Grey’s Anatomy

Sandra Dohnuts

Baking, Dessert, Golden Globe Gold, Golden Globe Gold: Goldy Bird, Snack, Sweets

Just like that we’ve arrived at the end of this year’s Golden Globe Gold celebration, Goldy Bird and are ready to see whether my bets will pay literal dividends or whether I will need to assume a new identity and disappear again. But let’s not worry about that because after catching up with the divine Ryan, Katey, Rich, Diane and Gael, we’re wrapping things up with icon, queen and this year’s nominee slash host slash my dear friend, Sandra Oh.

I’ve known Sandy for close to two decades after meeting on the set of The Princess Diaries. I was part of Mandy’s entourage at the time but I quickly bonded with Sandra given she is extremely delightful, charming and I knew she was destined for greatness.

Despite the fact I introduced Sand and her ex-husband, I took her under my wing, introduced her to Alexander Payne and then encouraged her to audition for a little show called Grey’s Anatomy.

Needless to say, she is grateful for the way I shaped her career.

Sandra was super stressed as we caught up, busy perfecting the final Globes script with my boy Andy Samberg and getting set for their moment in the sun. Given two of my friends are co-hosting, it goes without saying I haven’t been this proud since the Tina and Amy years.

Given how busy she is, I didn’t want to waste to much of her time so we quickly sat down to run the final odds of the season. Obviously she downplayed her chances for Best Actress in Drama, predicting it is Julia’s to lose – I know Sandy is winning though – while we both agreed that Matthew Rhys will take Best Actor, Penelope Cruz will take Best Supporting Actress and Pose will snatch Best Drama.

With that, I now hand things over to the globes while Sand and I sit in her dressing room preparing for the final show and smashing some Sandra Dohnuts.

 

 

Pillowy dough covered in sticky, sweet ganache and a healthy layer of sprinkles? They may not be classy, but damn are they perfect.

Enjoy!

 

 

Sandra Dohnuts
Serves: 6.

Ingredients
100g butter
¼ cup raw caster sugar
3 eggs
1 cup milk, plus 2 tbsp for the glaze
½ tsp vanilla extract, plus 2 tsp for the glaze
3 ¼ cups plain flour
4 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
150g icing sugar
4 tbsp cocoa powder
½ cup sprinkles

Method
Preheat the oven to 160°C.

In a large bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar together until light, pale and fluffy. With the mixer still on, add the eggs, one at a time allowing to mix after each addition, and the milk and vanilla, mixing until combined. Still mixing, add in the baking powder and salt until just combined – it may look a bit curdled, but relax.

Remove from the mixture and fold in the flour until just combined, making sure not to overmix.

Transfer batter into a piping bag and pipe into a doughnut pan. If you don’t have a pan you can try and pipe them into circles – they may not look perfect, but they’ll taste it!  Bake for 8-10 minutes, or until golden and fluffy.

Remove the doughnuts from the oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool. Repeat the process until the batter is done.

While they’re all chilling, sift together the sugar and cocoa powder in a medium bowl and slowly stir in the milk and vanilla until a smooth, pourable glaze forms. Pour over the chilled donuts and sprinkle, with the sprinkles.

Leave to set, then devour.

 

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Riza Weil Pudding

Dessert, Oy with the turkeys already!, Snack, Sweets

If I ever got involved in hardcore, life-enveloping BDSM akin to 50 Shades of Beige it would come down to the beautiful aggression of Paris Geller and that all comes down to the wonderful performance of my dear friend Liza Weil in the role.

While ASP based Luke’s cantankerous spirit on me, she blessed Paris with most of my (at time terrifying) other qualities and when it came time to cast the role I knew that Liza was the only one we should cast.

I first met Liz when she guested on The Adventures of Pete and Pete where I was working to get both Pete’s recast to sexier gingers to help launch the Red Hot Project years earlier. While I was unsuccessful and sadly can’t lay claim to the thirst inducing calendars, I did gain a lifetime friend and punishing life coach in the form of Liza.

After all is said and one with the Thanksgiving mainstage, you need something a little sweet to fill that remaining gap in your stomach to ensure you’re adequately engorged … which again, is exactly how I would describe Paris.

You know she is too much, you know it will be punishing but you stick with her anyway as that is what makes life great. Coincidentally my Riza Weil Pudding also makes life great.

 

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Creamy, sweet and spicy, it is everything you need to tide you over before dessert.

Oh … you thought this was dessert? No my dears, no.

No. This is dessert entree – enjoy!

 

riza-weil-pudding-2

 

Riza Weil Pudding
Serves: 4-6.

Ingredients
¾ cup uncooked white rice (for creamier pudding use short or medium grain rice)
2 cups milk, divided
⅓ cup raw caster sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
⅔ cup raisins
2 apples, peeled cored and diced
1 egg, beaten
1 tbsp butter
½ tsp vanilla extract

Method
Bring 1 ½ cups water to boil in a large saucepan. When bubbling away, add in the rice and stir. Reduce heat, cover and simmer for 20 minutes. Drain.

Place the drained rice into a fresh, large saucepan with 1 ½ cups of milk, the sugar, cinnamon, apple, raisin and a pinch of salt and cook over medium heat for fifteen minutes.

Whisk the remaining milk and egg together, stir into the mixture and cook for a couple of minutes.

Remove from the heat and stir through butter and vanilla, serve immediately and devour.

 

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Edward Berrcann Pull Apart

Dip, Oy with the turkeys already!, Party Food, Side, Snack

Oy, how my heart is breaking.

I was watching Kate McKinnon’s SNL cold open over the weekend, thinking I couldn’t possibly sob harder this week. Then I went back to visit Ed Herms one last time – I guess I just wasn’t expecting it to hurt as much as it did.

I’ve known Ed since the 70s, after meeting on the set of The Great Gatsby where I was involved in an affair with a strapping young chap by the name of Sam Waterston – fun fact, our relationship inspired his later show Grace & Frankie.

When the relationship ended in disaster, I caused a massive scene on set and it was Ed who stepped in, stopped me from getting kicked out and took me under his wing. That my friends, was the beginning of a beautiful friendship that lasted until his final breath.

Not wanting to arouse … suspicion and let him know how the future turns out – butterfly effect and all that … and by that, I hope that by not telling him the movie will be erased from history – I travelled back to the GG set during filming of the classic A Deep Fried Korean Thanksgiving.

It was such a treat to spend that little bit more time with him and celebrate filming a special episode for our favourite holiday together – I was an extra in Jackson’s family – and be reminded of the kind, loving presence he brought to set and, more importantly, my life.

Despite me worrying about how it would impact his health, I opted to stick with our old favourite for when he’d sit me down for a scotch to offer life advice, my Edward Berrcann Pull Apart.

 

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So yes, there is more than enough cheese in this little beauty to clog your arteries and bowel, and send your cholesterol through the roof. Well … maybe. I mean, I may be a doctor, but I am definitely not qualified. But how can you go past a shit tonne of cheese and bacon to simultaneously dull the pain of losing your friend and celebrate his beautiful life.

Exactly. Give thanks. Enjoy!

 

edward-berrcann-pull-apart-2

 

Edward Berrcann Pull Apart
Serves: 1 Gilmore. 4-6 normals.

Ingredients
250g smoked bacon, diced
2 onions, diced
2 cloves of garlic, finely minced
1 tsp dried chilli flakes, optional … because you’re probably sick of me constantly using
chilli
115g butter, at room temperature
1 tbsp thyme leaves
1 cup vintage cheddar, grated
1 cup mozzarella, grated
cob loaf
handful chopped fresh parsley, to serve

Method
Preheat the oven to 180C.

Heat a large frying pan over medium heat and cook the bacon, stirring, until golden and crisp, or about five minutes. Add the bacon, garlic and chilli flakes and cook for a further five minutes. Reduce heat to low and gently cook, stirring for a further fifteen minutes, or until soft and juicy. Remove from the heat.

Add the thyme, butter and a good whack of salt and pepper to the frying pan, stir and leave to sit for about fifteen minutes.

Meanwhile, carve a 3 cm cross-hatch pattern into top of the loaf, stopping about half a centimetre from the base. Transfer the loaf to a lined baking sheet.

Stir the cheeses – leaving some for the top – through the bacon mixture and spoon generously into all of the slits. Push it back together as tightly as possible, despite it being a losing battle, top with the reserved cheeses and bake for about twenty minutes, or until golden and bubbly.

Garnish with parsley, you know, to make it healthy and devour.

 

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Lemon Merrin Dungey Pie

Baking, Dessert, Pie, Sweets

When I first met Merrin Dungey – aka Mezza – she was cracking jokes with some of the lower members of the cast of Deep Impact. Despite being quite the high roller on set as T’s best-friend, I was drawn to her infectious joy and decided to take her under my wing.

Let me tell you, Mez is just what the doctor ordered – I feel joyous again!

Jubilant even.

Mez has long been someone I’ve relied on to lift my mood and in exchange, I’ve lifted her up the Hollywood ladder. After Deep Impact, I quickly introduced her to Sorks and got her a brief role on The West Wing, landed her a part with my – and I guess the world’s – Friends and bounced her too Chrissie Apps on Jesse before landing her the big fish that was Alias opposite my then boyfriend Bradley Cooper.

It had been a couple of years since we last caught up – I may have caused a scene on the set of Trophy Wife when she was guesting and was scared I had embarrassed her. Thankfully, I hadn’t but sadly that meant I had to struggle with my mood these last few years.

Mezza is trying to relax and make the most of her free time before reporting to the set of her new show, Conviction, so was down to party and bring the joy … which she did.

As did my Lemon Merrin Dungey Pie.

 

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I like my lemon curd like I like to act to attract men – tarty, smooth and soft and warm inside. Add the culinary equivalent of Merrin / valium, pastry, and a generous dollop of mallowy meringue and you’ve got the perfect dessert to eat away your feelings.

Enjoy!

 

lemon-merrin-dungey-pie-2

 

Lemon Merrin Dungey Pie
Serves: 8.

Ingredients
Pastry
1 ½ cups plain flour
2 tbsp icing sugar mixture
125g butter, chilled, coarsely chopped
2 ½ tbsp iced water

Filling and meringue aka all the rest
Lemon Kurd Cobain
1 cup cold water
¼ cup cornflour
8 large eggs, whites only
⅔ cups sugar
¼ teaspoon coarse salt

Method
In a larger bowl, sift the flour and icing sugar together. Using your fingertips, rub the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles wet sand. Add the water and mix with your hands until it just comes together … just.

Shape into a 2cm thick disc, wrap in cling and refrigerate for half an hour.

Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Remove the dough from the fridge and roll out until it is about 5mm thick, lay the dough in a 23cm pie dish, trim excess, line with baking paper and return to the fridge for half an hour.

Then add pastry weights and bake for 15 minutes … and then remove the pastry weights and baking paper and bake for a further 15 minutes, or until golden and crisp. Set aside to cool completely.

That was kind of militant right now, wasn’t it? Sorry.

Anyway, while the crust is cooling, get to work on the curd. Start by whisking together the water and cornflour, then go to the recipe and when it calls for the butter add the cornflour slurry.

Rather than chilling the curd, pour it straight into the crust, smoothing over with the back of a spoon and chill in the fridge for 3-5 hours – the pie, not you – or until it is set.

About half an hour before you’re over the pie chilling preheat the oven to 180°C … again.

While the oven is warming up for you, combine the whites, sugar and salt in a large, dry bowl of an electric mixer and whisk on high until stiff peaks form. Layer the meringue on the pie, sealing in the curd, and bake for about 5-10 minutes, or until the meringue starts to brown.

You could always use a blowtorch in lieu of the oven but I don’t, and nor should anybody else, trust me with a blowtorch.

Either way, once you’re done devour and feel happiness again.

RIP *spoiler* from OITNB.

 

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No more bad Francies

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner

After being thoroughly disappointed by the world for most of last week (until Jay Z dropped by), followed by 13 hours spent watching OITNB season 4 which culminated in a horrific kick to the guts in the second last episode – seriously, I am still llorando – I decided that I needed to focus on the positive and bring a little bit of joy in the world.

But seriously, how fucked up was the end of episode 12?

Anyway, I have decided to become the personification of valium and bring joy, or at the very least a feeling of strange calm, to everyone on the planet.

As I am still reeling from Orlando and the culmination of the fictional prison overcrowding/under-trained guard perfect storm, I wanted to catch-up with someone that brings an infectious joy to my life (rather than infectious disease, FYI) so gave the dear Merrin Dungey a call.

What says while your turn as Ursula made me uncomfortable it will never take away from your majesty on the one-two punch that are Alias and the egregiously Emmy snubbed Summerland?

Picture source: Still from Alias.

 

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+.