Isaac Brock: Top Ramen

On this very special LIVE episode, recorded at The Cascade PBS Ideas Festival on May 31, 2025, host Rachel Belle sits down with Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, who represents Washington’s 7th District. She’s also the first elected official to be a guest on Your Last Meal!  Congresswoman Jayapal is an activist and fierce advocate of immigrant rights, but she was thrilled to (mostly) take a break from talking politics to chat about one of her favorite topics: food!   She talks about what it was like immigrating to the United States on her own at 16, what she thought of American food when she arrived and what American snack has been her favorite since she was a child living in India. She recalls the time President Joe Biden personally called her to invite her to the White House for breakfast, and a tells a charming story about why her daughter became such an avid cook at such a young age.   Become a Cascade PBS member and support public media! Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle - Season 2 out now! Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame. Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from Isaac Brock — lead singer, guitarist and songwriter of the Portland, Oregon-based band Modest Mouse!  Isaac tells Rachel Belle about the time Modest Mouse got to collaborate with an ice-cream company on a flavor that ... wasn’t so well received; he talks about the first concert he went to; and Rachel and Isaac bond over their love of milkshakes.  Become a Cascade PBS member and support public media! Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle - Season 2 out now! Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame. Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Modest Mouse’s lead singer, guitarist and songwriter has one of the longest, and most disjointed, last meals in Your Last Meal history, but each dish draws from a lifetime of experiences and memories.  A lover of culinary highs and lows, Isaac wants both traditional Japanese ramen and Top Ramen for his last meal, something he ate a lot of in his younger years. We’ll learn the history of instant noodles with Andrea Wang, author of the children’s book Magic Ramen: The Story of Momofuku Ando.  Isaac tells host Rachel Belle about the bar he used to own in Portland, Oregon (and why he made a rule to never drink there!); what sorts of hijinks he’s been roped into doing on an upcoming Modest Mouse cruise; and his quest to figure out a mysterious dish his parents made him for breakfast when he was a kid.   Become a Cascade PBS member and support public media! Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle - Season 2 out now! Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame. Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from Bridget Everett, star of the HBO Max show Somebody Somewhere, singer, comedian and cabaret performer.   In this fast and fun lightning round, Bridget sends host Rachel Belle into a spiral of jealousy by revealing her go-to New York City grocery store; struggles to pronounce the name of her favorite cake (Rachel can’t pronounce it either!); and together they discuss a Midwestern delicacy: St. Louis sushi, which is nothing like its Japanese namesake.   Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle - Season 2 out now! Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.  Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Bridget Everett’s last meal takes us to New Orleans’ second oldest restaurant, where Creole and Italian cooking collide into a cuisine called (you guessed it) Italian Creole! The owner of Pascal’s Manale, Dickie Brennan, joins the show to talk about the special menu and the restaurant’s long history.   Bridget performed her delightfully raunchy cabaret act for years before landing the lead role on HBO Max’s Somebody Somewhere (and she still performs it!), but she made a living working in restaurants. We talk about the highs and lows of her 30-year restaurant career, and when she was able to quit. And she tells host Rachel Belle how she learned to cook on national television.   Both Bridget and her character on Somebody Somewhere love ordering “French toast for the table” at The Chef, a diner in Manhattan, Kansas. Is French toast actually French? We learn its origin story from Max Miller, host of Tasting History.  Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle - Season 2 out now! Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.  Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from actor Jeff Hiller (Somebody Somewhere), author of the new memoir Actress of a Certain Age: My Twenty-Year Trail to Overnight Success.   Jeff talks about visiting the real-life cafes featured in Somebody Somewhere, what he thinks of the Swedish food he grew up eating and why he never ever throws a dinner party.  Listen to Jeff Hiller on Your Last Meal! Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle - Season 2 out now! Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.  Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

If you fell in love with Jeff Hiller’s character Joel on Somebody, Somewhere (he was just nominated for his first Emmy for his performance!), you’ll want to pick up his new memoir, Actress of a Certain Age: My Twenty-Year Trail to Overnight Success.  Jeff tells host Rachel Belle how he got his big break, his first role on a TV show at age 45 after 20 years of auditions, and why his childhood ambitions of becoming a pastor were dashed.   Jeff loves eating in restaurants; he’d eat out every night if his husband would let him. So Tan Vinh, one of The Seattle Times’ food writers and critics, joins the show to talk about what it’s really like to eat at restaurants for a living. What does three dinners a night do to the body? What does Tan eat and drink on his days off? What does he do with the endless leftovers? Listen in to find out!   Then Jeff Hiller shares two options for his last meal: one for the little angel perched on his shoulder and one for the little devil squatting on the other.   Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle -- Season 2 is out now! Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) bi-weekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.  Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from Grammy-nominated singer, songwriter and pianist Regina Spektor!  Regina grew up in the Soviet Union, moving to the United States when she was 10, and many of her eating experiences are colored by her young life in Russia — including the desserts she likes! Regina tells host Rachel Belle which foods she’d choose over a birthday cake, why she woke up at 3 a.m. to house a container of chopped liver (when she was a vegetarian!) and her thoughts on karaoke.  Listen to Regina Spektor's full Your Last Meal episode from last week! Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle -- Season 2 is out now! Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) bi-weekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.  Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Grammy-nominated singer, songwriter and pianist Regina Spektor grew up in Soviet Russia, so when she moved to the Bronx with her family in 1990, American food was a bit of a culture shock. Cereal! Oranges! Chocolate pudding cups! It was all brand-new! Regina shares a handful of her family’s immigration eating stories.   When in doubt, order the soup! That’s what Regina does. She tells host Rachel Belle about her (nearly) lifelong love of soup, what caused her to rebel against it in high school and why the simplest of broths would be her last meal.   Cookbook author Caroline Wright never set out to have a career in soup, but a terminal cancer diagnosis resulted in a soup club, two vegan soup cookbooks and the title of Seattle Soup Lady. She tells Rachel her story.   Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle! Season 2 out now! Sign up for Rachel’s new (free!) Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.  Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from Dave Barry, award-winning humorist, columnist and author.   Dave tells host Rachel Belle about the all-author band he’s been in for 30 years (that includes Stephen King!), what food he finds the funniest and why he hates lightning rounds (the entire episode is a lightning round!)   Listen to Dave’s Your Last Meal episode from last week!  Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle! Season 2 out now! Sign up for Rachel’s new (free!) Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings! Follow along on Instagram! Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame.  Support Cascade PBS: https://secure.cascadepublicmedia.org/page/133995/donate/1/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.