “I like the look of that.” Knocking on the doors is quite a good in-built filter. The type of person who’s just going to spontaneously let two people into their house to cook for a couple of hours is quite likely to be quite interesting.
“Everyone’s got that thing that they actually really care about, and regardless of what it is, it is just nice to listen to people chat about something they’re really passionate about. It’s pretty intoxicating.” We were curious as to whether there was a lack of things to talk about with a complete stranger, or an abundance; Hal said, “I watched a couple of episodes back, and I noticed we take a lot of cues from the house. But there are times when I think, ‘god, we are really crap at making conversation’. I think cooking in general, and eating with people is a good way to be quite open, because it’s something you tend to do with people you’re closer with - if you do it with a stranger your mind kind of tricks you into still being quite open, just because that’s the norm when you’re eating with people. And before they know it, we know them. Then we’ve got them.” In one episode, brilliantly titled ‘Pop-Up Cooks and Pop-Up Books’, after the host shows them into the kitchen, he starts very proudly showing off his kitchen knives. Hal says, “I feel like everyone knows two or
