These were professional chefs and some of the food they were dishing up looked appalling. Was this because they were panicking in front of the judges or were they trying to be too fancy and clever or were they just not very good. If the latter was the case it is concerning. At least two of the dishes looked inedible. People are paying good money to have food put together by these people.
Elliot decided last night that he wanted to make some raspberry compote to go with yoghurt. I refused to eat compote but was happy to eat sauce . I hate it when cooking or anything else for that matter becomes pretentious. I remember a few years ago listening to a CD featuring Philip Glenister in his Life on Mars character Gene Hunt complaining about "poncy words." "Gravy or sauce is gravy or sauce. It's not compote or jus" he pointed out with a liberal sprinkling of four letter words. I got the message though. It's like how anything homemade has suddenly become Artisan. We now have Artisan markets, Artisan Bread etc etc. It's the word of the moment to describe things we have already had anyway.
Masterchef left me cringing when one of the contestants was told that he shouldn't serve Yorkshire puddings with roast chicken. Why the hell not I ask? If you like Yorkshires (as I certainly do) why shouldn't you have it with chicken, beef, lamb or nut roast for that matter? It's the same as sauces. I know bread sauce should accompany chicken or turkey, apple sauce should accompany pork, horseradish should accompany beef and mint sauce lamb but why shouldn't you have apple sauce with beef if you fancy it?
There's too much of this nonsense going on. Food is food. As long as it's cooked well does it matter what's on the plate as long as it's something you enjoy? The combination might not be balanced for Masterchef judges but if it leaves you with a rosy glow what does that matter.
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Yesterday I mentioned the highly unpopular Bishop of Norwich Henry Le Despenser. He features in one of the latest postings from the excellent Norfolk Tales, Myths and More Facebook site. This is a tremendous site for lovers of Norfolk and Norwich history - unearthing many unusual stories from the past thousand years.
Le Despenser was no fan of the Lollards. In Norwich just across the road from the historic Bishopbridge is a pub called The Lollards' Pit. It may or may not have been the site of the pit. Some people believe the pit to be a bit further along.
The pit was a place of execution where heretics were burnt at the stake (or in the case of Masterchef medium rare at the steak). It is difficult to comprehend today that you could be executed for advocating the translation of the Bible from Latin into English. Can you imagine today going to church with the Bible reading being in Latin. Mind you some might complain that much of what goes on in church may as well be in Double Dutch!
In principio erat verbum doesn't really have quite the right ring to it though!
Anyway the Lollards (this was a movement throughout the country but mainly in East Anglia) were burnt at the stake and their bodies were thrown into the pit. The area many centuries later became a children's playground for a while and, as far as I am aware, no youngsters were traumatised by ghosts.
Lollardary (not sure if that's a word) is a fascinating subject and one I will be returning to in the future.
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When I took the grandkiddles home after their sleepover I listened to Radio One going in both directions. It wasn't for the music I can assure you but because they had a teaser that I was very interested to find the result of. No looking this up on the internet and I will give the answer in tomorrow's blog. The question was
Which word in the English language has three consecutive double letters? A lot of people said whooppee but that only has one p.
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So the new variant of the COVID strain is called Omicron. Omicron is an anagram of Moronic. Not sure exactly what that says if anything.