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Cooking for our Queen


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Tonite at 18:30 BBC2. Great British Menu for seven weeks.

Top chefs compete for the honour of cooking a dish for the Queen's 80th birthday. Tonight: starters.

John Burton Race and Michael Cain doing the Starters and the judges are:

Oliver Peyton - Prue Leith - Matthew Fort

You have less then than one hour to program your Sky box.

Edited by Nicolai (log)
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really enjoyable I thought.

Burton-Race is a cocky bugger although I 'm sure it's for the camera. His starter I personally thought appeared a little contrived, or as Jennie bond commented 'twee'. Caines dish however looked a little bland.

Be interesting to see what else they come up with for the other courses.

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What were the proposed starters?

Do they choose a "winner" for each course as the show goes along or is the final menu decided at the end?

"Under the dusty almond trees, ... stalls were set up which sold banana liquor, rolls, blood puddings, chopped fried meat, meat pies, sausage, yucca breads, crullers, buns, corn breads, puff pastes, longanizas, tripes, coconut nougats, rum toddies, along with all sorts of trifles, gewgaws, trinkets, and knickknacks, and cockfights and lottery tickets."

-- Gabriel Garcia Marquez, 1962 "Big Mama's Funeral"

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What were the proposed starters?

Do they choose a "winner" for each course as the show goes along or is the final menu decided at the end?

John Burton Race made a Crown of English asparagus, using goat cheese, beetroot jelly and asparagus

Michael Caines chose aTerrine of Capricorn goats' cheese, apples and celery and a salad of toasted walnuts and raisins

I personally would have chosen Michael Caines' dish.

And the regional winner is chosen based on the whole menu.

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I predict Gary Rhodes will win.

Sadie!!!!!!

:wink:

What? :cool::laugh:

Maybe we should start taking bets on it? :laugh:

Tim Hayward

"Anyone who wants to write about food would do well to stay away from

similes and metaphors, because if you're not careful, expressions like

'light as a feather' make their way into your sentences and then where are you?"

Nora Ephron

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I also really enjoyed the programme, glad that both chefs we're taking it serioulsy, hopefully the rest will through out the series. Could have watched it for a good few more hours.

That some inside knowledge then Sadie? I know Gary was in Whitstable for a bit of the show, ate in Wheelers and visited the harbour.

There is a book to accompany the series Great British Menu

I went into a French restaraunt and asked the waiter, 'Have you got frog's legs?' He said, 'Yes,' so I said, 'Well hop into the kitchen and get me a cheese sandwich.'

Tommy Cooper

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I thought it was quite good too; having the chefs opposite taking the piss out of each other what quite fun.

Starters were a bit dull. WHAT MORE GOATS CHEESE???

JBR comes off a more of a miserable git than I would have thought. Very funny to say he would have done things simpler when he used to run one of the most expensive high-end haute joints in London back in the Landmark days. Plus ca change...

Good laff though. I think the quality of the chefs makes the series... I mean these are genuine premier-league names here...

ta

J

More Cookbooks than Sense - my new Cookbook blog!
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Starters were a bit dull.  WHAT MORE GOATS CHEESE???

I got the impression that JBR was suffering from a heavy cold (certainly he sounded that way), perhaps that was why his starter was described as too heavy on the garlic. But has nobody told him that Her Majesty doesn't eat garlic?

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Good laff though.  I think the quality of the chefs makes the series... I mean these are genuine premier-league names here...

Well, most of them. Simon Rimmer is going up against Marcus Wareing later in the series. I'm sure Rimmer's a fine cook and all that but Wareing is a different league surely?

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I thought the JBR starter looked a bit sloppy and the asparagus didn't look great quality IMO. hopefully tonight the show won't have quite as much padding. Otherwise a decent attempt at showing some proper cooking for a change.

"Why would we want Children? What do they know about food?"

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so i completely dismissed what looked a load of rubbish and it was passable, doh!

sounds very like the sky programme 'greatest dish in the world' or whatever it was called though.

Yes, at first sight it is very similar, although in that John Burton Race didn't stoop to such playground sniping. Perhaps he really wants to win this one?

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I'm worried about the judges. Couldn't they find someone other than the ubiquitous Matthew Fort. JBR came across as a complete prat. Since he does this consistantly, he must be one naturally.

The 30min format is too limiting. Two chefs, two courses - too much for 30min.

Stll, it provides the fix I soo need that Masterchef (I still cring just thinking about it) singularly failed to in the one episode I watched.

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Couldn't they find someone other than the ubiquitous Matthew Fort. 

He's not exactly Anthony Worrall Thompson is he - Worlds Geatest Dishes and this. Give the bloke a chance, at least he's worth listening to.

Agree- I have a lot for time for him. Fort not Thompson. I would rather flambe my knackers than watch Thompson on television.

I liked the programme- what little I managed to watch, since I was feeding the infant - but couldn't quite understand the format for the week. Is it just the same two chefs for the week culiminating in the Fort, Leith and Peyton judgement on Friday? If so, another three days of Burton Race snipping at Caines, could be a little torturous. Although it was patently obvious that was for the benefit of the camera.

Edited by Bapi (log)
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Incredibly, the series is 7 weeks (I think), 5 nights a week so yes, its Caines vs JBR all week. Thompson is also involved I'm afraid so make a note in your diary to miss that week (not sure when that is however). I'm enjoying it so far except for JBR's off-the-rack pantomime villain persona.

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I have to say that I find JBR very entertaining. I'd imagine if you got his banter all day long it might become tiresome, but it's only a half hour programme. Sure, he's doing all the chat for the cameras, but it is a TV show after all. :wink:

He did seem to get cheese all over the asparagus though, which seemed to be taking his admiration of rustic style a little too far...

PS

Edinburgh

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I have to say that I find JBR very entertaining. I'd imagine if you got his banter all day long it might become tiresome, but it's only a half hour programme. Sure, he's doing all the chat for the cameras, but it is a TV show after all. :wink:

I find JBR very irritating especially after watching tonights show. I would find him funny if I truly believed he was just joking around, however I think he firmly believes that he is the superior chef.

I really like Caines as a chef and as a personality, he has a calm, refined aura about him which is reflected in his dishes.

From what I have observed I hope Caines wins

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OK, I now can't bear this any longer.

Champagne Sadie and I subscribe to a dreadful gossip newsfeed called HolyMoly which published a leak about the show last week.

As informed UK foodies we should know - on the oither hand, if you like the show and don't want to know how it ends... you probably shouldn't.

HERE IS THE SPOILER

Use it wisely.

After all it could be total rubbish.

:wink:

Tim Hayward

"Anyone who wants to write about food would do well to stay away from

similes and metaphors, because if you're not careful, expressions like

'light as a feather' make their way into your sentences and then where are you?"

Nora Ephron

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