Welcome back to the home of the oxymoron. Evil genius. He asked the newspaper to print his obituary early so he'd enjoy it. That's like hiding at your own funeral. Yeah, a big, great gig. I'm Russell Kane. Join me to weigh in on whether the biggest players in history are more evil or genius. Becoming that rich, I'd say that is some level of genius. It also helps that it's a long time ago, right?

It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream van plays music when it's

out of ice cream.

Listen to Evil Genius on BBC Sounds.

Thanks for downloading this program from the free thinking team at the BBC.

Hello.

Now, you probably had your lunch ages ago,

but I'm just getting hours ready. Now, it'll be a working lunch. We're going to chew over all the big questions. Like, can going out for a meal really be an aesthetic experience,

like going to a gallery or a theatre. What kind of statement are we

making when we say that we don't like beetroot? And what can the great thinkers of history,

the philosopher David Hume, the anthropologist Claude Levy Strauss, tell us about table manners?

I'm going to chop a bit of iceberg lettuce here, and round the table, there are four people who will soon be on the receiving end

of Freethinkings' first ever prawn cocktail offensive.

They are Lisa Markwell, who used to edit The Independent on Sunday, and is now training to be a chef.

The philosopher and wine writer Barry Smith, the journalist Alex Clark, who likes long literary

lunches, some of them written by Marcel Proust, and the food historian Elsa Richardson.

So I've done the lettuce, guys, and now I need some Thousand Island dressing. And I thought of

making this earlier, but actually I'm going to do it now. So,, perhaps I should ask you, what are the ingredients of a classic Thousand Island dressing? Just see if I brought the right stuff. Well, I'm afraid to say that I have never made a prawn cocktail. It's one of those things that I order in a restaurant but wouldn't necessarily make at home. And I'm quite, I have to say, I'm a little bit surprised at holding an egg.

I'm holding an egg. I'm holding a hard-boiled egg. Well, to my shame, if I was going to make this at home, I would call it a Mary Rose sauce, classically, for a prawn cocktail. It would be, shock horror, tomato ketchup mixed with mayonnaise and probably a little bit of spice or something, but... Dash of Worcester sauce.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, I've got some to basket.

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