Canadian

Jason Priestleek and Potato Soup

Donna Martin graduates, Main, Soup

Sadly my #1 West Bev lover, Luke is busy with the Riverdale pilot for my favourite network – and no I’m not joking – The CW, so I had to settle for my #2 (don’t ever tell him he is second), Jason Priestley.

Yes Jace is a total babe, with that glorious coif and chiseled jaw of a man beyond the teenage years he was depicting (next to Andrea … and Luke, everyone looked young so it didn’t matter), but he was also the good guy and I spent more time lusting for a bad boy like Luke.

That being said I flip-flopped, in all the ways, between the two and ended up inspiring Aaron to have Kelly torn between the two men. It was a meaty role for me off screen and her onscreen, and I’m just so glad that I was able to play such an integral part in shaping the wonder that is Kelly Taylor.

Jace and I first connected in the late 80s when he had a small guest stint on 21 Jump Street. I was working for Johnny Depp tutoring him on his favourite topic, immigration and customs law, but lost interest when he objected to my teaching methods (which went on to inspire Ms Vaughn in Billy Madison). Thankfully Jace was there to take me mind off the tragedy and I endeavoured, as I do, to make him a big, big fucking star!

The time I spent on the set of 90210 was the happiest of my life, between the affairs and the feuding, it was as dramatic as I’d imagined life on the A-list. Despite this, I was always drawn to Jace’s cool, calm demeanour – maybe his race car driving career was enough of a bad boy edge for my heart, I don’t know?

It was such a thrill to see Jace again! It has been a few year since we last caught up, with him busy working behind the camera and me, well, building this little media empire. Knowing that I was struggling with Annelie’s continued amnesia, J was more than happy to drop by and hopefully trigger her memories. It didn’t work … but thankfully I had a nice warm bowl of my Jason Priestleek and Potato Soup.

 

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Like Jace, soup is the perfect dish to have around when you’re down and feeling blue. Or craving blue cheese. Leek and potato is a dish that proves that simplicity in the kitchen, is a good thing.

It is even better with some crumbled blue cheese and crisp bacon. Simple … with a punch, right?

Enjoy!

 

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Jason Priestleek and Potato Soup
Serves: 4.

Ingredients
olive oil
1 large onion, roughly chopped
1 garlic clove, crushed
700g desiree potatoes, roughly chopped into mid-size carcubes
2 leeks, washed, dried and thinly sliced
5 cups chicken or vegetable stock
4 rashers streaky bacon, finely diced
½ cup double cream
100g blue cheese, plus extra to garnish
salt and pepper

Method
Heat a good lug of oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat and sweat the onion and garlic for a couple of minutes. Add the potato and leek, and cook for a further five minutes or until the leek starts to soften and the potatoes start to caramelise.

Slowly pour in the stock and bring to the boil. When bubbling like Jace and my sexual tension, reduce the heat to medium and simmer, uncovered, for fifteen minutes. Remove from the heat and allow it to rest for 10 minutes to cool.

While resting, heat up a small frying pan and cook the bacon until crisp. Remove from the pan to drain on some paper towel.

While the bacon is resting, go back to the soup like Dylan returning to Brenda and blitz with a stick blender until smooth and beautiful. Pour in the cream, crumble in the blue cheese and return to a low heat, stirring to combine / heat. Season with a good whack of salt and pepper.

Ladle the soup into bowls, crumble over bacon and some excess blue cheese and drizzle some cream. Mainly for aesthetics.

 

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Keanachu Reeves

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I tell you, Keanu is like a fine red wine – and no I don’t mean he stains my teeth if I’m dehydrated – he just gets better and better with age.

While he has had more misses than hits since The Matrix saga concluded, Keanu has never once held that against me despite the fact I am his closest, unpaid advisor. That being said, he decided to co-star again with Sandy fucking Bullock against my judgement and that is definitely his worst film of the 00s and obviously I argue that is the reason for the slowing of decent offers.

I guess it is hard to hold my other terrible advice against me, given I’ve been making questionable choices for the entire duration of our friendship. From getting him expelled, to forcing him into taking pay cuts to bump up the wages of my other friends Gene and Al or robbing banks with Lori Petty and inspiring both Point Break and her stint in Orange is the New Black, my choices have never been great.

But Keanu always stands behind me, although only figuratively after Speed.

Despite our love affair ending after the meddling of Bitchy McBullfuck, I always try to keep my options open with him by keeping the spice in our relationship … which is where my Keanachu Reeves comes into play.

 

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I’ve oft spoken about my love of spice and melt your insides hot chilli – and if you’ve missed it, your homework is to re-read every article. Actually, while you’re there can you proof all my past posts and point out all my sausage-finger typos and drunken grammatical errors – I just, kind of can’t be bothered doing it myself but know that I should, you know?

Anyway … way off course. Keanachu is a gangbang (I wish) of my George Takeios, Chilli con Kim Carnes, Chipotlenny Kravitz Burritos and Candace Cameron Bure-ito Bowls because, full disclosure, I just throw any and all spices, chillis and beans into a pot when cooking Mexican and hope for the best.

It is yet to fail me, so enjoy – Keanachu is as delicious as its namesake.

 

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Keanachu Reeves
Serves: 6.

Ingredients
1 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, finely diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
500g beef mince
½ red capsicum, diced
½ green capsicum diced
1 tbsp chilli powder
1 tbsp ground cumin
1 tsp oregano
½ tsp cayenne pepper
2 chipotles in adobo, finely minced
400g can crushed tomatoes
400g can kidney beans, drained and rinsed
salt and pepper, to season
1 cup grated cheddar cheese
f-loads of corn/tortilla chips
guac, to serve – you don’t have to pay extra though
sour cream, to serve

Method
Heat the oil in a large pan over medium heat. Reduce to low and add the onion and the garlic, sweating until they are soft, translucent and smell glorious. Add the mince, breaking up with the back of a spoon, until it is starting to brown.

Increase to a medium heat and add the capsicum and spices, stirring to combine and release the flavours. Add the chipotles, tomatoes, kidney beans and a good whack of salt and pepper and, again, stir to combine. If it is too thick, add a bit of water and reduce to a low heat, again, and leave to simmer, half-cockedcovered for 15-20 minutes.

Preheat oven 180°C.

Layer chips, be them corn or tortilla, on the base of a large baking dish, top with balls-hot chilli and a good layer of cheese and bake in the oven for about ten minutes, or until the cheese is golden and bubbly … and hot enough to give third degree burns.

Serve generously or eat from the dish with copious amounts of guac and sour cream.

 

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My Own Private Guytablow

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner

Talk about a blast from the past! I was heading back from rigging the Rip Curl Pro for Matty Wilkinson in Bells Beach, when I thought, damn my life has been lacking drama lately so I picked up the phone and called my dear friend Keanu Reeves.

As you would be aware, Keanu is 100% pure adrenaline meaning, obviously, we had a torrid love affair which may or may not have lead to his expulsion from the Etobicoke School of the Arts. While he was bummed to be expelled from ESA, the incident bonded us for life and loosely inspired three of his latter films: Speed, My Own Private Idaho and The Devil’s Advocate.

While to commoners it may appear that Keanu has fallen off the face of the earth in recent years, we try to stay in touch every couple of months when we get together to read scripts and make smart career decisions … like avoiding working with my nemesis / evil shrew, Sandra Bullock.

Yep – sorry Jason Patric, I’m the reason Speed 2 became available.

What says thanks for finally letting me share our beautiful love story?

Picture source: Screen cap from Point Break.

 

As you can probably tell, we are very social but the fun isn’t only limited to celebrities! You can follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr and Google+.

The Croque Madame

12th Annual Easter Meggstravaganza, Easter Meggstravaganza, Main

Yes, The Rock is now more widely known as a movie star but let’s be honest he will always be the acclaimed televisual faux-athlete of the WWE … making him, obviously, the perfect fit for the successful TV star of the Meggstravaganza.

Oh, plus he has Ballers that is currently on HBO, so he is firmly in the TV legend realm. Fun fact: Ballers was originally conceived as a romantic comedy about my sexual exploits in the late 90s / earlier 00s, just before he hit the big time.

I first met The Rock while attending the non-shit version of William McKinley High School, where we quickly bonded over being man-children and having to shave in kindergarten. Our love for wrestling also bonded us, although he was less enthusiastic about my Ancient Greece inspired naked/sexy Greco-Roman Wrestling, called Dicko Roman.

While the style didn’t reach the mainstream, I did parlay it into a beautifully scripted porno that, to be honest, should have crossed over to mainstream … like a gay, hardcore Debbie Does Dallas.

The Rock has long been a fan of Meg Ryan’s work (we used to spend our Friday night slumber parties play wrestling and watching her rom-coms), so he was thrilled to be given the opportunity to help her re-ascend to greatness.

He is very busy, what with him currently filming Babe-watch with my on again-on again fling, Zeffy, but was able to take some time out to snack on a rich The Croque Madame.

 

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While this isn’t the most ideal meal to serve someone busy being shirtless and oozing sex appeal like the OG Mitch Buchannon, The Rock just can’t go past the quintessential French brunch version of the grilled cheese. Between the rich white sauce (which admittedly I am very heavy handed with to avoid waste … despite the risk it poses to my heart), the gruyere (which smells like SJP looks, a foot), the whack of dijon and the perfectly fried egg, you can’t help but be there to devour it.

Before a slow-mo run into the water to burn of the extra calories – enjoy!

 

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The Croque Madame
Serves: 2.

Ingredients
30g unsalted butter
1 tbsp flour
1 cup milk
¼ tsp salt
Freshly grated nutmeg
1 cup Gruyere, grated
4 slices sourdough
Dijon mustard
4-6 thin slices of deli ham
2 large eggs
pepper, to taste

Method
Preheat the oven to 180°C.

In small saucepan, melt the butter over high heat until it starts to foam. Whisk in the flour and cook until it is golden and viscose, before adding the milk and salt, whisking constantly until the mixture thickens. Remove from the heat and stir in a pinch of nutmeg and half the cheese.

Lay the slices of bread on a baking sheet, spread with dijon and top with the ham and remaining cheese. Divide half of the bechamel over the top and close the sandwiches.

Melt a lug of unsalted butter in a frying pan over medium heat, add the sandwiches and fry on both sides until golden brown and the cheese is melted and gooey.

Place the sandwiches on the baking sheet, top with remaining bechamel and bake in the oven until it crisps and browns. About ten minutes.

While the sandwiches is becoming gloriously golden, wipe out the frying pan and heat over high heat. When nice and hot, reduce the heat to low and fry the eggs, sunny side up, until the white is gloriously cooked and the yolk soft.

Remove the sandwiches from the oven, plate, top with the fried eggs, season, devour, regret eating so much and run slow-mo into the water, obviously after waiting 15 minutes.

Or you could run in straight away and hope that you hit some trouble and need Zeffy to save you. Which coincidentally is one of our top ten role play situations!

 

As you can probably tell, we are very social but the fun isn’t only limited to celebrities! You can follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr and Google+.

Panna Cotta Paquin

Dessert, Oscar Gold

Despite being trans-Tasman neighbours, it took us a while to meet and befriend Academy Award winner Anna Paquin.

Unlike most of our celebrity friends we connected with her as fans first, while we were visiting our friend/black-market plastic surgery patient Lil Kim on the set of She’s All That. During an altercation after Lil K found out we weren’t licensed plastic surgeons or you know, doctors, Anna swooped in like a mother-goose and hid us in her trailer.

To show our appreciation, we became her personal cooks during the course of filming and our relationship developed to the deep state of love we currently share and has seen us visit and bake her treats on all of her future sets.

Well except for True Blood after I was thrown out for repeatedly draping myself naked in Alexander Skarsgård’s trailer, car, house, bedroom, etc.

She was sweet about it though and to apologise for the awkwardness I made her a batch of Panna Cotta Paquins, which I whipped up yesterday while we discussed the minimal Aus-Zealand nominees this year and our shared hope that Boyhood prevails for Best Picture.

 

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The recipe is an adaptation of a Nigella classic (from Nigellissima) and is smooth, delicate and beautiful. Like Skarsgård…oh, Skarsy! Maybe Anna will be able to get through to him for me?

Enjoy, while I enjoy this.

 

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Panna Cotta Paquin
Serves: 4.

Ingredients
75ml milk
425ml double cream
50g raw caster sugar
1 vanilla pod
3g gelatine

Method
Combine milk, cream and sugar in a saucepan, stirring to ensure the sugar dissolves.

Slice the vanilla pod lengthways and scrape seeds out with a spoon or (carefully) with the tip of a knife. Stir seeds into the milk mixture and then add the emptied pod.

Heat the saucepan over low heat until it is just about the come to the boil (bubbles will form around the edge). Remove move heat, remove vanilla pod and empty half of the mixture into a heatproof jug or bowl.

Vigorously whisk in the gelatine (you could whisk less vigorously if you dissolve the gelatine in water but I can never be bothered and it never turns out poorly). Pour the liquid in the jug back into the saucepan, whisking as you go until it is all combined.

Pour the mixture evenly between 4 dariole moulds or ramekins and refrigerate until set.

Four hours seems to be enough for me, but Nigella suggests overnight and I would never argue with her!

Serve with fruit, berries, caramel or by itself, it doesn’t matter.