This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from Oscar, Grammy and Juno award-winning singer-songwriter Melissa Etheridge!

Melissa shares:

Oscar, Grammy and Juno award-winning artist, Melissa Etheridge, started playing with an adult band when she was just 12 years old and this year she released her 17th album, "Rise."

Melissa tells host Rachel Belle:

Then Cathy and Jerome Jenkins, owners of Cathy's Kitchen, join the show to tell us more about Melissa's last meal and the unconventional road they took to becoming restaurant owners. 

This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from John Cameron Mitchell,  writer, director and star of Hedwig and the Angry Inch; the cult film is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year!

John shares:

Listen to the full episode of Your Last Meal with John Cameron Mitchell here.

It’s the 25th anniversary of Hedwig and the Angry Inch, one of host Rachel Belle’s Top 5 Favorite Films of All Time! Today we get to hear from the man who wrote, directed and starred in the film, and played Hedwig on Broadway, John Cameron Mitchell! You may also know John from his roles in Shrill and Girls.  

John talks about his fraught relationship with food as a youth, digestive issues that completely vanished after he came out as gay and moved to New York City. He tells Rachel who the Hedwig character was based on, and which parts of the story come from his own life. He shares a bonkers story about a man who cooked and served...his own genitals at a dinner party. And he talks about what he ate to stay strong and energetic during his recent 12-week Broadway run, performing eight shows a week as Mary Todd Lincoln in Oh Mary!  

Then we learn a bit about the history of omakase, which was popularized in the U.S. by a Netflix documentary that came out in 2012.  

To celebrate 25 years, John Cameron Mitchell is touring the country, June through November, doing Q&As after film screenings of Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Tickets are going fast, buy yours here. 

This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from Hrisihikesh Hirway, musician and prolific podcast host and producer!

Hrisihi shares:

Listen to the full episode of Your Last Meal with Hrisihikesh Hirway here.

Your ears are in for a treat -- this week they'll be graced by the velveteen voice of Hrishikesh Hirway! Hrishikesh is a prolific podcaster & he hosts and produces many, including my favorite food podcast of all time, Home Cooking, co-hosted by past Your Last Meal guest, Samin Nosrat, and the excellent music podcast, Song Exploder, that was turned into a Netflix show. He's also a musician and his new album is out now!

Hrishikesh tells host Rachel Belle:

Then we're joined by Jim Henson Company "puppet wrangler" Lara MacLean, who took it upon herself to start baking the cookies that Cookie Monster demolishes on Sesame Street, because she wasn't happy with the last iteration! 

This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from Eve Plumb, the actor who played Jan Brady on The Brady Bunch!

After spending most of her life in southern California, Eve moved to New York City and in this week's lightning round, she talks about the food she misses most from her home state. 

Listen to the full episode of Your Last Meal with Eve Plumb here.

Eve Plumb was 10 years old when she landed the role of Jan Brady, the middle daughter on The Brady Bunch, and now she's sharing what was going on behind-the-scenes in her new memoir, Happiness Included: Jan Brady and Beyond.

The night Eve got the part, in 1969, her parents took her out for a celebratory dinner at Martoni’s, a martini-soaked, Italian-American Hollywood hot spot popular with folks in the music industry. Los Angeles culinary historian Katherine Spiers spills the tea on all the juicy Martoni’s celebrity gossip and tells host Rachel Belle which unsuspecting dish was all the rage in 1960s L.A. 

Eve connects the dots between her favorite fast food order and her last meal and talks about which The Brady Bunch cast member she still has monthly drinks with! 

This week on The Leftovers, never-before-heard audio from Dawn Richard, singer; animator and Adult Swim creative consultant and owner of Papa Ted’s vegan food truck in New Orleans.   

In a lightning round, Dawn talks about graduating from college at the same time as her dad and her grandma, which food celebrity she admires most and how she finds a way to "New Orleansify" everything she cooks!  

Listen to the full episode of Your Last Meal with Dawn Richard here.

Become a Cascade PBS member and support public media!   

Watch Rachel’s Cascade PBS TV show The Nosh with Rachel Belle. 

Sign up for Rachel’s (free!) biweekly Cascade PBS newsletter for more food musings. 

Follow along on Instagram. 

Order Rachel’s cookbook Open Sesame. 

Dawn Richard is a proud New Orleans native and a true Renaissance Woman: singer; animator and Adult Swim creative consultant and owner of Papa Ted’s vegan food truck in New Orleans.  

Dawn went vegan back in 2013, in solidarity with her dad after he received a non-Hodgkin lymphoma diagnosis. She talks about getting naked for PETA, the ethical intentionality behind her food truck and what (not-vegan) food she misses the most but will never eat again.  

Then we crack into the history & explore the culture of what is, perhaps, New Orleans’ oldest food tradition: crawfish! Food historian Dr Zella Palmer introduces host Rachel Belle to Al Scramuzza, the city’s late Crawfish King, and shares her favorite places to experience a crawfish boil in the city.