Spectator Life

Christmas is probably the only time I bother with appetisers or canapés proper; usually I am quite content to stick a bowl of fancy crisps on the dining table, and let my husband make sure everyone’s drinks are topped up. But Christmas is different. Christmas demands canapés. And, given the Vintage Chef moniker, I tend to favour the old-fashioned, the retro, the kitsch; the deviled eggs, the vol au vents – and the devils on horseback. The dish is thought to date back to Victorian times, when it would be served not as an appetiser or hors d’oeuvre, but as a savoury: a kind of palate-cleanser that came after the main meal to be eaten with the dregs of wine; they have since migrated to canapé status.

The traditional Christmas meal takes on different guises around the globe. Our festive table groaning under turkey and all the trimmings would look quite unrecognisable to many. For Jewish people living in the US the tradition at Christmas is to eat Chinese food. And in Japan come Christmas you’ll find everyone eating KFC. Seriously—you have to be sure to order your friend chicken weeks in advance to avoid disappointment. I don’t suggest looking to Japan for Christmas culinary inspiration, but there is the odd thing we might want to borrow from abroad. Namely, dessert. Call me a heretic but I’ve never much liked Christmas pudding. Too dense and heavy; packed full of nice things but somehow underwhelming.

‘What’s that earthy flavour in the sauce?’ ‘It’s a black Himalayan moss which monkeys find an aphrodisiac.’ If 2020 has been the weirdest year the modern world has known, that was well and truly reflected in Masterchef, The Professionals. Because this year's series, the 13th annual, dispensed with its own unwritten rules. For years the received wisdom had been just to cook some meat or fish in a modern European style with traditional pairings. If you wanted to be dangerous you might put a square of dark chocolate in the sauce for your venison but even this was usually considered de trop; if you wanted to be playful use popcorn.

First things first, I should issue a disclaimer: I’m not a fan of bikes that have apps. It’s always struck me as odd that a lot of electric bike manufacturers make a big deal about making bikes more friendly for riders – and yet so many insist on adding additional tech that your average cyclist neither wants nor needs. But perhaps the Cowboy 3 can convince me that an app can be more than just an add-on. The Cowboy 3 is unquestionably the best looking electric bike on the market right now in its price class (£1,990). It’s the third generation of e-bike from the Belgian startup – and is a definite sign of the business reaching its maturity; prioritising safety above all else (although clearly still maintaining an incredibly strong design ethic).

With the sad news of John le Carré’s (1931-2020) passing this weekend, a retrospective of some of the finest screen adaptations in the writer’s canon. For many aficionados of the genre, le Carré was the unrivalled king of the spy novel, who maintained a remarkably consistent output – his final novel (the satire Agent Running in the Field) was only published just over a year ago. We’ll be looking primarily at movie adaptations, but I’ll also briefly take in the storied history of Le Carré on the small screen.

It remains the case that for most people free NHS tests are only available for those taking part in pilot schemes, who have been asked to have one by health professionals, or in people or families showing symptoms of the virus. This means that some people are now looking to private providers to get tested before seeing loved ones and although many such providers are offering tests for a fee now, how do you know which are high quality and which should be avoided? For a start, always look for a home test kit that is CE-marked as this shows it meets the European standards for medical testing and is also approved for sale in the UK – do not use any test without this approval mark.

The name ‘toad-in-the-hole’ suggests something a little more whimsical (or saucy) than its reality. The origins of the name are spurious and, to be honest, a little tenuous: I’ve seen theories that the hole is a hungry stomach and the toad a ‘substantial meal’, another that suggests the dish resembles the way toads peep their heads out of burrows, and another which attributes the name to a trend in the eighteenth century for live toads to be incased in stone.

First-time visitors to the Isles of Scilly are hard to find. Once you discover this spell-bindingly beautiful archipelago twenty eight miles off the Cornish coast you quickly become part of its fiercely loyal legion of fans. Indeed, it’s almost impossible to resist the urge for a return visit. It came as no surprise, then, to learn that the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge decided to holiday on the island of Tresco in the heart of the Scillies twice in close succession this year.

Hurrah! At last the UK government has lifted quarantine restrictions for the Canary Islands, meaning British visitors no longer have to spend a fortnight in isolation when they get back to Blighty. Spanish authorities simply require you to take a rapid-result Covid test upon arrival. For sun-starved Britons, this is great news. Warm and sunny all year round, barely four hours away by plane, with all the mod cons of mainland Spain, the Islas Canarias are the ideal winter sunshine destination. I’ve been half a dozen times and each trip has been a blast. So which island should you head for? Well, Lanzarote and Fuerteventura are both dramatic, but the place I like best, and keep returning to, is Tenerife.

One of the first films ever produced, 1903’s The Great Train Robbery, revolved around a robbery of a steam locomotive train, and ever since then the genre has continued to be one of the most enduring in cinema. It isn’t hard to see why. The core elements of the heist film are some of the most solidly pleasurable devices in big-screen entertainment. They often consist of the wily and charismatic veteran thief, putting together a crew for a ‘last job’; a love interest who is either unaware of his or her plans or an enthusiastic participant in them; a supporting cast of various degrees of eccentricity or unreliability; an implacable nemesis, whether a lawman or a rival; thrilling action scenes; and exotic locations.

If this year you hear the distant rumble of dusty games’ compendia being brought down out of attics, it's safe to say you can blame Netflix's latest smash hit series The Queen's Gambit, which seems to be convincing everyone that chess can be cool. App stores are reporting a surge of searches for a game first brought to England ten centuries ago by Vikings. Set in the 1950s The Queen’s Gambit tells the story of Beth Harmon (played brilliantly by Isla Johnstone and Anya Taylor-Joy). Aged eight, she survives a fatal car crash only to end up in an orphanage.

The text below is the basis of a talk given by Christopher Snowdon, head of lifestyle economics at the Institute of Economic Affairs, at the Spectator annual health debate 2016. The debate was entitled: ‘Can we trust health advice?’ Before answering the question of whether we can trust health advice we must first ask: ‘Which health advice?’ It varies so much over time and between countries. In 1979, the government advised men to drink no more than 56 units of alcohol a week. This was later reduced to 36 units, then 28 units and then 21 units. Last month, the Chief Medical Officer reduced it once again, this time to 14 units.

The end of March is nigh, and thanks to the EU’s latest pronouncements, a no-deal Brexit is still a very real possibility. The idea of No Deal causes most millennials to quake in their Balenciaga boots. But there’s nothing like a bit of positive thinking to get you through a crisis, right? Here are 7 reasons a no deal Brexit will be good for millennials. 1. Brexit provides a faultless scape goat We all need a go-to excuse to get us through life’s ups and downs, and now Brexit can be that for everyone. No longer do you need to rely on permanently delayed tubes, or numerous dying aunts – Brexit is here for you. Parents question why you don’t have a job? – Brexit. Why were you late for the party? Brexit. Need an excuse to break up with Mr wrong?

As we are now well into the unwanted Lockdown sequel and winter approaches, time perhaps to enjoy an enforced home cinema experience with a selection of movie thrillers that you may have missed the first time round. Titles range from big budget star vehicles to smaller scale pictures that introduced us to some of the possible on and off-screen icons of tomorrow. The Coldest Game (2019) – Netflix https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12DftzVD2Gg I came across this Polish-produced Cold War thriller one night when searching for movies similar to Bridge of Spies (2015).

Diwali, which falls this year on November 14th, is a festival of family, fireworks and food. Here are the dishes to try to keep the Diwali flame alive in a Covid winter. Covid has already put paid to regular Diwali celebrations. It was inevitable: eight people around the table to tuck into a Christmas turkey is one thing; a Diwali gathering involving your typical Asian extended family— aunts, uncles, fourth cousins and all—is quite another. But, as a festival celebrating the triumph of light over darkness, we should all get in on the cheer and do our best to salvage the festivities by rustling up some celebratory food.

I have always been a bit of a stew-pusher; it tends to be my answer to any of life’s dilemmas, culinary or otherwise. Friends coming round? Stew. Cold and dark outside? Stew. Feeling sad? Stew. To be honest, it doesn’t matter whether or not the weather demands it, I am always in the mood for stew. I’d eat mince and dumplings in June, a slow-cooked sticky oxtail ragu in high Summer. But once Autumn arrives, and my obsession is legitimised by the cold and the dark evenings, there’s no stopping me. In our household, it’s casseroles from now until Spring. I struggle to think of something more comforting and cosy than a big, generous dish of braised meat, tender vegetables and a beautiful sauce arriving at the table.

Wild swimming has become almost tediously fashionable recently, and no heatwave is really complete without a flood of articles on how it feels to take a dip in the outdoors (and even more tedious ones about how ‘in my day, we just called it swimming’ from people fortunate enough not to have grown up with chlorine and floating plasters as their introduction to the water. But the strange thing is that as the weather chills, so does the trendy interest, even though winter swimming is far more fun - and even better for you - than its summer equivalent. Only recently we’ve seen more research suggesting there is a ‘cold-shock’ protein found in regular winter swimmers which could slow the onset of dementia.