Great British Menu 2013

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So, it looks like the best cookery show on television is back for a Comic Relief inspired run and it débuts tonight at 7:30pm on BBC HD and BBC Two.

The brief this year seems to be for the chefs to create 'imaginative and whimsical dishes' for the banquet; to me that suggests we'll see the chefs given free reign to do pretty much anything they want and really 'push the boundaries' along the way.

That said, I hope we don't get too many 'accessory' dishes where the food takes a back seat to the way it's being presented as we've seen in previous seasons. Although, to be fair, they've generally been seen straight through by the judges and not got near the finals.

Anyway, the series' Homepage can be found here and I'll try* and update the OP with any relevant information I find along the way, as well as iPlayer links, etc.

Here's hoping for another epic Johnnie Mountain-esque strop by a chef along the way!

*Depending on how into GBM I get and whether I remember or not.

Catch-up links:

S8E1 - London and South East Starter.

S8E2 - London and South East Fish.

S8E3 - London and South East Main

S8E4 - London and South East Dessert.

S8E5 - London and South East Judging.

S8E6 - Scotland Starter.

S8E7 - Scotland Fish.

S8E8 - Scotland Main.

S8E9 - Scotland Dessert.

S8E10 - Scotland Judging.

S8E11 - North West Starter.

Not sure where the BBC HD ones have got to, but will update if they appear.

 

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Oh gawd...

The chefs will also be set fundraising challenges to raise money for Comic Relief. Also, each week a special guest will also join the judging triumviate.

 

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Oh well, I managed to miss the first episode. Good job there's Sky+ to rescue me.

Anyway, non-HD iPlayer link here with the HD link to follow here, once they upload it.

 

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I still haven't managed to catch up with this, but I've updated the OP with the relevant iPlayer links for those without recording services.

If anyone can find the HD versions, do let me know.

 

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Tom Aikens was sheer class this week, blew the other guys away. I really wanted to see that black guy's dessert go before the judges though!

I couldn't agree more. Aikens was a clear front-runner with three fantastic dishes, although his main course was a real disappointment.

His food was not funny or witty, it was boring and restaurant. Geesh.

How Corrigan thought that Matt Gillan's food was worthy of getting in front of the judges is beyond me.

Adam Simmonds ought to feel utterly robbed that he didn't get to go up against Aikens.

Tonight sees the start of the Scottish heat.

Which, as seems to often be the case, has been hugely disappointing.

Mark Greenaway always seems to miss the point of the brief and it feels to me that he's trying to get away with tarting up some existing dishes on his menu to vaguely tie in with the theme and see if he gets away with it. I remember his starter getting slated last year and he obviously didn't learn his lesson.

Tony Singh is just bafflingly haphazard with his approach. His starter was a complete mess, his fish course was downright dangerous and his main seemed to get made up on the spot. His attempts at humour are also wearing very thin, very quickly.

And as for Michael Smith... well, he runs hot and cold with the best of them. I loved his starter, hated his fish course and was left utterly nonplussed by his main.

I'll catch-up with the desserts at some point and see if any of them have managed to pull it out of the bag. At the moment I can't see anyone other than Smith going through to the finals.

 

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Okay, so the Scottish desserts were equally disappointing.

Smith's was all accessories and very little cooking, Greenaway's was yet another restaurant dish that he'd hoped to get away with and Singh's showed promise, yet fell a little flat in its execution and looked tacky on the plate.

I'm not sure there was even four good dishes amongst them this week, let alone four from one chef. I'm even struggling to remember one stand-out dish despite having watched all four episodes back-to-back.

 

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Michael Smith's starter was great. It showed a lot of dark humor.

Actually, that's a good shout.

The drudgery of the cooking on show had largely made me ignore that dish, which was a pretty accomplished idea and hit the brief square-on.

This week and last week, several of the chefs have said that the fun is in the eating when it is clearly a nice restaurant dish, and that shouldn't stand.

A fantastic point, eloquently made.

I'd obviously started blocking that particular phrase out, such was the regularity of its appearance last week. If all they can say about a dish is that it's pretty damn obvious they've missed the brief by some margin.

Scotland has disappointed for another year

Is it just me, or does anyone else detect a slight chip on the collective shoulder of the Scottish entrants for the past few years?

It annoys me how they seemingly feel compelled to shoehorn their national identity on a dish first, then think about the brief second.

Oh god you aren't funny, you're just annoying.

Almost toe-curlingly bad in her attempts to raise a laugh.

Another shining example of the 'funny woman' stereotype.

 

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Not sure if I like the new format, with the judges seeing the menus (and their respective chefs) beforehand... kinda ruins some of the surprise in my eyes!

I really don't see the point of this addition in the slightest. It doesn't even seem to add anything.

So the judges get to see what each chef is going to come up with for their menu before it's served... but are still voting on the menu as a whole? And they are asked to give each dish a points score... yet we don't get to see all of the scores or even the respective points totals?

Stupid idea.

 

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It just seems like another way to throw results.

But they aren't even showing the scores, so why does it even matter?

We just seem to see any dishes which scored a 10, so unless there's some sort of godawful redemption feature later on, what's the point?

And can they actually please judge on the brief and not just the taste.

I'm a little more comfortable with that arrangement than you seem to be, as it is first and foremost a cooking competition, but I do agree it needs more focus on the brief.

Have we actually had a fun dish so far this year? Only Michael Smith's chicken starter seems to have had any humour behind it, the rest have been 'accessory' dishes for the most part.

 

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Judges and to score it before they knew which chef cooked it. Now they know which chef cooked it and so can score accordingly.

I'm pretty confident that the judges of GBM are looking for the best quality dishes for their final banquet and there's nowhere near as much favouritism as you seem to think there is, if any at all.

But even if what you said was accurate - why would it matter?

Previously they'd score each dish after they'd tasted it, then be given the menus at the end and pick their winner based on the menu as a whole. It was never a case of the highest points total winning, nor was it a question of favouring a certain chef - and Matthew and Oliver especially would have a pretty bloody clear idea of who cooked what.

And while they now know the chef behind each menu, they still score the dishes, although we don't get to see the numbers, and they still pick their favourite menu at the end. Nothing meaningful has changed; it's just been made unnecessarily complicated.

Yes it is a cooking, but that does not mean fun dishes have to be crap.

What was rather the point I made.

I'd rather all the cooking was fantastic and the jokes lacking than the other way round - humour should be within the dish, not something on or around it.

Take Tom Aikens menu as an example. His starter was very similar to last year's winner, and was all style and little substance. His fish course was quirky rather than fun, his main was just boring and his dessert relied upon props.

 

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Finally caught up with last week's round and couldn't be more pleased that Aiden has finally made it through to the finals. He's produced some awesome food over the years but has all-too often relied on restaurant dishes he's shoehorned round the brief and lost out to someone who has been truly innovative.

But this year he's got a showstopper of a main course and I'd love to see it at the banquet. It's going to have to be something truly fantastic to beat that dish, although I do wish he'd drop the noodles or find some other way to serve them up as the execution of that particular element doesn't seem to fit with the rest of the dish.

When it came to his competition, I didn't feel that Mary-Ellen had really done her homework and worked out just how much pressure she was going to be under in the GBM kitchens. There didn't seem to be a point during the week where she was in control of her cooking and she seemed far too easily distracted and flustered.

It also annoyed me that she seemed to have come up with two good ideas for dishes and thrown in a restaurant dish for her fish course and main. For me, both completely lacked creativity and missed the brief by a country mile. I really have no idea what that peppermint fish dish was all about or what it was supposed to represent.

And as far as I'm concerned, take away the props from her other two courses and they wouldn't be seen as anything special. The starter in particular did nothing for me at all and seemed to be only saved by its creative presentation, where the dessert didn't look to eat all that well, although the judges did seem to praise its flavour.

As for Chris Holland, he had some interesting ideas but his dishes lacked the necessary execution to make them fantastic - summed up perfectly by his dessert which looked great but lacked flavour. That ought to have been amazing as he had every chance to nail it, yet served up something disappointing and bland.

And, to be honest, I wasn't sold on his food. I thought his starter was needlessly complicated for little result, his fish course gimmicky and too heavily reliant on a model gnome, and his main completely unsuitable for this or any of the previous banquets. I'm not sure I'd even want to order it from a menu, given the choice.

 

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And now on to the North East and, for me, some of the most unlikeable chefs in the whole competition.

Colin McGurran cooks some fantastic food and I totally respect his abilities as a chef, but if he was put up against another pair of more likeable competitors he'd really stand out as an utter tool. It's just that he's on screen in the heats with two prize idiots that he seems vaguely normal.

I can't really say I was totally on-board with his quail starter last year, but I also can't remember anything that seemed to be a better choice. I'm sure Rogan could pretty much have cooked for the entire banquet, but when it came to the rest... was there anything better that the dish that won?

Anyway, I'm sure he'll win through this week. He is a fantastic chef, despite my misgivings.

But when it comes to Stephanie Moon, she just leaves me absolutely cold. I don't understand her food, I don't like her ideas and in her personality grates on me something rotten. She's constantly trying to come across as likeable and a little bit 'wacky' but the act falls completely flat and I feel she's almost reduced to bit-part status and there to make up the numbers.

I can still remember and cherish the look on Nigel Haworth's face last year when he was tasting that dish of hers with the goggles and nose clip - he really didn't need to even speak after that!

And Charlie Lakin might cook some fantastic food but he's made some bloody idiotic choices along the way and never seems likely to do anything of note - a shame really, as he ought to do much better. And as with Stephanie, his personality and failed attempts at humour just grate on me.

So far I've only seen the North East Starters, but there's nothing on show that excites me. Colin's dish wasn't funny in the slightest and didn't seem to make any sort of sense, Charlie's was spectacularly misjudged and Stephanie's was, as pointed out on the show, three canapés on a plate. And three badly-cooked ones at that.

Roll on the fish course.

 

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Well, the fish courses weren't all that interesting either.

I'm glad that Colin's dish wasn't trying to be hilarious and instead just tried to be charming, because you wouldn't want to accuse him serving up a restaurant dish he'd tried to fit around the brief...

I'm amazed it got the score it did. Atherton's obviously got something for Colin as there was nothing about that dish that was suitable for a banquet. For starters, you'd need a brigade of hundred to plate it up!

Charlie seemed to be quite brave with his surf & turf dish, but let's be honest - it simply wasn't suitable for this year's competition. Anything where all the humour is only in the sodding title ought to get shot down in flames. And yet again, you shouldn't be able to get away with a restaurant dish dressed up as something you've thought long and hard about and designed specifically for the brief.

And I have no idea what Stephanie was thinking about. Grapefruit and chicory salad with a crab custard pie and lemon mayonnaise? Well, I'm not bloody laughing. And neither was Jason Atherton, going on the score that she received.

Rubbish, rubbish, rubbish. Nothing funny about those three dishes at all.

 

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Ended up fast-forwarding through the mains to the last ten minutes and was rewarded with two boring restaurant dishes without so much as an ounce of humour and one genuine attempt at a funny dish let down by the cooking and presentation.

All-in-all, a complete waste of time.

 

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Both fit the brief and both are incredible. Now just need someone to show the same skill on the first two courses.

I couldn't disagree more about your choice of pudding.

The fez is a gimmicky restaurant-style dish that's just been tinkered with to make it fit the brief. It's not funny - merely clever in its execution and mildly exciting with the bubbling milkshake out of the top.

If that's as good as it gets, it'll be a poor show. Take the red food colouring out of the white chocolate coating and it's got nothing much to say for itself, at least where this year's brief is concerned.

Thinking about it, I've seen funnier and more exciting desserts in years gone by when the brief didn't even ask for humour. I'm really expecting the dessert course to be the one that blows people away and that fez didn't wow me in the slightest.

As for the other two desserts... well, I wouldn't look twice at them on a menu and I'd be severely disappointed if they found their way to my table at a banquet.

Colin McGurran will get through, but I really can't see any of those four dishes making the final banquet.

 

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I disagree and I'm a little confused by your comments (I don't mean to be rude). You seem to be going on about how they are missing the brief and just presenting restaurant dishes, and then you post your comment above.

To be fair to you, my ramblings last evening might not have made the most sense, but I stand by them!

Firstly, the fez dessert hit the brief and looked fantastic. You simply can not cook funny food! You cook great food and present it in a style suited to the brief, in this case Red Nose Day.

Yes, the fez did hit the brief and it looked good (but not great - the way it was served did it no favours) but as far as I'm concerned it's not a funny dish.

Once the dry ice has finished bubbling the milkshake out of the top, we're left with a tiramisu in the shape of a fez. The novelty has worn straight off and its all on the dessert to taste fantastic, which I have no doubt it does.

And while I agree that you can't cook funny food, you can present it in a way that amuses and makes it a fun experience to eat for the diner - and that fez fell down on the last point, which for me is the crucial thing this year.

Tommy Cooper, whilst not connected to Comic Relief, is an icon of comedy of which Comic Relief is built upon. If I was presented that dessert I'd instantly know what it was referencing and I'd have a little laugh, but most importantly I'd hope it tasted superb. We'll see what the judges think, they have the advantage of tasting it, but I think it looks great.

I'm being somewhat mean-spirited about the fez dessert as I've seen it all before, but it's not won me over as much as it seems to have done with the rest of you.

Chocolate-based desserts that you pour a liquid into in order to 'set them off' have been all the rage in the last 18-months. Take the colour away from the chocolate fez and remove the black icing and it's a sort of tiramisu with a gimmick.

Back to your comment above. Aiden's main course looked fantastic and I'm sure tasted great too. But take away the noodles as you suggest, and where is the funny part???? That is the only part that the other chefs and Phil Howard laughed at.

Sorry, I said noodles where I meant to say fork.

I don't think the whirly fork thing needs to be there myself, as it makes the noodles seem a novelty where as they should seem like an integral part of the dish. And the whole 'Pot Noodle' thing is funny enough for me without an additional prop.

It's not funny to present a selection of meat on a wooden board, I get that at steak restaurants, and it's hardly funny to put a few rib bones to make a loose connection to the Flintstones who I'd never associate with comedy.

A steak restaurant would never even get close to how that was served and they wouldn't be able to cook anything on the board as wel as Aiden did - have you ever had potato 'rocks' and 'fossilised' salsify before?

Sticking a selection of beef on a wooden board is not what we saw here - creating an amusing piece of dining theatre would be more accurate. The fantastic cooking couple with the innovative and witty presentation all add up to something genuinely clever and funny.

The brief this year is Comic Relief, and it is important that the chefs make an effort to tie in their food with the theme, but I wouldn't want them to present average food just so they can make it look funny.

Which, as far as I'm concerned, is exactly what Colin did with that tiramisu.

It's a restaurant dish that's been tarted up a little to fit round the brief. And onc the initial joke has been played out, there's nothing left.

I know I'm not going to win people over with my argument, but we all have our opinions and I'm sticking with mine!

 

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I've been looking forward to this week's round, what with having three newcomers to the GBM kitchen, and it's certainly been enlightening even if the cooking hasn't necessarily been up to scratch.

Poor Emily not only has to contend with looking like a heroin addict, but she's also a bag of nerves and seems a little under-prepared. I have almost no idea where she was coming from with her dish and I really wouldn't want to sit down to a plate with that much fat on it, no matter how tasty the rest of the dish.

Lucky to scrape the score she did, but I feel we'll see an improvement from Ms Watkins over the next three courses.

I didn't think Chris Eden's dish was particularly witty or appetising and in my opinion, Mr Kerridge got it spot-on with his comment about there being two distinct dishes served-up with nothing much to link the two. And a little printed can with some rather runny duck parfait in does not an amusing dish make.

Again, lucky to scrape the score he did.

But I was rather impressed with Peter Sanchez-Iglesias's Picnic. It had all the right elements of an entertaining dish to eat, even if thought the Coronation chicken seemed a little weird and didn't particularly appeal to my palate. The Scotch egg and the quiche Lorraine certainly worked and I felt that the presentation was playful, but not overly twee or forced.

Three very interesting chefs, with careers I've had an eye on for a few years, and hopefully a great week of cooking with some knock-out dishes to come. Looking forward to seeing Phil Howard in the kitchen again tomorrow too - a nice little bonus!

 

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Finally caught up with last week's remaining episodes.

South West Fish:

At first glance, and certainly after their initial explanations and the accompanying images, I was really impressed by all three chefs, which makes a change for GBM this year.

Peter's fish course sounded fantastic and looked great, but concerns were raised as soon as I figured out that there wasn't a single piece of potato on the plate. As Tom said, fish and chips without chips and deep-fried fish seemed a strange idea and, as is increasingly the case with this year's brief, not funny.

And while it seemed to eat well, why he couldn't have done something with potato to tie it in properly is beyond me. I could think of loads of ideas for a light addition to the plate that wouldn't ruin the balance, so why couldn't he?

With Chris Eden, I thought his fish course sounded great, looked impressive and seemed to just about fit the brief with it's funky surfboard plate and tin of wax. In fact, I thought it might be a winner... until he plated it up and the faults became apparent.

But Emily's dish seemed to be almost perfect for the banquet in alnost every sense. It sounded fun, it looked fun and really felt like it had all the elements needed to back the apparent humour up with taste, despite the addition of the braised leeks. Just a massive shame about the low score it received, despite seeming to go down well with the people tasting it.

South West Main:

Compared to the fish course, none of these mains excited me. All three were severely lacking in humour and all seemed more apt for previous year's competitions.

Peter's dish, despite his insistence otherwise, was just a roast dinner in fancy clothes. Can't say any aspect of it excited or intrigued me and I'd be pretty annoyed if that landed on my table at a banquet, once the initial surprise had worn off. To me it seemed very safe and very dull for a competition like this.

Chris seemed to have completely lost the plot by this point - I haven't got the faintest idea what he was thinking with his 'BLT' dish. It was painfully unfunny, looked awful on the plate and seemed to eat pretty badly as well. And I'm extremely surprised that he got the mark he did - Kerridge went very easy on him.

And Emily's shoot lunch just passed me by completely. It looked terrible, missed the brief by a country mile and felt completely out of season to boot. Why it got the praise and the score it did... well, someone can try and explain that to me if they like.

South West Dessert:

Peter's was the stand-out dessert here, despite his increasingly annoying utterances of 'nan' at every moment. Was it funny? Probably not, but it had a touch of humour to it and also looked absolutely delicious. Shouldn't make it anywhere near the banquet though - the 'fez' tiramisu dessert knocks it into a cocked hat.

Not sure why he thought the pairing of Granny Smiths and Ascorbic Acid was a good one, but he doesn't strike me as the sharpest knife in the block.

Unfortunately by the dessert round, Chris had well and truly gone past the point of no return. Using whole peaches was a pretty stupid idea to start off with and everything he did from that point just seemed to compound the problem - it was never going to work.

And I have to say I wasn't bothered about Emily's dessert in the slightest. It looked dull and unexciting and seemed to lack the crucial spark of humour it so badly needed. The individual components were actually pretty appealing but the way it was all served up just sucked all the life out of it.

Overall I'm not surprised that Vicky Pollard won through on Friday, but if he mentions his sodding nan again I'm likely to throw something at the TV.

On to Northern Ireland now, something I'm not looking forward to as I find all three chefs to be complete tools.

 

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I thought Emily's shoot lunch looked great. One thing to remember is that a lot of these episode were filmed last year, so whilst this is out of shoot season now, it could have been perfectly in season when filmed. I don't think there is any worry about it getting to the banquet though.

Yes, true, but the point of GBM has always been to cook for the banquet and be 'on season' for the event and not when the heats were filmed.

There was one particular year where the event was in the middle of summer and no end of chefs were castigated for using wintery produce.

Peter's dessert did look good and the judges certainly thought it tasted great. I think it has a chance of getting to the banquet, seeing that it is on Cassamia's menu as "Apple Pie from Great British Menu 2013". You never know.

They all tend to do that though. I dined at various restaurants last year that had either all four dishes from the heats or one or two selected choices on their menu.

It's an interesting dessert, but doesn't seem very 'fun' to me.

As for Northern Ireland, I don't understand it when chef's feel that they have to make a specific point about where the dish has come from.

It's the same complaint I have about the Scottish chefs - seems to be some sort of inferiority complex where every dish has to scream about the nationality of the person who cooked it.

The Titanic presentation was pretty poor. It is in no way comedic or funny, even though the idea of it was interesting. He could have presented it as a comic relief ship with red funnels or something, not as the ship on which 1500 people died. Oh, but it was built in Belfast.
Not been impressed with this week although the cowboy pie looked tasty!

Hah, someone thought that using the Titanic for comedic value was appropriate?! I'm going to look forward to seeing that all day now!