WARM, WITTY AND WISE
DON’T do it, Basil! John Cleese has signed a deal to remake Fawlty Towers for the boutique hotel generation. His co-star will be his daughter Camilla, above. Only two series of Fawlty Towers were made, in 1975 and 1979 – the most perfect TV comedies ever. No sequel necessary.
They say, never go back. Just as the return of Sex And The City was greeted with huge excitement only to fizzle away in disappointment, the same will happen with Fawlty Towers Two. That’s my prediction.
Though I’d love to be proved wrong.
ON VALENTINE’S Day you used to send an anonymous card to someone you fancied like mad.these days that is borderline illegal so February 14 has become colonised by smug couples who book up all the restaurants and give each other cuddly toys.
The most humiliating moment of my son’s life (he was single at the time) was the night we managed to get a table for a quick supper before going to a concert.
We glanced around the restaurant full of twosomes canoodling over their pasta.
He looked at me in horror. “I’ve just realised it’svalentine’s Day and all these people think you’re my date.” I apologised and promised to pay for his counselling.
MPS who lose their seats get about £5,250 (equal to one month’s salary) as a pay-off. A cross-party parliamentary committee thinks they should get more (surprise surprise) – £162,360 – which is what their German counterparts get.
Crikey. What else do they want? A medal?well yes they do, apparently.
A “medallion of service” to soothe their feelings of rejection. And politicians wonder why we don’t rate them.
DID ANYONE bother to make the “lemon Swiss roll and amaretti trifle” which won the Jubilee Pudding competition last summer? I never fancied it much.
Now there’s a government-endorsed “toolkit” offering “templates and materials to help with your Coronation celebrations”.
However, the famous Coronation Chicken, invented for the late Queen, doesn’t get a reboot. “It looks like sick,” Princess Margaret once said when presented with it. She wasn’t wrong.
The toolkit does include a recipe for a strawberry and ginger trifle from Michelinstarred chef Adam Handling. I love a trifle, the naffer the better – jelly cubes, readymade custard, stale sponge squares, a big slug of sherry, tinned fruit, squirty cream, glacé cherries and hundreds and thousands.
This trifle is nothing like that. For one thing it’s served in individual glasses so you don’t get that satisfying squelch when you spoon it out of a big glass bowl.
And as for the instructions…
“Bloom the gelatine in an ice bath,” says Adam. “…add the malic acid”. Bloom? Ice bath? Malic acid?what is he on about?