The food writer and former MasterChef Australia judge on his cravat collection, watching brain surgery and the best meal he’s had for under $20 What was the most surprising thing you learned while filming The Hospital: In the Deep End? That I didn’t faint while watching brain surgery. The production team expected I would keel over like a giant redwood in a forest. Actually, I was so fixated by watching what was going on – did you know the brain actually does pulsate? And they’re cutting bits out and it’s like, “What’s that? What does that do? You just cut out an oyster-sized bit of brain – what do you mean, you won’t notice that’s gone?” And you can actually see the brainstem! Now, the brainstem is where it is at; you don’t fuck around with the brainstem. And you’re literally standing there, wide-eyed, looking at it through a hole. You feel like you are in amongst the pulsing fibres of the human noggin. Continue reading...