caitmcg

I honestly think there's no question that this was planned all along, and has nothing to do with David "Hat Guy" Murphy not appearing (whatever the true reason for that is). I do not believe at all this was a last-minute pivot. They're all about new twists this season.

If World on Fire was any indication, PBS cuts stuff out for Passport. I would be shocked if anything available on Passport were different than what is broadcast on PBS proper at another time.

Any prime minister in a parliamentary system with proportional representation, really.

Aargh. I really hate that they've gone from snipping a second or two here or there to deleting substantial parts of (or entire) scenes. Thank you for your service in letting us know what we're missing, @Badger.

Didn't they do something similar several seasons back in the second half of LCK, bringing a group of past contestants in to compete and have one try to win their way into the main contest? This scenario seems pretty unlikely to me, that the producers would tell him, "you'll probably lose, so if you want to save face you might want to just bail."

Interesting...

If you mean the chefs, the eliminated chefs (main show and LCK) are kept around while the entire season up to the destination for the finale is filmed, sequestered so that no one outside knows who and in what order they were booted.

I did expect to see a three-way contest for the first LCK episode (David, Valentine, Soo), but a) I didn't miss annoying David and b) given how badly he flamed out in the sudden-death cookoff in ep. 1, I don't think he had the headspace for it. If he'd survived a few episodes he might have got the hang of QFs, but you can't slide by in LCK. I don't think that's much shy from the first opportunity to slide (back) into the main show since they started doing the two tiers a couple or three seasons ago.

Well, in addition to not liking the texture, they also said it lacked any flavor of the bar snack he was working with, "toasted corn kernels" (i.e. Corn Nuts). Gail pointedly said, "There's fresh corn and there's toasted corn kernels, and they're not the same."

Every time they show a little clip of Kristen on her TC season, I'm reminded of how long ago it was, because she looks so young, baby face and all. ETA: I did like that the clips they played from the hops QF showed more of Joe and Kristen's commentary about Michelle and Laura's dishes than they presumably had time for in the main episode.

They all had the same amount of prep time, two hours. The pasta group was first in the kitchen, then after a while the soup group joined them, then chicken.

That is way more than the little snips here and there they usually do. Especially the first part. I really hope it does not portend a trend.

That's Mexican guy – and Colorado resident, I think – who won immunity for soup (posole, a Mexican soup).

No, the one whose chicken wasn't cooking fast enough was in the roast chicken group, and ironically, he ended up being the top in his group (they loved his sauce and said his chicken was perfectly done).

No surprise, in that we've seen her maintain her cool in past crises plenty of times, but I also like that the trainee, who initially was not so successful or confident in calming the patient, found her mettle in dealing with the husband once he fired the shots.

For anyone in the US with YouTube TV, I just wanted to note some confusion in the labeling there: there is an episode currently available as VOD that is labeled 13.2, that is actually 12.2. (Obviously, S13 episodes aren't available yet here except for those with PBS Passport subscriptions.)

The Prestige TV podcast episode Did "Mad Men" Stick the Landing?, about how effective "Person to Person" was made an interesting listen. The host and guest are admitted megafans of the show, but had some good discussion about how various character arcs wrapped up and whether the show actually intended us to buy that Don dreamt up "I'd like to buy the world a Coke."

Season 13 premieres on PBS March 17.

It has very good flavor for being so simple. I've used it when I needed to make a vegan cake, but also for black-bottom cupcakes with a cream cheese filling, so...

The classic recipe for wacky cake, aka crazy cake, which dates to the Depression and is egg- and dairy-free (so is now popular as a vegan or just plain easy chocolate cake) was for mixing it in the pan, with three holes for oil, vinegar, and vanilla. I've always found it easier to just mix it in a bow, and I prefer Margaret Fox's Amazon cake for its higher proportion of cocoa powder than the original.

As a WaPo subscriber, I can give the article as a gift link, so you don't need to worry about free access.

The Season 1-5 DVDs have the most generous commentary of any show I've seen on DVD. There's commentary for every single episode, and most have two commentary tracks, one with actors with prominent storylines in the episode, and the other with Matthew Weiner and someone else from behind the scenes (writer, director, etc.). I know they didn't continue at that pace for the final two seasons, but I don't know how much commentary they include, because I don't own them.

It's really the CTM wig vs. her real hair, more than the modern suit that makes it hard to see Lucille.

Yes, it is a heritable condition, so it stands to reason.

I'd happily partake, those descriptions match my preferences. This is the same dough that's generally used for rugelach and pecan tassies, and I agree, it's very easy to work with, whether you're rolling it out or pressing it into a mini muffin tin (for tassies). Pro tip: chilling the formed cookies or tassies for at least a couple of hours or up to overnight makes for maximum flakiness.