The Great British Bake Off Episode 1 - A Commentary

I can’t get a read on Paul Hollywood.

Ali looks like he’s about to lose all sphinctal control.

Is Glen modelling his look on Hollywood?

Mary Berry is a magnificent woman.

Becca. Put the grapefruit away. Hollywood’s eyes say it all.

Howard is from the future.

Mark is a poor man’s Glen. Making a cake shaped like a lemon sounds difficult, but is it really?

Who is that girl?

Ali, are you kidding with this rose and lychee number? Only works in a martini honey (my signature drink as you will surely know).

Her name is Ruby.

I love a piping bag.

Obviously Mark’s lemon shaped cake plan went to hell.

OHMYGODRUBYSCRYINGWHYISSHECRYINGOHTHISISAWFUL.

People are scattering flowers over their cakes. Is this a thing?

Apple and Pecan? In comes the hippy ship.

Oh Howard, we don’t want a seeping filling. Come come.

Of course you are in shock Ali, it’s your default state.

What’s this Sue? Historical context?

She says the courting cake is back: We say it never left.

Do Hollywood and Mary socialise outside the show? I get the impression Mary has better things to do.

Two girls have told me they fancy Toby. Apparently, uselessness is sexy. Thank heavens for that.

Mary likes a good rise and nice thickness.

Am I just descending into smutty innuendo? Maybe.

“It has happened before. Salt rum baba. 2012.” Fucking mare.

I wonder if ‘fucking mare’ is an accepted truncation of ‘fucking nightmare’ or whether I was just being too cool. Best check.

Has Paul been wearing velour the entire episode?

Don’t Google ‘fucking mare’.

Show stopper round? Are they ACTUALLY going to bake Hugh Jackman?

A common misinterpretation of Berkley’s theory there Ruby.

“Still wet inside.” Oh grow up.

Tiny Tempah. Nice one Mel.

Toby isn’t so much baking as self harming. Any more kitchen plasters and he can join the blue man group.

Howard’s bear blows my mind.

Rob to win.

Sketchy

It was things lavatorial that lured me to Sketch, ten years late. I’d heard you could wee in a giant egg which, as regular readers will surely know, has always been an ambition of mine.

First impressions were good. A wonderful Georgian exterior and two resplendent people on the door. The man - bowler hatted. The lady - dark hair and brows, the delicacy of her sylph like frame belied by strength of her cool, blue, appraising gaze. I suspect she writes when she has the time. Which is neither here nor there, that isn’t what we’re here to talk about.

My friends and I had planned this wrong: The Gallery was booked out for people we were not, and we had not reserved a spot in the (by all reports delightful) Lecture Room restaurant. Thus, in being restricted to the ground floor bar, I concede that my experiences are not wholly, or even slightly, representative.

The bar had enough fruit on it to supply all the fondue parties in Thatcherian England. Doubtful Louis Quinze chairs were strewn about the place. A straw pole of the clientele revealed they worked in Oil, or Gas, or possibly both. And it was very loud indeed.

WHAT?

I SAID IT WAS VERY LOUD INDEED.

I wasn’t convinced by the DJ at first, but then he seemed to mix (technical term) Michael Jackson and Rhianna which brought the room to shuddering eargasm.

I ordered an Old Fashioned because it seemed appropriate. To his credit, the barman ran the bourbon he was going to use past me, though moved about a lot as he made the drink. I’m not sure why.

Visiting the bathroom was similar to taking a light hallucinogenic. Mirrors, blue lights, nursery rhyme music. There was a water feature that, looking back, might have been a urinal. Also, the stairs were melting.

Cloud Atlas in review

For Cultbox.

Confidence Tricks

 

The set of people that we judge to be confident is in fact made up of two distinct groups; the truly confident and those that can fake it. For all intents and purposes this doesn’t really matter since outwardly those accomplished members of the second group are indistinguishable from those in the first.

Confidence is contextual. A man too shy to maintain dinner conversation may have no problem calming a charging horse. Of course some irritating individuals might be able to do both. Some supremely gifted individuals might be able to do both at the same time, though this is rare, not least because there are very few dinner parties to which horses are invited.

So though one might be able to stumble through something resembling Kreisler’s Rigaudon in front of sixty people, or perform a group dance to Queen in front of six hundred, this does not guarantee that one has the necessary social equipment to perform stand up comedy alone.

Such an act requires…well there’s no other way to say it… balls.* Quite frankly, those spherical totems of bravery often escape me.

The event was a showcase of wonderful comedic talent of which I was not a part, though it became clear that the evening would fair better if someone introduced each half and somehow I found myself about to be that someone. I don't want to overstate it: The crowd was an invited mix of munificent media types with kindness in their hearts and a modicum of alcohol in their veins. The heckling sort they were not. But even so, I had nothing prepared**, and felt that there would be some expectation that whoever stood at the microphone ought to be funny.

Additionally, it must be remembered that what paucities of charm and vocal dexterity I possess are not universally applied. Anyone whose misfortune it has been to receive a voicemail from me, can attest to this. I gabble, I maunder, I veer wildly off topic.***

As I held the microphone to my mouth, all my sweat glands were convinced I was locked in a sauna with a rabid Doberman. My words of welcome were met with tepid applause of the kind afforded to a runner up at a church fete. At which only half the crowd have hands. Could do better. I bailed and devoted the remaining minutes to a paean for the first act. The professionals took over and the crowd was with them.

My recollection of the second half is hazy, but I distinctly remember contrasting Gangnam Style with Coleridge’s Xanadu. I think they liked it, but to be fair, Coleridge always is an absolute hoot. But I do remember people laughing and that feeling warm and fuzzy.

Somewhere, my first dalliance with stand up comedy is recorded. But I’d rather you didn’t see it. So I leave you with Xanadu instead. The proper one obviously.

* You catch my drift no doubt, though I have never fully understood the idiom. I have two such objects suspended from my person and rarely does either instill me with courage.

** This isn't strictly speaking true. I always have an old joke about onions on stand by, but it is so good I keep it in reserve for the direst of circumstances.

 

***“Well, er, actually, Portugal accounts for almost half of the world’s cork production, so I don’t suppose you are free on Thursday?”

On A French Beach

We flew into Nice at the end of the season, but not so late as to bump into a Graham Greene character. Staying at a villa in the hills, we’d all pile into the car and roll between Cannes, Antibes, Cap Ferrat and the rest; eating, drinking and generally having a good time.

There came a day when one of our party wanted to swim in the sea, so we took ourselves off down the coast to find a quiet beach. It was a Saturday and our mission was doomed to failure. In the end, we gave up and defaulted to a busy public stretch with a small handiplage at the end of it full of slings and hoists. I wanted to try them, but it was deemed inappropriate.

We found the remaining postage stamp of beach that had not yet been occupied and sandwiched ourselves between an old French couple, a gaggle of girls tanned to a butterscotch brown and four Australians who, with admirable foresight, had brought an icebox of beer along.

The elderly French lady removed her bikini top and her breasts began an intimate conversation with her ankles. Behind me, the Australians were discussing precum. Their broke from this topic when a girl in their number noticed a tattoo on her neighbour’s forearm and asked what the green script meant.

“Oh, it’s in Thai. It means ‘Hot Chicken, Cold Chicken’.”

The girl, not unreasonably I thought, asked why.

“Oh, because sometimes you get chicken and it’s really really hot, but other times it’s really really…”

Cold?

“…cold.”

Right. I padded off down the beach, waded into the sea and struck out for a buoy in the distance.

_______________________________

The word buoy is difficult one. I remember having a conversation with someone who followed the Olympic sailing (can you imagine?) and said that Ainslie—"Harriott?" I gambled wildly—had got into all sorts of trouble for touching one.

“I should bloody well think so,” I replied, incensed, “I’m astounded he was allowed to compete at all.”

“No. A buoy.”

“Well indeed. It’s a disgrace. Prison was it?”

“No, a buoy.”

etc.

_______________________________

We returned home to eat chicken. Hot chicken.

Person of Interest

I review Person of Interest on CultBox.

A bit of fluff

The politics blog Conversamus has recently introduced a new section with a more creative brief. They are looking for any cultural comments, observations or reviews, so if you think you have an idea then why not get in touch?

I'm looking after a dog at the moment so I wrote about that.

His words, his Bond.

I suggest Fleming's most significant Bond novels for CultBox.co.uk.

Read it here.

Rock Of Ages

A review for CultBoxTV.

Burger & Lobster, Mayfair

Sky's The Limit

I've been doing bits and bobs for Sky Television. Here are two bits and one bob.

Artisan Coffee

Another one for Great Little Place...

Highgate Ponds

A small piece I did for the lovely people at GLP...

Sophie's Steakhouse. Wow trousers.

As my Aunty Margaret used to say, some people are all talk and no trousers. If I remember correctly, she was in the midst of explaining her thesis on the great transvestite orators from the early 19^th to mid 20^th centuries, but in abstraction, the phrase conjures up notions of bollocks-less threats, failed promises and dashed hopes.

According to their website, Sophie’s Steakhouse prides itself on “putting the emphasis back on the customer” and on its “food, service and atmosphere.” I like eating, receiving and breathing these things so some friends and I toddled off to the Fulham Road one (there is another in Covent Garden) to judge for ourselves. Was this talk, or was this trousers? In short, trousers. Great big mustard chord plus fours with velvet trim, a sheaf of forgotten fifty-pound notes in one pocket and an unopened packet of aniseed balls in the other.

Sophie’s doesn’t take bookings, so one polls up and hopes for the best. We were lucky enough to get a table immediately, but the bar is excellent should you need a place to wait. Once seated one is presented with a small plate of salami to be getting on with whilst perusing the menu. It’s a nice touch. I often wish I were presented with a small plate of salami at other moments in my life.

It’s a Steakhouse so I had lobster, because I’m a wild horse and you can’t tame me. It came fully shelled with avocado in a club sandwich. It was one of the most AWESOME (yes I used Caps Lock, what of it?) sandwiches I have ever eaten. Even thinking of it now sets me salivating. The fish and chips and steak of various kinds were received favourably by the others. We had to restrain one of our number from drinking the special steak sauce directly from the bottle.

Pudding was perhaps a little less awesome but still did the job. The fudge brownie was served warm and gooey and it in turn made me feel warm and gooey.

The service was excellent. Our waiter and waitress (both with cheek bones you could cut glass with and legs for days—where they find these people I don’t know) were intimate without being invasive and relaxed but proficient.

The atmosphere is energised, with a throng of people about the bar and, when I was there at least, there were some groovy tunes on the sound system. Although why Rhianna doesn’t know her name by the end of the song ‘What’s my name’—having so importuned for its entirety—is a mystery to me.

Graduation - A case for in absentia

By some miracle or (more likely) through some administrative bungle, I have a degree. Whatever the reason, it's mine now and I’m not giving it back, so there. Oliver Ray BA. It has a rather pleasing ring to it, don’t you agree? It should sound good. Those two letters symbolise three years of hard(ish) work, lectures, rent, tuition fees, booze, tears, ink, laughter, torpor, tutors, friends. BA. Done.

But once the results come in there is still one thing left. The Graduation Ceremony. The truth is, I didn’t want to go. But there was a meal after with family and friends, so I changed my mind.

Tickets were £25. A maximum of three could be purchased. Gown rental was £39. To put £114 in some kind of context, that’s almost a velvet smoking cap from Lock & Co. It is precisely two DVD box sets of The West Wing Series 1-7. President Bartlett wouldn’t stand for this kind of shit. Nor would Rob Lowe.

The day arrived. I threw on a suit (dashing), threw myself into a cab (stuffy), threw money at the cabbie (annoyed) and passed through the doors to the Barbican (mysterious). Naturally, it would make far too much sense to hold the ceremony where we actually studied. Picking up my tickets was easy. Queuing for robes was a bore, and once donned they had the curious effect of making one want to indulge in a bit of ritual Satanism. Then came the ceremony. The fact is, unless you are as benevolent as Pudsey Bear, you don’t give a ha’penny fig for ninety percent of the students that walk up there. And that’s fine. Everyone else feels the same way. But you clap, you listen to the speeches and place mental bets on which jokes have been dusted off year after year.

There are some exceptional students, some mediocre (that’s me) and some that frankly make the whole thing drag on. Yes, actually, I AM looking at you Peace Studies, don’t think we can’t see you skulking at the back, you self-righteous nonsense mongers. Eventually my turn came. The trot up the stairs, the brief pause at the edge of the stage. And then up on to it. Suddenly walking demanded my full attention and I stepped with the exaggerated care of the slightly inebriated (though of course I wasn’t. How very dare you). I shook the nice man’s hand (“I’ve never met you before and doubtless never will again, but very well done”) and received my scroll.

Back in my seat, I found the scroll wasn’t my degree, but in fact a printed letter. ‘Dear Student’ it began. OH, the insatiable flirts. The text was humdrum, with the odd platitude shoved up it for good measure. I have made life long friends and have been taught by some of the best minds in the land. I don’t need raw hands and empty words. I’d rather have a smoking cap or the complete West Wing. Oh, and then a job.

The Dylan Dog Case Files in review

For Mouth London.

Wimble Womble

Mouth London ended up posting this. You can read the tinkered version here.

Everyone on the underground was going to Wimbledon. Perhaps it would have been wiser to take the over ground. Or to have wombled free. The District Line sagged with our collective weight, but rattled in a self-satisfied sort of way. Now was its time to shine, viridescent, casting the other lines into shadow.

Outside Southfields station there were cabs ferrying people to the grounds. I hopped in one and noticed three people were following me in. I tend not to share cars with strangers, but it seemed the done thing today. We exchanged a few bons mots re the weather and the order of play before settling into silence (companionable or awkward, I forget which), gazing out at the hundreds of others convening on the Club.

I fell out of the taxi (one must arrive in style to these occasions) and through the gates. There was the usual rigmarole of bag checks for exploding bananas and the quick look up and down to get a sense of whether you were the sort of man to lunge wildly at Pippa Middleton and then I was allowed in. The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club stretched out before me.

I spent the first couple of hours taking in some of the smaller matches. Even in the early stages, vixen mating calls were erupting from the women’s games. I saw Feliciano Lopez square up to Michael Berrer. Some girls have since told me it ought to be Deliciano. His athleticism is unquestionable, he has that jaw line I suppose and he is somewhat callipygian as professional sportspeople are wont to be. I overcame the urge to seek out a copy of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and moved away. The time had come to collect my centre court tickets.

I meandered through the crowds, deciding who had come to see the tennis and who had come to be seen. There was an interminable amount of brown suede loafers and interminable brown suede loafing. The pallid, the tanned, the sock-and-sandaled, the unprepared with skin burnt or white, alternately strawberry and cream. The odd Louboutin flashed saucily on stairs up to the show courts hoping to be caught on camera. I saw Noel Fielding looking smashing, Panama at a rakish angle.

Tickets collected and Pimm’s in the veins, I entered centre court. Having missed the beginning of the match, I joined a small group of people at one of the gangways, poised to enter at a break between games. The moment arrived and we dashed to take our seats. It’s amazing what banked seating does for the atmosphere. Matches suddenly become gladiatorial. I watched Nadal doing what he generally does in circumstances such as these.

The lineswomen about the periphery of the court were all rather formidable, reminiscent of French resistance fighters. The kind of women that would knead bread with hands that had strangled a Nazi two hours before. By the by, all the line and court judges have been in that smart outfit since 2006. If you’d like a Wimbledon blazer in doeskin flannel, get yourself down to Ralph Lauren with £870. Or become a French resistance fighter.

Later, rain threatened and the roof unfurled over the court. It seems to be working rather well. Cliff hasn’t felt it necessary to give a repeat performance. When the roof is extended, the court becomes slightly alien. Cheering, ball thwacking, judgement calling all take on a different resonance. Suddenly grass is indoors, like some space age hydroponics bay. Appropriately, Murray played after the roof closed with all the cold determination of Borg (Star Trek not Björn). He won and a lucky audience member got a sweaty wristband in the face. He needs to shave and smile more.

Being at Wimbledon was a treat. I have since had to follow the tournament on television. This is not without its advantages. I can still throw on a dressing gown, but I don’t get the odd looks.

Apocalypse When?

Small. Perfectly formed? Read, perhaps enter, here.

Case Histories in review

Read it on The Bubble.

The River Cafe

I review The River Cafe, Hammersmith, for Mouth London Magazine. Cast an eye, or possibly two, over it here.