CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Hello!
Welcome to QI, where tonight, we've packed up our provisions
and plonked down for the perfect picnic.
Let's meet our picnickers.
Making the sandwiches, it's Richard Osman.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Supplying the Thermos, it's Rachel Parris.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Carrying the hamper, it's Romesh Ranganathan.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
And reading the newspaper in the car, it's Alan Davies.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
And their buzzers are quite literally buzzing.
Richard goes...
BUZZING
Rachel goes...
BUZZING
Romesh goes...
BUZZING
And Alan goes...
BEES BUZZING
SPLAT
LAUGHTER
All right...
You've been in my lavatory again, haven't you?
LAUGHTER
SPLAT
LAUGHTER
SPLAT, SPLAT, SPLAT, SPLAT
LAUGHTER
OK, what would you keep in this basket?
You get those if you go fruit picking, baskets like that.
Yes, you do, but not this particular basket.
I'm going to... It looks a bit like a building to me.
It is a building, that's exactly right.
What you'd keep in it is a basket-making company.
Wow! No way.
It is a seven-storey picnic basket.
It was built as the headquarters for a basket-making company
called Longaberger Company.
It was the brainchild of Mr Dave Longaberger,
and at one point, the architects tried to talk him out of it,
they said it was a very bad idea, and he said,
IN AMERICAN ACCENT: "If they can put a man on the moon",
"they can certainly build a building that's shaped like a basket".
LAUGHTER
You say brainchild... Yeah.
Hmm. Yeah.
Unfortunately, Mr Longaberger no longer with us
and the Longaberger Company has downsized and relocated.
It's rather sad, isn't it?
Was he buried in a coffin made in a massive coffin-shaped factory?
Yeah.
LAUGHTER
What do you think gets made in this building?
So it's the middle bit that we're really interested in,
the very long bit, what do you think it was?
Oh, now, is that the ropemaking place at Chatham?
It is absolutely the ropemaking place in Chatham.
Rope has been made there since 1618,
and it's where all the strands are woven together to make the rope.
I know it because I've been in it. Have you?
Why were you in it?
We were doing a Horizon documentary
about how long is a piece of string...
Oh! And, er...
Well, well, well, how...
That's the sort of thing Horizon ought to be doing.
LAUGHTER
They've got a building about a quarter of a mile long,
the ropes go almost as far as you can see properly.
They make very, very long ropes indeed.
They do, and it's really, really tough work.
You start the ropemaking process by combing the raw hemp fibre
across boards with long iron pins, they're called hatchels,
and it straightens the fibres, and then they use whale oil
to lubricate the fibres, which is known as train oil.
Did you say whale oil?
Whale oil, yes.
A whale is part oil.
I have a recipe.
Do you want more?
Is there a vegan version?
LAUGHTER
It would be nice if you could tap into the whale and get some oil,
without having to drag it out and slice it up.
Yeah, what, like a tap? Yeah.
What are those things you stick in trees,
you know, that you wind in and then the sap comes out?
To get the sap out. So you could do that with a whale.
It wouldn't be pleasant. No.
If you said to the whale, "Look, you've got two options here."
Yeah.
LAUGHTER
"Either we put a tap on you..."
Yeah?
"Or we slice you into pieces. What's it going to be?"
You have to then go, you have to go five miles away
to hear the answer.
HE IMITATES WHALE
LAUGHTER
"I think he said tap. Let's do it."
LAUGHTER
Right.
I have a picnic here for you.
Ooh!
Now, I've got some packed lunches for you here.
Rachel, that's for you, darling. Oh, thank you!
You're going to have a Cornish pasty. Yes!
Richard, you've got ham sandwiches.
Romesh, you've got a toast sandwich, that's for you.
LAUGHTER
I'll be honest, Alan, yours looks...
..a little tiny bit mouldy.
LAUGHTER
So, what quite interesting thing can you tell me about your snacks?
Richard, ham sandwiches.
In nature... Yes?
..they're the only thing that grows in triangles.
Well, here's the extraordinary thing, so 1851, we know
from a census, that 436,800 sandwiches were sold on the streets
of London, and they were all ham, every single one.
They didn't sell any other sandwich? They just sold ham sandwiches.
Do you know who invented the pre-packaged sandwich?
Would it be a Joe Lyons tea shop?
No, it's much more recent than you might imagine, it's M&S...
M&S?! M&S?! 1980.
Wow. What?
Apparently, an assistant wrapped up some leftover sandwiches
from the cafe and put them out for sale and then it took off.
This is like freestyling it, just going for it and see what happens?
Yeah, just go for it, sell them.
So the most popular ones, egg mayonnaise, BLT
and chicken salad, those are the ones that make all the money.
All morally corrupt, those sandwiches, just so you know.
Am I right, my vegan brothers and sisters, yeah?
Romesh, let's have a look at your toast sandwich.
What have you got in it?
Er... Do you have to rip it like that?
If you'd just opened the bag,
we could have reused it, what is wrong with you?
It's got my name on it,
it's very unlikely you're going to have another Romesh on this.
Or even me, based on how this is going.
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
Tell us what's in your sandwich.
So my sandwich has toast in it.
Yes, it is literally a toast sandwich.
Yes. And I can give you a fact about this. Go on, then.
One day, Romesh Ranganathan was given this on QI
and was very insulted.
LAUGHTER
OK, so this is an historic sandwich. So Mrs Beeton, the great Mrs Beeton,
her Book of Household Management in 1861,
she had a recipe for a toast sandwich.
It was a piece of toast, seasoned with salt and pepper,
and served between two slices of bread.
Wow. In many ways, she didn't need to write that down, did she?
No. I mean, no.
She says, "This sandwich will be very tempting"
"to the appetite of an invalid."
LAUGHTER
I've got to tell you, it's delicious. Is it good?
Mm. Toast sandwich.
That's a good idea, like, it's all about texture, isn't it?
And I bet that's got a lovely texture to it.
Big up Mrs Beeton. Yep. She's absolutely smashed it.
LAUGHTER
Rachel, Cornish pasty, what do we know about the Cornish pasty?
Well, this bit is where you hold it.
Yes. That's called the...
..handle. Yes.
Famously.
Um, or in other parts of the south, they call it the edge.
LAUGHTER
And why was it created?
For the miners.
Absolutely right. It was a portable lunch, basically,
to take down the mines, you're absolutely right.
Is it true that in those pasties...
Yeah...they put the pudding in the pasty as well?
Yeah, so it was perfectly possible to have the savoury bit one end
and the sweet bit the other end, so you can see one
there which has got...
So is that a pastry barrier? A little pastry barrier, yeah.
Cos if they didn't have enough pastry,
slam a bit of toast in there, that'd do the same thing.
It's not the only one that does that, actually, Romesh.
A Bedfordshire clanger looks like a long sausage roll
and again, it's two-thirds savoury and one third sweet.
They did that on the Bake Off.
Did they? I didn't see.
Can I just say, we should whisper this if anybody in Cornwall
is listening, but the oldest Cornish pasty recipe...
..comes from Devon.
Oh!
LAUGHTER
HE SHOUTS: Did you hear that, Cornwall?
You didn't even come up with a pasty, losers!
LAUGHTER
The Devon one is from 1510, the Cornish oldest one is from 1746.
Are you enjoying that toast sandwich?!
It's just, you think it's going to be boring
but the middle bread just tastes
so different from the other two pieces!
LAUGHTER
You've really gone full circle on it.
Honestly, I think it might be the best thing I've ever eaten.
Well, you're a vegan, so I'm not surprised.
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
I just remembered I know a thing.
Oh, wow! About Cornish pasties. OK.
That picture reminded me. Yes?
Those ones where it's all...
The crimping.
Crimping, I was going to say!
I have all the baking terms that you need.
Yes. It was just going to be that it's called crimping.
Oh.
LAUGHTER
Right, Alan's eaten his sandwich,
I said it was mouldy but this is actually a rather brilliant thing,
this is a mouldy anti-theft sandwich bag!
LAUGHTER
So the sandwich is not mouldy at all, the idea is to stop people
nicking it out of the fridge!
Didn't work with Alan.
No, clearly not.
Do you want the rest of your toast sandwich now, Rom?
I'll eat it... Did you actually like it, Romesh?
I did, I feel nervous about saying,
cos I'm being persecuted as a vegan on this show,
but, erm, it tasted all right.
I didn't know you were a vegan, you should mention it occasionally.
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
Ahem.
How long have you been a vegan?
I've been a vegan for five years, Sandi.
OK. Was it to do with feeling sorry for animals, or what was it?
No, I just sort of wanted to feel better than people, you know?
LAUGHTER
Oh, so, a smugness thing. Yeah, I just sort of...
Also, two cows came round and kidnapped his children.
LAUGHTER
And said, "That's too difficult to talk about cos no-one believes it,"
so he's got to go through this whole thing.
LAUGHTER
Is that because children should be seen and not herd?
LAUGHTER
APPLAUSE
Where did the first ever picnic take place?
The garden.
KLAXON
APPLAUSE
Outdoors. In the...
KLAXON
I thought I was fairly safe there.
The earliest picnics took place indoors,
it was a sort of potluck supper
in which each guest brought some food for the meal.
I've got to make an admission here, just based on what we've said
in the last 30 seconds, I don't think I know what a picnic is.
If you're having a picnic inside, that is a meal.
Is it?
LAUGHTER
We now think of it as an entirely outdoor thing,
but it was absolutely an indoor pursuit and, in fact,
some of the earliest regular picnics
were held by a group of Londoners who formed The Picnic Society
and they used to meet at a wonderful place called the Pantheon
in Oxford Street in the early 1800s and it was always indoors.
What I quite like about this is, the Pantheon is no longer there
but on that site is an M&S, so you could in fact go
to the Pantheon and buy yourself a picnic.
And maybe a packaged sandwich from 1980.
From 1980, yes, would be ideal.
LAUGHTER
So the first time we go outdoors, Romesh, is the early 19th century,
so the British and indeed the American graveyards became
very crowded and for the very first time they began to be built
further out of town and that's the very first place where people
would go to enjoy some green space out of the cities
and they would pack a picnic
and they would they join a day out in the cemetery.
But in fact, the first public parks are actually based
on these cemeteries.
In fact, the top three attractions of the United States
were Niagara Falls, George Washington's house
and Mount Auburn Cemetery in Massachusetts.
You know, today, you have all sorts of things in cemeteries.
There are people having yoga classes,
people who go bird-watching, film festivals...
I went to one the other day that had a helter-skelter,
I thought, "Come on, this is a bit much." That's getting bit silly.
Crazy golf is a good option.
LAUGHTER
A lot of obstacles you need to get around.
Right, back to the great outdoors now, here's a question about pests.
What is the best way to keep those pesky wasps at bay?
A jar of something that they like, and then they go to it.
To kill them or to just trap them?
Well, if they get stuck in there, not much you can do.
LAUGHTER
A wasp gun? I don't know.
A wasp gun is a gun that fires wasps, isn't it?
LAUGHTER
You're just adding to the problem, aren't you,
just generating more and more of them.
It fires them a long way away, Romesh.
Makes them angry, though, and when they come back...
It's like that joke
about the bloke who throws a snail off his front step.
And then three days later the doorbell goes,
and the snail goes, "What?!"
So, the best way to keep a wasp away from a picnic,
they send out scouts, the wasps, to go and see
where the best food is.
If you see the first couple, take them hostage. Oh, OK.
If you trap them, they cannot report back to the nest
about the food source, but if you kill them,
they can release a pheromone
and the other wasps go, "What? What's going on? What's going on?"
They get the pheromone smell... Yeah.
They go, "Can anyone else smell Dave?" Yeah. Yeah.
LAUGHTER
But you shouldn't kill wasps at all because...
That's really good, so just catch them and that's it.
Yeah, because they do some fantastic good work.
Oh, do they? I doubt that very much.
I hate them.
OK, so here's the thing that you may not know,
so social wasps eat cockroaches and spiders.
There is a woman whose Twitter handle is @waspwoman,
Dr Seirian Sumner,
she estimates they eat 14 million kilogrammes of insects per year
in the UK.
Each?
Not each, no. Oh, right.
LAUGHTER
No, as a team effort.
Oh, OK. Yeah.
OK. Let's go to Italy.
So what did they do in Italy
to stop people eating their lunches as picnics?
So have a look here, this is of course the gorgeous
Basilica of Santa Croce.
You don't want people having a picnic on the steps, do you?
No, but what they want is for you to respect the place.
This particular building is the place where you will find
the burial place of Michelangelo, Galileo, Machiavelli,
Rossini, it's like all this greatness of Italy
and they don't want people just eating sandwiches on the steps,
so they had a really simple idea how to stop them doing this.
Was it that they get the spooky voices of all those dead people
on a loudspeaker?
IN GHOSTLY VOICE: Stop eating sandwiches!
Hey, this is a-Michelangelo!
I see you've brought a sandwich!
Why you ruin-a the steps with your sandwiches?
LAUGHTER
You need to stop!
It's me, Rossini!
I'm-a going to be crazy angry
when you're eating a sandwich on the step-as!
Sorry, none of these are spooky enough voices!
No. Too jolly!
Don't you want to see a film where Romesh plays Michelangelo?
LAUGHTER
I'm-a going to do a ceiling-a picture!
This one is-a God, this one? That's-a Jesus, that one!
LAUGHTER
It's good, eh?
They did a really simple thing, they hosed down the steps.
While you're having a picnic?
To stop people, they simply washed the steps.
With water? With water.
And it stopped people sitting down because you...
Cos they're wet. Cos they're wet.
And they're very concerned about their buildings,
has anybody been to the Trevi fountain in Rome? Mm-hm.
They have a whole squad of volunteer retired police officers
guarding it because apparently, people like to swim in it.
So you can be fined for sitting on the fountains,
for washing your feet in them,
letting your pets play, water fights...
Thus far, I'm still hearing you can have a wee, no problem.
Yeah.
I went to Florence and I saw, by some miracle there wasn't a queue,
Michelangelo's statue of David...
It's a great-a statue!
LAUGHTER
IN ITALIAN ACCENT: You go all the way behind, see everything!
It's got massive hands, a tiny winky.
That's how we do it.
LAUGHTER
I'll tell you who it is, it's Rossini, don't tell anyone!
LAUGHTER
But what I was going to say was...
LAUGHTER
No, no, I think they've got more to do!
There's a replica of it outside. Right.
And, honestly, you can't tell the difference. No.
So don't bother queueing up and going in. I agree.
OK.
Why did Shakespeare not suffer from hay fever?
Benadryl?
LAUGHTER
Is that his friend?
Claudius and Benadryl. Yeah. Because there wasn't any?
Because there was less pollen in the air back in the days of yore.
Well, you're probably heading in exactly the right direction.
Yes! Vagueness pays off!
Yes, very good!
So are you saying there was less pollen? I didn't know that.
Yeah. Amazing. I could go on, but I won't.
Yeah, yeah.
So, basically, today one in four people have hay fever.
It appears not to have existed until the 1800s.
So anybody, we just picked Shakespeare at random,
but anybody who died before then can't have had it,
and we don't really know why.
So the very first documented case, 1819, there was a doctor called
John Bostock and he suffered with it and he decided to investigate,
and he spent nine years looking for people with the condition
and he only found 28, so it could be a change
in the environment, the type of crops grown,
intensity of farming, it doesn't seem to have existed at all.
Bostock called the condition summer catarrh
and he tried to treat himself -
I have to say these are not things I recommend -
bleeding, cold baths, vomiting, opium, meh...
LAUGHTER
You're open to it! Yeah, whatever.
No success with it at all
and then there was a scientist called Charles Blackley,
1859, also had hay fever and he finally found the cause,
he identified the culprit as grass. He had a load of hay on his chin.
LAUGHTER
But what they didn't understand was why would city dwellers get it
if it's to do with grass pollen, which is what Blackley suggested?
Why would sailors at sea get it?
So he flew kites with sticky paper on them at different altitudes
and he was able to analyse the dispersal of pollen
at various altitudes
and established that it carried hundreds of miles out to sea.
In fact, there is more pollen at an altitude of 1,000-2,000 feet
than there is at ground level.
Does anybody have it here?
I do. Do you know exactly what it is and why you get it?
No, I don't. But I was... Well, then, you don't deserve it.
LAUGHTER
Now, Paul McCartney and John Lennon first met at a picnic in Liverpool,
but why are the Beatles the reason you can now eat out in Australia?
Er, did they, like, go to a restaurant
and then wanted to go outside and then they said, "You can't do that,"
and they said, "We'll do what we want, we're bigger than Jesus,"
and then they went and ate outside and...
Er, no. Let's do Beatles in two different senses.
Different sort of beetles. Oh, Richard!
Ahh. Like you've played the game before!
Like beetles with an E. Whoa. Ahh.
This is just such a joke, man.
You've said the names of the Beatles,
you've put the photo up there. Yeah.
And I trusted you.
Yeah. Yeah.
What I actually said was that they met at a picnic... Yeah.
God knows what a picnic is any more, after this show.
LAUGHTER
So, Australian picnicking was saved
by the introduction of millions of dung beetles.
So let us imagine, Australian cattle industry
takes off in the 1960s, what is the side-effect
of a fantastically successful cattle industry?
Load of manure. Poop. Loads of poop. Loads of cowpats.
So, the native dung beetle, they're used to a little bit
of a dry poo, like a kangaroo poo, for example.
They don't like the wet dung that is introduced
by the European cattle.
And there was a period of time when these cows were producing
200,000 pats...
..per minute.
I know.
The poor guy that's got to count those up just to get that figure.
I mean, Australia was in danger of disappearing entirely
underneath a load of shit.
And it wasn't vanishing
because the dung beetles were not eating it,
so there was the Australian dung beetle project
and they imported 1.73 million beetles, 43 different species,
and it was so successful, that is now the reason
why Australians can enjoy a picnic.
Look at the size of that!
Blimey. And they ate the whole thing?
LAUGHTER
And it does look nice and dry.
It's spelt wrong, though.
LAUGHTER
What are you saying it should be?
Yes, what would you say?
I wasn't going to say it cos the klaxon was going to go off. Ah!
LAUGHTER
No shit!
KLAXON
I was trying to lure you into my trap!
I felt that.
Now it's time for the gathering storm that we call
General Ignorance. Fingers on buzzers, please.
Heading off to Italy for a moment,
where are you if you are dining alfresco?
BUZZ
Rachel.
Outside.
Outside! KLAXON
No! I'm sure that's right!
Do you want to try again?
BUZZ
Inside! Yes!
Absolutely right. They don't call eating outside alfresco,
so they think of it as being in the cool, OK?
And for them, that means being in prison.
So it's like the English slang, "in the cooler".
So eating alfresco is to eat in prison.
If the Italians eat outside, it's called fuori or al aperto,
so outside the door.
Now, what liquid can you take five times more of through security
at Genoa Airport?
BUZZ Yes!
Pesto? Yes!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Like you were my own boy, I was so proud!
How did you know that?
Cos he's a vegan!
LAUGHTER
I didn't know you were vegan!
LAUGHTER
Yes, they have relaxed the ban, but only for pesto, the liquid ban.
Passengers can now carry 500ml of pesto in their hand luggage.
It has to be the proper stuff, not supermarket-bought,
and they have a special machine to scan it.
I say special, it's the same one that does breast milk.
LAUGHTER
They changed it because so much pesto was being confiscated,
they thought, "This is ridiculous, we have to stop this."
Now, they also had a problem at London City Airport.
What was it that was being confiscated in great quantities?
Coffee?
No, it's particularly British in the same way as pesto...
Marmite. It is Marmite, absolutely right,
They ran a Marmite amnesty in July 2017
and if you took through an oversized Marmite, you could swap it
and get a small 70g one. The trouble is
that half the security officers would let you through,
it's the other half who wouldn't.
LAUGHTER
OK, moving on.
If you're... Oh, this is so controversial.
If you're making a cuppa,
does the milk...
SCATTERED GASPING I know.
Oh, a gasp, an audible gasp!
Does it go in first or second?
AUDIENCE RESPONDS
Did I ask you? KLAXON
LAUGHTER
OK. Not everybody agrees, first or second?
AUDIENCE RESPONDS
Second. First? Some people shouting first?
KLAXON
LAUGHTER
OK.
The trouble is that there is no correct answer, that is the point,
yet opinion is so unbelievably strongly divided.
But the British Standards Institution
has a 5,000 word report...
LAUGHTER
..on the correct way to make tea.
Which you are going to read out to us now.
LAUGHTER I'm going to precis for you. OK.
It's like when they dramatised the Leveson Inquiry
or something like that. It is.
We're going to do an interpretive dance. OK.
Here is the definitive thing from them,
they say milk should go in first.
GASPING
Oh, I know, I know!
SCATTERED APPLAUSE
I know, it's very upsetting for some people.
And they also say you should have 2g of tea per 100ml of water
and it should be brewed for six minutes
and served at a temperature between 60 and 85.
Milk first - a 2003 experiment at Loughborough University
found that adding milk after the water can heat it unevenly,
and that leads to the proteins in the milk clumping.
But Yorkshire Tea says milk second,
particularly if you're brewing in a mug.
Then you should brew the tea first
otherwise the milk will drag down the temperature of the water.
If the teabag's in the cup, you can't put milk in till it's brewed.
That is the thing. That'd be stupid.
Yeah, so the milk has to go in second. Yeah.
But in that debate, they're called Miffers - milk in first -
and Tiffers - tea in first.
Ah! Ooh!
Oh!
See, now, this always happens at a picnic.
But speaking of football, Alan...
Yes? Romesh... Yes?
Who is the most successful Arsenal manager of all time?
BUZZ
Is it me?
Do you want it to be you?
No, that's Bertie Mee,
he was one of your most famous managers, wasn't he?
Well, in terms of winning trophies, it's Arsene Wenger.
KLAXON
LAUGHTER
Do you follow football, Rachel?
Not at all, but I'm willing to participate in this conversation.
OK. Timothy... Say George Graham, say George Graham.
George Timothy...
KLAXON
Rachel, it's not George Graham!
Herbert Chapman.
KLAXON
LAUGHTER
Steffi Graf.
Weirdly, Rachel is heading closer to the correct answer than anybody.
What?! Oh, really?
Martina Navratilova. Er...
LAUGHTER
Serena Williams! It is women that we are...
Vic Akers.
It is Vic Akers, absolutely right,
who founded the Arsenal Ladies football club.
He managed it til retirement in 2009.
Under his management, the ladies' team won 32 major honours,
including the FA women's cup ten times
as opposed to Arsene Wenger's management,
where the men's team has won seven FA Cup titles.
Vic Akers is the kit man for the men's team and he always
wears shorts, no matter what the weather.
So on my podcast, we refer to his genitals
as little Vic and the Akers.
LAUGHTER
He's greatly loved, Vic.
What a fantastic track record, 32 major titles. Astonishing.
I mean, at the time hardly anyone else played women's football,
it must be said.
Well, there was a time in the 1920s when there were 150 women's football
teams in England and they could draw bigger crowds than the men's teams.
The reason it all fell apart was that the FA stopped women playing
on Football Association pitches.
This team is Where's Wally FC.
LAUGHTER
This team was actually the Dick, Kerr's Ladies team,
they were named after the munitions factory where most of them worked.
They were the first women's team to ever play in shorts
and my favourite player is a woman called Lily Parr,
and apparently she was astonishing, but she was also a chain-smoker
and she insisted...
Look at the length of that cigarette!
LAUGHTER
She insisted that part of her wages was in Woodbine cigarettes
and sometimes she was known to play while still smoking.
LAUGHTER
THUNDER
So, it looks like our luck with the weather has run out.
Let's have a quick look at the scores before we are
completely rained off.
Er, last tonight by...
Oh, that's frankly...oh, dear, there we are.
Last tonight with a rather narrow margin,
the audience with -20!
Getting drenched in fourth place, with -19,
it's Richard!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Slightly soggy with -15,
Rachel!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
A bit moist with -14,
Alan. Thank you.
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
And coming in from the cold, with two points,
it's tonight's winner, Romesh!
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE
Finally, my mum will love me.
LAUGHTER
I'd like to thank Rachel, Richard, Romesh and Alan,
and leave you with this from American actress Marie Dressler.
If ants are such busy workers,
how come they find time to go to all the picnics?
Good night.
APPLAUSE