Mandolia

I am, of course, deeply hurt at the slur cast upon GB's cuisine!!!! The home of fish 'n' chips * et al. *fries to my US friends.

Thank you for confirming what I was sure I'd seen. Explains a whole buncha stuff, starting with the cynical manipulation of some viewers buying into/believing a carefully honed brand.

The production team includes Ree, I think? I;m sure I've seen her name on the closing credits. So it all makes perfect sense. With a minion off camera doing most/all of the prep (apart from Todd bashing peppercorns) and, dare I say it, overseeing the cooking. (and I don't doubt that professional decorators spread their Christmas * magic on The Lodge for the purposes of the show.) *probably filmed months ago!

I did once have fillet steak and lobster thermidor on the same plate, at a rather swanky Surf & Turf restaurant over here. And it was really rather good. Not something I would normally have chosen (and mega expensive) but my host insisted! But steak with peppercorn sauce (with a slug of brandy AND CREAM) as one dish, and shrimp (or other surfy stuff) as another is probably my preference.

Cathy I couldn't agree more about "the best of the best" element of these shows. Some of the things done/techniques involved are staggering. I think I shall stick to watching cooking shows!! Talking of which, I turned on the tv yesterday late morning as I wanted to see the news headlines...up pops Food Network and there was TW judging on that cookie comp (absolutely no idea who the other judges were but no matter). Ree did not look her best and I wouldn't classify her input as being anything other than less than enlightening. It did make me laugh, tho, when she said to one of the competitors that his offering for that particular round might have benefited from some SPRINKLES. One of the PW progs which is being repeated endlessly at the mo is when Ree takes younger daughter and Bryce off to Bastlesville (if that's the correct spelling) for an afternoon out, leaving Ladd and Todd to cook supper. The Bartlesville excusion included a trip to the nail salon...INC BRYCE! Manicures and pedicures (I think Bryce was only subjected to the pedicure). Poor boy - imagine the teasing he'd have had from his friends. Back at the ranch, Ladd and Todd create such an unlikely Ladd meal, apart from the steak & potatoes. Fillet steak with peppercorn and shrimp sauce with quartered potatoes cooked in the oven on a sheet pan plus roasted asparagus drizzled with olive oil (another sheet pan - PW's pantry is Sheet Pan Central). Bryce TODD (silly me!) bashes the peppercorns while Ladd cooks the shrimp. Then the steak is started off (yes: seasoning is involved) in a skillet before being moved into the oven. The best bit: making of the shrimp and peppercorn sauce. The most enormous slug of brandy into the pan with the peppercorns. Then add the shrimp back. Then a good glug of heavy cream. It just doesn't sound Ladd-ish. Just at the right moment (not that it's rehearsed or anything) (yeah, right), the Bartlesville Trio walk in. And there are the usual Ree squeals of excitement as supper is unveiled. Garlic was probably invovlved somewhere along the line, but I lost concentration.

I think I could be persuaded to "go crafty"! Except I lack the patience, which is a major stumbling block. (there's a daily show airing in the UK at the moment which is all things Christmas crafting: makes me feel so inadequate to the point I'm nearly unable to watch. Almost (just nearly almost) better to watch PW throw a buncha stuff from the pantry into the mixing bowl/food processor and marvel (?) at the weird combinations she creates.)

I'll try to remember to take photographs! Not sure about the desert/s - I never pay any attention to that bit as I don't eat/like sweet things, which is why I wince at most of PW's sweet creations into which all bar the kitchen sink is added. I suspect it'll be Christmas pudding and brandy butter with a couple of other choices, one of which is bound to include chocolate. Venison is delicious - we have "wild" venison in this area (two herds up on the hill and the woodland area opposite the village). The deer population is very carefully managed, and it's not just random shooting. Farmed deer isn't quite as gamey as wild and doesn't need so much preliminary attention. Wild venison needs really looooong and slooooow cooking which is why a casserole/stew works so well (having first done a marinade for hours of, say, red wine or port plus bay leaves, juniper berries, chunks of onion, orange peel, garlic). Today I'm being taken out to lunch at a tapas place in the local TINY town - a slightly incongruous setting for dishes one associates with sitting in a Spanish restaurant overlooking the Mediterranean in the summer (it's pouring with rain and cold)! I've been playing a silly game of "What Would Ree Do?" in terms of adding her take to items on the menu. A whole buncha everything in the pantry seems the answer!

Yes...9th December. The main course is venison casserole/stew (local venison). Mashed potatoes (but not done with 12 lbs of butter, cream cheese, buttermilk and cream a la PW, the sight/thought of which I'm unable to blank out) and mixed vegetables.

I'm not quite 100% yet (and I hope the beastly infection isn't percolating again...suspicious ache in my lower back, which is why I'm up at this time of night), My question "are they nice?" was ref the (potentially soggy) bacon crackers! But I can see that, tagged onto the de-frowning remark it wasn't quite clear!! Sorry. (I have a couple of friends who have SO overdone Botox and nips & tucks and it looks horribly unnatural - what used to be a beaming smile has become a featureless rictus grin)

The idea of a bacon and fried egg (runny yolk which goes everywhere when you bite into it) sandwich is at the forefront of my mind...it's 1 a.m. in the UK, I have no bacon!

I love bacon wrapped water chestnuts - the water chestnuts don't lose their crunchiness. Lots of people in the UK still (it's a bit retro!) do "devils on horseback" as a canape/nibble for drinks/cocktail parties...half a rasher of bacon wrapped round a (stoneless) prune and then cooked in the oven til the bacon is crispy. Served warm. It might sound a tad gross but it's actually really good. Ditto bacon wrapped round dried apricots. I've made masses of these little "treasures" in advance and then froze them uncooked on trays before placing in a freezer bag. Thaw. Shove onto a baking rack in a sheet pan and put hot-ish oven til bacon is cooked, turning once to get evenly cooked bacon. (I use smoked streaky bacon.) I think it's the combined smokey flavour plus a bit of sweet which makes the devils very more-ish.

Yes, I was referring to the Town House thingies! I kept thinking how uncrisp the cracker part must be. "soggy mess" sums up what I imagined!

I developed crows feet years ago, growing up in the tropics and squinting at the sun from an early age. And almost no sun protection, apart from my mother sploshing a dab of Coppertone on my nose if we were at the beach. (and I've always loathed wearing sunglasses) I know I've been lucky about skin cancer - my best friend from childhood has had a lot of "bits" removed,, some rather serious ones Have to say that what I call my laughter lines do reflect a lot of laughter but also Sun Squint. Anyway, I happened to see those (faintly weird to me) crackers with bacon & parmesan (or the sweet version: bacon & soft brown sugar). Which apparently are gloriously delicious to bring out with drinks. My initial reaction was a frown (which exaggerated ALL the lines on my face, as I'm good at frowning and have never had de-frown treatment). Are they nice?

I've had green bean salad in Italy (and, tho' my family has no connection to Italy, it's also something my mother used to do) - beans cooked until just done, drained then a dressing of lemon juice, olive oil, a splash of balsamic, small amount of crushed garlic over, salt & pepper which is poured over the beans while still warm. And jolly good it is, too, as a summer salad! It's the marinading pre cooking/roasting in the oven that I can't get my head round.

Yep. I found the recipe. The toms and green beans get a blast of the same marinade as the chicken (I can see no point in marinading green beans). Recipe on the PW website doesn't mention the ciabatta croutons, tho - a suggestion to serve with a loaf of crusty Italian bread. (and, as a variation: crumble some feta over the finished dish: that's a no from me) https://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/italian-chicken-sheet-pan-supper/ Modest (!) quantity of garlic in the marinade: 5 cloves. It seems that PW buys (BUYS) packs of ready-to-use/peeled garlic cloves you can get in the supermarket. Is it just me, or isn't this a mega-watt waste of money?

PW's "take" on croutons was an eye-opener. Rather than bite-sized pieces of bread she tore a ciabatta loaf into BOULDERS to scatter-bomb atop a supper dish of chicken cooked on a sheet pan (which also involved tomatoes and green beans...I missed the beginning, so have no idea what level of seasoning oddity might have crept in) then shoved into back into the oven for a final 10 mins or so, to allow the boulders to toast/ crisp up. All I could think about was my poor teeth biting into a sharp shard of industrial-sized crunchy ciabatta crouton. Don't know why/how the quotey thing appeared...can't get rid of it!!

The contrived nature of the "set pieces". the forced giddy ditzyness, the unmistakable feeling she's taking her fans (of which there are many, who live by PW's every word and think she's a friend, poor deluded souls) for mugs, the cynical commercialiation/promotion of "the brand", portraying a mythical ordinary-ness. Enough to be going on with?! Oh...her food is pretty rubbish, too: Mrs Drummond has no concept of Less Is More.

Am very envious of your Hong Kong trip and the food ('cept for the million year old egg!!). Have you bought one of those bamboo steamer "basket" things as part of your venture into Chinese cooking? Very useful, according to someone I know who's taught herself to be a dab hand at cooking all-things-Chinese from different regions. She makes wonderful dim sum filled with minced shrimp, etc. which are to-die-for good. I wouldn't have the patience to even try, as awfully fiddly! (Ree has done a few stir fry dishes with an abundance of ingredients which aren't necessarily authentic...there's a surprise.) Link below is ref a series which was shown in the UK ages ago. It was repeated in its entirety quite recently which I watched more or less in one hit. So interesting. http://www.keofilms.com/projects/exploring-china-a-culinary-adventure/

Bilingual: brilliant choice of word! And "buncha" is a description I now use regularly (which makes me on the path to being semi-fluent).

Hi CharlizeCat! UK caster sugar has finer granules when compared to UK granulated sugar, and is used in baking and for making meringues/sorbets, etc. Granulated sugar in the UK is "coarser" (slightly bigger granules) when compared to US granulated sugar. In the States I think there's something called "bakers sugar" which is akin to caster sugar. (Icing sugar in the UK = confectioners sugar in the States) I find the subtle differences between UK and US cooking-speak fascinating - sometimes it feels as if they are 2 different languages, requiring a dictionary!!

It can be a bit confusing. Some things totally stump me, tho, and different types of cream is one of them!

I use lots of nutmeg. In white sauce and also mashed potato. Always with spinach - if not doing creamed spinach, steamed spinach with lemon juice, nutmeg, s & p. Thank you for trying to unravel my muddles over the different types of cream UK versus the States. And, of course, I should have said shrimp rather than prawn!

It wasn't anybody's recipe - a Mandolia Throw Together - but the other day I cooked fresh linguine in one pan (takes 1 or 2 mins) and in a deep sided frying pan sauteed finely diced shallots to which I added 3 cloves of garlic "squished" in garlic press, then a good slug of white wine which I let bubble away to burn off the alcohol. I had a half-used jar of sun-dried tomatoes so chopped those up and added to the mixture. This was followed by the addition of a small carton single cream *...mixed together, added s & p. On not too high a temperature in case of sauce splittlng. Bag of baby spinach tossed in and mixed around. Grating of nutmeg. When baby spinach was wilted, I chucked the pasta into the pan of boiling water (salt and a glug of olive oil added to the water) THEN added fresh/raw king prawns (shells removed) to the sauce. Another splosh of wine. Stirred around until prawns cooked...which is moments, really. Drained the linguine and poured onto the sauce and using pasta tongs tossed everything around. Tasted. Adjusted seasoning. (I didn't intend it to be something swimming in sauce, more "coated") Sprinkling of parsley on each serving. Served with garlic bread and a simple salad of salad leaves and avo, with an instant dressing of olive oil from the sun-dried toms jar/balsamic/squeeze of lemon/s & p. It was quick to do (and commented upon as being delicious) but, despite having everything at my fingertips, I can't say I broke a world record for speed! * Single cream in the UK - not sure what the equivalent is in the States?

I so agree about this. And it always irritates me. It's the same with Jamie Oliver's 15 minute meals (some of which are really good but they take WAY longer because of getting the required kit together). It's all dependent on having every last thing to hand before a knife even touches the ingredients. I don't just mean the physical elements of a recipe and required seasonings, etc: it's a pre-heated oven, maybe a frying pan (skillet!) on the hob, a pan of simmering water, the food processor in place. Realistically, the timings don't work when you add on the preliminaries (as an example, my food processor "lives" in a kitchen cupboard and takes more than a moment or two to extract and put in place on the counter).

I read somewhere ages ago that what I call hot peppers are, indeed, addictive and the more you have the "hotter" you can stand and the more you use Well-known that hot peppers release endorphins, so maybe PW suffers from acute peppers' euphoria?!