Jack Monroe #16 Queen of the freezer, bathtime teaser & blue tick pleaser

skronkywildcat said:

Anthony Bourdain - I don't agree with some of the stuff in this piece, but there are some interesting tit-bits from insiders re his relationship with Asia Argento - https://penthousemagazine.com/can-we-talk-about-toxic-femininity/

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That article was incredibly eye opening. I’d always been on the believe women side of things, but Asia Argento had always given me pause... I do believe people can have bad things happen to them and have horrible experiences but also still be toxic assholes at the same time.

poppycat said:

Agree with every word about Anthony Bourdain, he didn't suffer fools easily and would have seen through her bullsh*t in seconds.
Can't agree with you on the crisps though …………………. on their own yes (Tyrells are my favourites) but never in a sandwich or crumbled on mashed potatoes and manky hard yolked poached eggs

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I’d never admit this *out there* but I’m quite partial to a crisp butty - just white bread (the cheap sort), butter and crisps (ready salted).

lipsticktaser said:

Number one - the blurb for that recipe says pasta e pepe is pasta and chickpeas (wrong) and then shows a recipe with no chickpeas.
Number 2 - it’s essentially spaghetti hoops with cheese. I have that on toast about once a week I love it. Why fuck with what is already simple.
Number 3 - you can’t call something cacio e Pepe when the only ingredient the same is pepper.

Just because you say it is something, doesn’t make it so. A mushroom is not a sirloin stake just because you will it too. Just as a rinsed hoop is not spaghetti For other use. A hoop is a hoop, is a hoop.

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This is one of my pet hates, you cannot call cauliflower a steak as steak is specifically a cut of meat@!

OhhBacon said:

A layer of cheap crushed crisps on top of a pasta bake then grilled...is a total winner!

In other news whoever mentioned Nancy Birtwhistle on here, big thanks. Have started following her and she has great ideas. She made some amazing fritters yesterday from left over veg from a roast. Simple and delicious.

There are so many good cooks, chefs, food writers etc filming on Instagram. They all seem to be able to tap into the nations need in different ways. I love watching Yotam Ottolenghi he is brilliant at simply showing how to cook great food with great and simple images and instructions.

If I was a food writer and had a new book out and was spending 20 hours in a sweaty humid kitchen cooking then now is the perfect time to take some pictures and upload it. She doesn’t seem to have a genuine interest in food. What happened to lockdown larder? Once Jamie was off she quit that, just showing the disingenuous nature of what she does. Even that twat Wicks is still prancing around with his pe lessons.

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She's still trying to get that trademarked though isn't she, 'lockdown larder'. By the time they've made a decision on it, lockdown will have been and gone, silly mare.

Veronicaaa said:

I can't stop laughing at this 'recipe'.

Delicious tin can recipe: Jack Monroe's anellini con cacio e pepe

Jack Monroe’s Tin Can Cook features 75 delicious recipes that use only canned foods and dried ingredients. Try her delicious, easy-to-make anellini con cacio e pepe.

www.panmacmillan.com

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I can’t believe she g HB as the cheek to “write “ that and call it a recipe . Nobody would eat such crap. When Iv been depressed it’s been an effort to eat a biscuit.

Instabums said:

It’s not even economical - even own brand spaghetti hoops are pennies less than a bag of pasta, factor in the hoops being 1 serving versus the bag of pasta making several meals and all of a sudden it’s looking quite fancy

Proper pasta is a cheap cupboard food so what does she have against it?

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Too FANCY for poor people.

So just to clarify... she's put - in an actual book - a "recipe" for cacio e pepe that involves... rinsed spaghetti hoops?

Fuck. Me.

As someone who's only just at the tail end of the worst and longest depressive episode of my life, and without even delving into the sheer disrespect for Italian food, I can tell Jack that washing a sieve is the most thankless task in all of kitchendom and thus recommending it to those in the pit is like a person with legs telling a snake to run.

Flumps said:

Sorry, this made me snort. Or HOOT as I believe is de rigueur.

I am also a terrible klutz. When I was pregnant, years and years ago now, I slipped on some ice and fell and landed really heavily on my hands. In shock I proceeded to carry on with my day which was to take my then husband and his mates to a 5-a-side game. I drove to the sports club and could feel my left arm seizing up as I drove and by the time I got there I could no longer turn the wheel with it and was in A LOT of pain. They carried on with their game, because I go v quiet when I'm in pain. Had to ring my mum and she took me to A&E. At A&E they tried to X-ray my elbow, couldn't because I couldn't move it and they couldn't use certain angles because I had the iron apron on and they were worried about the baby. Waited for a doctor with my mum, still mostly silent. Doctor had clearly decided nothing much was wrong from what he could see on the x-ray and that I was being a bit of a wimp, and I couldn't be in much pain as I was talking quietly and politely. He proceeded to try and straighten my arm. He got to a certain point and then I fixed him with a stare and said, still quietly and politely but apparently terrifyingly, 'You are going to fucking stop doing that right now'. Sent me away in a sling, saying it was bruised.

2 days later I was cooking dinner, touched the hot bar of the oven with the hand attached to the bad elbow that had only been getting more painful. Like you, I snatched it away from the hot thing. There was an audible POP, my arm straightened and what was apparently an undiagnosed dislocated elbow snapped back into place with about the most intense moment of *something* I'd ever experienced. Had a lovely burn on my hand for ages too.

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This made me feel as queasy as thinking of eating mashed potatoes, with poached eggs and crisps Something about dislocated limbs makes my tummy go all funny

HarderFaster said:

washing a sieve is the most thankless task in all of kitchendom and thus recommending it to those in the pit is like a person with legs telling a snake to run.

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Amen to that. I avoid sieves wherever possible!

Honestly, dried pasta is one of the cheapest and most economical foods there is. Cook some, add butter and seasoning with maybe a bit of cheese and you have one of the best comfort foods ever!

Veronicaaa said:

I can't stop laughing at this 'recipe'.

Delicious tin can recipe: Jack Monroe's anellini con cacio e pepe

Jack Monroe’s Tin Can Cook features 75 delicious recipes that use only canned foods and dried ingredients. Try her delicious, easy-to-make anellini con cacio e pepe.

www.panmacmillan.com

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Is tinned spaghetti much cheaper than a large bag of value range pasta? I don’t like hoops so I have no idea how much they cost but I can’t imagine that for the equivalent amount of pasta there are good savings to be made.

That spaghetti hoop monstrosity has actually angered me. It's just such blatant bullshit for her to take up space on a page. A 500g bag of value pasta is under £1 isn't it? Just fucking cook some of that and have it with cheese, butter, salt and pepper. Or have hoops on toast. Or on a baked tattie. Or maybe with a potato waffle. She makes meals into a form of self flagellation.

Readingismyhobby said:

I can’t believe she g HB as the cheek to “write “ that and call it a recipe . Nobody would eat such crap. When Iv been depressed it’s been an effort to eat a biscuit.

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And if you managed to “ cook” that I hardly think you’d feel better..

Passive_Agessive_Lemon said:

Is tinned spaghetti much cheaper than a large bag of value range pasta? I don’t like hoops so I have no idea how much they cost but I can’t imagine that for the equivalent amount of pasta there are good savings to be made.

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It's not. You can get a kg of own brand (not even basic) pasta for just over a pound in pretty much every supermarket. Much cheaper than tins - if value for money is the aim.

Eta: you can even do pasta in the microwave if you don't have a hob.

Veronicaaa said:

Sadly Bourdain died by his own hand a few years ago - which is what makes Jack's appropriation of his name to sell her 'depressipes' all the more disgusting.

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Oh no that’s awful! I feel terrible , I don’t know anything about cooking or chefs or anything but now you’ve said that I think I remember reading about him. Me making jokes mentioning him has left me feeling shitty, it’s a pity JM didn’t have the same consideration

At my local TFC (Turkish Food Centre) you can buy three bags of different pasta shapes for £1.

LennyBriscoe said:

Oh no that’s awful! I feel terrible , I don’t know anything about cooking or chefs or anything but now you’ve said that I think I remember reading about him. Me making jokes mentioning him has left me feeling shitty, it’s a pity JM didn’t have the same consideration

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I hadn’t realised he hanged himself, I’d assumed it was an overdose (;accidental orotherwise) his shows are great as is his book No Reservations

Tesco cheapest dry spaghetti is 20p for 500g

Their tinned hoops are 13p for 400g. And you're pouring how much of that weight away in the sauce?

It's a lot of nonsense. No one does this, or needs to do this. If you really aren't up to cooking (and I've been there alongside you) you end up having toast, crisps, biscuits, stuff that you can pull out of a cupboard and eat mindlessly for fuel.

Veronicaaa said:

It's basically 'heat up a tin of spaghetti hoops in the microwave. Add cheese and black pepper'. I've got the giggles so bad.

Meanwhile, with this one - wouldn't it be a whole lot less hassle just to do it in a pan, rather than hauling it in and out of the microwave every couple of minutes?? https://www.panmacmillan.com/blogs/...k-monroe-cooking-on-a-bootstrap-recipe-chilli

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What I genuinely will never understand about this is why things need to be bastardised so much. Pop a bit of grated cheese & pepper on a tin of hoops and you’ve got a lovely meal, all the better if you’ve got a slice of bread to have some hoops on toast?

It’s like the curries, so many people have pointed out... have a chickpea curry then fruit for after? Lovely.

Why does it all need to be chucked into a pot and heated through until it could pass through a cheese cloth?

emm said:

And if you managed to “ cook” that I hardly think you’d feel better..

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Cooking that would make me depressed.

A tin can cook reviews:

The only time I’ve had food that I’d imagine is worse than Jacks, is when I was in hospital having my daughter. The Portland it was not. It was seriously grim, you could hold a door open with the omelette.
Prisoners are fed better more nutritious food than that. That’s the thing, if you’re broke and have kids you want the cheapest most nutritious food. Toast and beans has fibre, carbs and protein. Chuck some chopped veg at the side if you have it.
Pasta, pesto and some frozen peas and sweetcorn. Simple is best. If people with low incomes are her target market, then they don’t have the disposable income to try peach curry.
I also take umbrage with her pricing. Yes a portion may work out at £1.20 but what supermarket is selling you 1 tbsp at a time.
Common sense would be to do a book along the lines of :
1) How to build a stock cupboard. What spices are you most going to use. How to use them. Seasoning. Oils and vinegars or alternatives.
2) Highlight the most bang for your buck in terms of food products. iE is pasta better than rice, or potatoes as a carb. Best cheap cuts of meat. The best lentil to buy that can be used in various dishes.
3) Recipes that use these Ingredients to make simple Family meals.
4) How to round up or down how many people it’s for. Is it for one ok do this but you should still make al the stock up. For 8 you should maybe add x for more depth of flavour.
5) how to turn the leftovers into another meal.
6) how to store the food you have and leftover for longevity in order to make money stretch.


No one wants a washed bean. A stew can become a Ragu with some tweaks.
People using foodbanks won’t have what she’s selling. People trying to save money and low income don’t want to waste cash. I wonder if the publishers try the recipes in her book. Her success rate seems to be one or two decent ones per book. That’s 14 over 7 books. It’s abysmal. And we’ll just skirt past the plagiarism because that’s a rant for another day.