Snack

Coffee El Scrowlands

Australian Survivor, Australian Survivor (2016), Baking, Dessert, Snack, Sweets, TV Recap

Previously on Australian Survivor, 24 Australians were marooned in Samoa where 21 had been voted out leading to what could be the most biege final three in Survivor history.

Thankfully I wasn’t allowed to dwell on this for very long, as we opened up on day 54 where El, Lee and Kristie were already on the way to the final immunity challenge where the producers finally did something right, and brought back fallen comrades.

While I normally love this segment – that Probsty cut from OG Survivor – this just served as another reminder of the wonderful people we could have had sitting in the final three. I mean, Des was hilariously misguided, as was Bianca, Evan never got to tell the cast about his secret career as a drama teacher, Pete … well he would have been a worse option, Barry was loveable, Tegan trained Becks, Rohan rocks a speedo and Kat is just fucking amazing.

Hell, even Andrew would have been more interesting.

Then we went through the darkest timeline where we were reminded that Craig, Phoebe, Conner and Kate were booted back-to-back-to-back-to-back, breaking more hearts than Rohan’s skimpy instagrams.

We obvs recapped the jury but given the fact I am hoping they will provide us with some entertainment later we’ll skip them, ok?

We arrived at the edge of a cliff – sadly not for a suicide pact resulting in Flick getting the title by default – for the most epically staged Hands on a Hard Idol of all time. And that includes watching Mama Kim dominate in Africa.

Before they got around to gripping the pole, JLP pulled out one final twist and whipped out the Final Three’s family. There were tears and proof that El is not the least eloquent person alive, Kristie is the only person left that knows who Richard Hatch is and Lee had major back surgery.

After getting some love, JoJo sent the Final Three over to the edge of the cliff where the tribe had to perch on small, stiff poles and grip an even thicker, harder pole – so yeah, it is completely in my element.

Sadly for the family members, it isn’t a great spectator sport – kind of like cricket, to be honest – and to make matters worse, it went for over 6 hours before El couldn’t go any further and had to be carried away, Bodyguard style (almost) by JLP.

Swoon.

With El out of the way, Kristie got to work making a deal. And by that, point blank told him to give her the challenge and cried … until he did stumble off, either from fatigue or mateship. Let’s be honest, mateship. After winning her first individual challenge, Kristie then appeared to finally snap before Lee apologised to El for ruining their shot at being Australia’s Romber.

Forgoing any form of scrambling, we then arrived at tribal council where the jury were in absolute shock and disbelief to see that Kristie had actually won the final immunity challenge. JoJo gave Lee a rundown of why he and El wouldn’t be voting tonight, before they both had an opportunity to make their case to Kristie. Obviously she gave El – who was actually playing the game – the boot, sending her into my loving arms at loser lodge.

Once again, yeah I’ve been hard on my beaut, mate El – we met in the army where she dobbed in my lewd behaviour, getting me dishonorably discharged – for making this season quite boring … but sometimes the best games are boring to watch (see: One World) and I quickly worked on forgiving her as she arrived for a commiserations cuppa and my favourite, an El Coffee Scrowland.

 

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El and I discovered this recipe on Sweet Perfection Cakes after lamenting the brutal way that – I want to say Arnott’s – removed these beauties from the shelves and ruined lives and the 90s arvo cuppa of Blend 43 my mum and I would share while waiting for my siblings to get home from school.

Yes – I snuck coffee at five, thus being so short. It really does stunt growth, yo.

Despite the fact I’ve tried to tinker with this to make it my own, it is perfection and takes you back to the joys of childhood. Arnotts, bring back my scrolls! And in the meantime, bake these – enjoy!

 

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Coffee El Scrowlands
Makes: 48.
Ingredients
3 cups plain flour, sifted
1 tsp baking powder
225g unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
1 cup muscovado sugar
1 egg, at room temperature
¼ cup small dried black currants
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
3 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp allspice
½ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp salt
375g white chocolate
few drops of red food colouring (the OG recipe called for oil colouring, but I used the generic water based and it worked a treat)

Method
Beat the butter, sugar, vanilla and spices on medium speed until light and fluffy. Reduce speed to low and mix in the egg on low speed. Remove from mixer, fold in the flour and baking powder and return to mixer on low speed until combined. The removal and folding is solely because when I don’t, I flour bomb my own kitchen.

Remove from the mixer and fold through the currants. Roll into a disc, wrap in cling and leave to rest for 30 minutes in fridge and preheat the oven to 160C.

Cut the dough into thirds and roll out between two sheets of baking paper until 5mm thick. Cut into mug sized(-ish) rounds and place on a lined cookie sheet. Repeat the process until all the dough is gone.

Using a spiral egg whisk, press into the top of each biscuit to give the scroll design. Obviously I did not have a spiral whisk so tried my best to be handy. D- for execution, B+ for effort – stay off my back, ok?

Bake for about 15 minutes, or until golden. Remove from the oven and cool on the trays for a couple of minutes before loosening and transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

While they are cooling, melt your chocolate – double boiler, microwave, I don’t mind, do what you think it right – until smooth. Stir through a few drops of food colouring and dollop on to the centre of the biscuits when cooled.

Leave to set. Devour.

 

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Cheece Taylor Burger

Main, Party Food, Snack, Survivor: Millennials vs. Gen X, TV Recap

Previously on Survivor, Taylor continued to get jiggy wit Figgy while the Gen Xers continued to lose immunity challenges. While the majority tried to get rid of Jessica – I assume to help with her eye probs – Ken wanted to save her, so pulled her aside to warn her. She obviously then ran to the majority, pissing dear Kengel off. Despite her misstep, David saved her and idoled out Lucy.

Who? Exactly. Shhh.

The olds arrived back at camp where David was super paranoid for the big move, he theatrically made. While Jessica got her head back in the game and worked to win Ken back over, telling him about the mysterious/ominous legacy advantage, promising it to him in the process.

After last night’s excitement, the olds awoke the next day and immediately commenced a good old fashioned idol search party where once again, David was lucky enough to find the idol. Though to be honest, now that they are hidden in plain site with a tribe symbol on them, once you’ve found one, others should be easy.

Anyway, the tribes then reconvened for a reward challenge – the millennials of course asked who, when Jeff said Lucy was voted out at tribal – where they … wait a minute, this is a damn switch up!

Waiting to recreate the success of Second Chances, Jiffy Pop opted to switch them into three tribes, royally pissing off Michaela who was swap-fucked – let’s be honest, the only person I want to be swap fucked by, is Ken – and ended up with Hannah, Will, Jay, Bret and Sunday as the new Ikabula tribe starting from scratch. Sadly she didn’t flip him off, though positively we can do away with most of the shitty generational references.

We arrived at Ikabula where Bret immediately shot my hope in the foot – does that even make sense, throwing those phrases together … am I Andrew? – talking about gen x, followed by Jay throwing in the requisite millennial reference.

Over on Kengel’s island, Figgy and Taylor were thrilled to still be together, while poor Adam tried to pretend to enjoy the role of third wheel before Kengel took him under his wing, immediately gave Adam a bit of cred and hopefully gave Ken some power.

Well, outside of his powerful beauty.

Meanwhile at Vanua, the tribe were connecting over sunrise except for Michelle who was feeling down about being the only tribe with a millennial disadvantage. Her other youngen Zeke, however, was in his element, connecting with Chris over being Oklahoma boys.

For keeping score, this is the second gay male that Chris has aligned with making him the greatest ally to the LGBT community in the game.

Outside of Kengel’s tight underwear, obvs.

Back with Ikabula, Queen Michaela continued to dominate the confessional game and life in general, building fire for the tribe and sharing her story of determination. Can you feel that? Yep, it is the #WinnersEdit.

And if I’m wrong, I obviously mean winner of my heart edit.

Finally Jiffy returned for the first threeway of the season, where the tribes all had to go down for some buoys, then try and score by tossing their balls into some holes. Despite Sunday getting them off to a horrible start, Ikabula took out the victory thanks to – almost single handedly – Michaela Jordan, with sweet Kengel also getting new Takali over the line.

But given CeCe’s dismal performance – again – and David’s laughable display, which lead to Zeke wondering if he was trying to throw the challenge, was there ever going to be a different outcome?

Back at camp, new Vanua got to scrambling after their manure performance. The Gen Xers hoped to take advantage of their numbers advantage, while Chris was hoping to turn it on CeCe and hopefully make the tribe stronger, pulling in David, Zeke and Michelle. Michelle was still scared though, so tried to work on CeCe … who gave absolutely zero fucks. CeCe then told David that Michelle was trying to get him out, who then considering playing his idol on CeCe to save her.

So yep, the editors succeeded in confusing me by the time they arrived at tribal. Thankfully he was a lot more straightforward than that, with yet another minority female getting the boot as CeCe went to loser lodge for some culinary comfort. I mean sure, she had almost single handedly lost two immunity challenges and deserved the boot … but the fear that Michaela will be the next one voted out due to unintentional racism, simply for being a woman of colour is too much.

Thankfully she is a boss.

So obviously I have been friends with CeCe for years, meeting at the Debbie Allen Dance Academy where I taught her daughter. While we initially clashed, due to her role as stage mom and mine as the vicious teacher with a cold heart, she grew to respect my style and a bond formed. After being booted from the one swap tribe with a Gen X majority, CeCe was pretty upset. However she saw me and a plate of my famed Cheece Taylor Burgers – which we’d eat after dance class in front of her famished daughter as part of my out-of-academy discipline lesson – her mood quickly turned around.

 

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So yes, this is a blatant copy of a McDonald’s cheeseburger but they are insanely delicious – I’m going for a sponsorship gig with Mindy Kaling – so why not?

(If In’n’Out wanted me as a spokesperson though, Maccas would be as dead to me as someone that crossed Abi-Maria).

But honestly, between the cheese, onion, fresh patties, soft bun, ketchup, mustard and most importantly, pickles – how could you really go wrong? Enjoy.

 

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Cheece Taylor Burger
Serves: 6.

Ingredients
500g beef mince
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
¼ tsp onion powder
¼ tsp garlic powder
6 hamburger buns
6 slices American cheese
dill pickles, sliced
1 finely diced onion, soaked in ice cold water and drained just before serving
mustard
ketchup

Method
Place the meat in a large bowl and combine with the salt, pepper and onion and garlic powders. Divide the mixture into six, form into thin patties, wrap in cling and place in the freezer for two hours.

Heat a large frying pan over high heat, remove the patties from the freezer and allow to come to temperature for a couple of minutes. While that is happening, split the rolls and fry the open sides for about twenty seconds, or until browned.

Now this is where is gets specific and it is important to follow this, ok? Place the patties in the pan, season generously and allow to fry for thirty seconds. Press down heavily on the patties for a couple of seconds, before immediately flipping and cooking for a further thirty seconds.

Remove to the bottom of the fried buns and top each with a slice of cheese, top with some ketchup, mustard, a few slices of pickle and some onion.

Close and devour.

 

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Peaches Cobbler

Baking, Cake, Dessert, Sweets

As you should be aware by now, I’ve known most of my celebrity friends for a long, long time and am – not meaning to blow my own trumpet – the reason that 99% of them are even famous/successful.

My dear Merrill aka Peaches, however, is the exception.

You see, I only met Peaches in 2007 when she was playing Big Day Out. Picture it, Gold Coast, 2007 – which I literally just told you. A young, sexy ingenue was killing it on the d-floor of the Boiler Room to Shake Your Tits before collapsing to the ground due from sheer exhaustion from their dance majesty.

That young ingenue, was me.

Peaches quickly sprung into action, I assume due to her pre-fame teaching days, diving of the stage, taking me in her arms and pouring water over my head to wake me up. Side note, that inspired me to travel back in time and write slash choreograph the hit movie Flashdance.

Cutting the set short, Peaches took me backstage to recuperate and we quickly bonded over our mutual love of filthy song lyrics. The following nine years are arguably the best years of my life, as I got to experience the joy of forming such a beautiful friendship.

We both been super busy lately, what with her doing herself, appearing on the (finally) Emmy winning program Orphan Black and releasing a new album and with me, well, being busy, ok, so haven’t been able to see much of each other recently. This almost-milestone date, truly is an absolute blessing.

Now I know that this is only technically my 249th documented catch-up, but I’m just going to pretend this is my moment due to the inconsistent scheduling of Australian Survivor causing problems. Plus, I agreed to catch-up with Peaches when I thought she was going to be the magical 250th visitor, so I needed to treat the occasion like it was.

Plus, Peaches Cobbler is the ultimate party food, so why deny it?

 

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Sweet, rustic and deceptively decadent – the sweet peaches, work beautifully  with the earthy walnuts and the pillowy dough to fill your stomach, and heart, with unending joy.

Plus, you can slather it in ice cream. What is not to love – fruity nuts, dripping in a sweet, white liquid? Enjoy!

 

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Peaches Cobbler
Serves: 4-6.

Ingredients
4 cups peeled, sliced peaches
2 cups raw caster sugar, divided
½ cup water
1 tsp vanilla bean paste
100g walnuts nuts
1 cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
50g muscovado sugar
pinch of sea salt
125g unsalted butter, chilled
vanilla ice cream, to serve

Method
Preheat oven to 180°C.

Combine the sliced peaches, sugar and water in a large saucepan over medium heat and bring to the boil. Once boiling, reduce heat to low and simmer for about ten minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat, stir through the vanilla paste and get cobblin’.

Blitz the walnuts in a food processor for a couple of seconds. Now you can either add all the other ingredients and blitz until the mixture resembles wet sand. Obviously I prefer the hand approach, if you do to decant the roughly blitzed walnuts to a bowl and combine with the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt. Chop the butter into small cubes, add the bowl and rub through the mix … until it resembles wet sand.

Now for the fun – add the peaches and liquid into a small baking dish, grab large balls of the dough and haphazardly place around the top to almost seal it.

Place it in the oven and bake for 20-30 minutes, or until golden, crisp and bubbly.

Remove from the oven and serve immediately, generously topped with ice cream. It may not look best that way, but it certainly makes it taste good.

 

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Ham Webb & Pineapple Pizza

Australian Survivor, Australian Survivor (2016), Main, Party Food, Side, Snack, TV Recap

Previously on Australian Survivor, the alliance annoyed the shit out of Australia for a couple of weeks before Flick dominated, won back my heart and joined with OG Aganoa to vote out Brooke and bring some drama back to the game. Then, of course, we had a non-elimination episode which brought back the boredom. Oh and apparently Sam enjoyed watching El and Lee fall in love on exile and Matt, Flick and Kristie enjoyed the luxury spa reward, though I legit don’t think that was shown.

Anyway, we opened back at the aforementioned spa where the trio plotted the exile crew’s downfall over bruschetta. Considering I made Brookechetta but a few days ago, I assume they are leftovers.

Matt thankfully made himself disappear, allowing Kristie and Flick to cement their twosome and plot the best way for them to play the middle and snag the win. Honestly, how awful would any of the others be as winners? Exactly.

Over on exile, Sam and Lee were very wet before Lee then grabbed Sam’s butt. I mean I hate them as players, but this is the love story I want to see slash would pay a lot of money to watch on the internet.

Sadly they took a break from forcing El to third wheel and went to the seventeenth straight reward challenge where the exile throuple were completely fine having slept on the sand in the rain, thanks for asking and Kristie felt strange about waking up in a bed.

Thankfully the challenge was a smutty dream, with the castaways split into teams and having to pour coconut water into each other’s mouth and spit it into a jar. As you’d expect, Sam was able to fill Lee’s hungry mouth, time and time again, with him never wasting a drop of Sam’s sweet nectar … securing them and El an advantage at the next immunity challenge.

The tribe returned to camp where Lee and El started talking about their relationship, breaking both my and Sam’s heart in the process. I’m obviously not bitter but El is dead to me. I just can’t. Not even. No.

While they were off canoodling, Matt decided to make himself useful and spoke to Sam about voting out one of the duo. Which if Sam is as jealous as I am, and we know he is, he will. After the Bachelor segment ended, we checked in with Kristie who was confused and anxious about who to go with, without realising she would beat anyone left at final tribal. She then broke down and got the pep talk Lee gives me in my dreams. Flick then channelled Kylie by spilling all the goss to El and Lee, however unlike Kylie, Flick was using this as leverage rather being a pawn.

Again, she or Kristie need to win.

We then dropped by the immunity challenge where the castaways had to balance on a triangle in the ocean, with Sam and the lovers getting to start the challenge ten minutes later after winning reward. After a lengthy battle – well, excluding Queen Flick – Lee was able to outlast his ex-boyfriend and current squeeze to win immunity.

They returned to camp where Matt continued to display a lack of awareness but at least knew to target El, Sam continued to quietly follow Matt’s lead – I assume trying to process what exactly the plan was. Meanwhile Lee and El plotted to split the vote with the girls to get out Sam, while the girls then tried to weigh up which was their best option. Kristie and Lee then went for one of their delightful odd couple discussions, where she threw Flick and Matt under the bus, spooking Lee and causing him to – can it truly be – play the game a little bit.

Lee then ran to El, who ran to Flick confusing me as they headed off to tribal where Brooke was looking well pissed from the jury. Matt then opened up tribal giving JoJo a rundown of the schedule for the rest of the game before El stepped up and announced that she would be voting for Sam, who then briefly touched on the fact he had finally started to do what he voted that villainous Nick out of the game for.

After a lengthy back and forth, Lee finally realised he still had his advantage and blocked Sam’s vote – once and for all ending their romance – before the girls ultimately stuck with Leel / Ellee and sent Sam out of the game.

While I question whether Sam had any idea about the game he was playing, we are actually close friends in the real world … where I obviously take advantage of his good nature and skim money from his charity.

The one upside of him not have a great understanding of Survivor, is that he arrived at the Jury Villa with a positive mood. So positive I wasn’t sure if he understood that he had been voted out. Thankfully I had a fresh Ham Webb & Pineapple Pizza on hand for us to devour while I explained to him that he was no longer in the competition.

 

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You may draw conclusions from the fact that I’ve made Sam a pizza that is usually the favourite of children and his intelligence in the game – but we are friends, so I won’t make that inference … just leave you to make it.

At the end of the day though, ham and pineapple pizza is pretty damn amazing, particularly with the addition of chilli. If this is what you get for being dim, sign me up for a lobotomy.

Enjoy!

 

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Ham Webb & Pineapple Pizza
Serves: 1, maybe 2 in a pinch.

Ingredients
1 pizza base, use Zsa Zsa’s recipe darling
4 pineapple rings
1 tbsp chilli flakes
250g leg ham, roughly sliced
½ cup grated mozzarella

Method
Preheat oven to 200°C.

Heat a skillet over high heat and fry the pineapple rings on both sides until caramelised, a couple of minutes maximum. Remove from heat and roughly chop up into caramelised chunks of wonder.

Prepare the base as per the Zsa Zsa recipe, sprinkle over the chilli flakes and top generously with the ham and pineapple. Sprinkle over the cheese and bake for 15-20 minutes or until it is golden and molten. Devour quickly to eat your feelings.

 

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Lucy Huangs

Main, Party Food, Poultry, Side, Snack, Survivor: Millennials vs. Gen X, TV Recap

Previously on Survivor, Ken. Ken was a babe.

Oh and Hannah lacked basic social awareness, David found an idol and the newest cast member Lucy, joined the underdogs – aka Kengel and friends – with Sunday and Jessica and blindsided Paul.

Obviously we arrived back at camp with the olds where Chris developed some sass as Jess tried to explain the situation. For those keeping tracking, Jess was like Hannah … but fractionally more aware. Then the biggest twist ever on Survivor happened, with Lucy getting a confessional before cornering Chris and Bret (and his cahrds) about joining forces to take out Jess.

Meanwhile the kids – millennials and literal baby goat – were playing around camp before Adam found a clue to the hidden immunity idol and I think cried. I didn’t have much time to figure it out as before I knew it, we ended up in the middle of the ocean for my favourite – and most sexually aggressive – reward challenge with Jiffy Pop.

To make it more exciting than the usual ball play, the tribes had to go for the ring and pull each other offover to their pole. As is usually the case, the challenge was completely insane, with Chris trying to dislocate Jay’s shoulder, Taylor awkwardly screamed at people, Ken was dreaming and dominant … but let’s be honest despite the millennials loss, the winner of this challenge was Michaela who took her top off to win the point.

Oh and wave that wiped out Jeff Probst. You know what that was? Mother nature giving you life.

We followed the kids back to camp where everyone, rightly, was congratulating Michaela for getting out the girls before Adam actually found the idol and proceeded to break our hearts as he broke down about his mother’s terminal lung cancer. I may be the worst but Adam still completely broke my heart.

Back at the olds, Lucy continued to leap into the spotlight wandering around camp telling everyone what to do. It pissed off Kengel and that is more than enough for me. To quote everyone’s favourite drug cheat Crystal Cox – forget you, go home, goodbye.

Before I got the chance to tell her to eat her rice, we arrived at the immunity challenge which involved some obstacles, a window washing cage and a word puzzle where after reminding me Michelle existed, the millennials managed a come from behind win.

The olds arrived back at camp to commence scrambling, where Chris and Lucy  opted to target Jess – maybe to help her get her eyes sorted – while The Hottie and the Nottie wanted to take out the newest dictator Lucy. But don’t worry about me calling her that, she likes to be hated. Jess then ran to Lucy to spill the beans to the person targeting her, much to Kengel’s chagrin. David then started talking about the idol and I was crazy confused by the time we arrived at tribal.

Bret and Chris were still salty from the last tribal before Lucy then started to chastise Kengel again – of course Jeff was going to defend our man, #ThroupleGoals – before Kengel gave Jess the ultimate smackdown for not trusting him … via stare.

David then decided to take centre stage and make a questionable move by playing his idol on Jessica, negated the five votes against her and sending my dear, cantankerous Lucy to my loving arms at loser lodge.

You know how I am insanely talented, successful and famous? Yeah – I owe all of that to my dear friend and militant life coach, Lucy. When I couldn’t be bothered doing an assignment, Lucy was there to berate me into completing it. When I was missed deadlines, she was there smacking me across the back of the head until my writer’s block passed.

I fucking love her. As much as we both love my Lucy Huangs.

 

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With more bite than everyone’s – outside of her family – tiger mum, this wings are everything you want when you’re feeling down. Mainly because the kick of heat and the delicate chicken are the perfect accompaniment for booze.

Plus, they are crazy messy which you just know would piss off Lucy /  send you into an existential crisis about how much of a disaster you are after that second bottle of wine is opened.

Just me? Cool. Enjoy!

 

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Lucy Huangs
Serves: 4-6.

Ingredients
1kg chicken wings, tips removed with drumettes and flats separated
salt and pepper, freshly ground
¾ cup cornflour
2 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
½ cup Frank’s hot sauce
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper

Method
Preheat oven to 200°C.

Grab the wings out of the fridge for about 30 minutes to take the chill out. While that is happening, combine the cornflour with a good whack of salt and pepper in a large bowl. Once the wings are less chill, toss them in cornflour mix and place on a wire rack set over a lined baking sheet. Drizzle with oil and chuck them in the oven to bake for about 45 minutes, or until golden and crispy.

Meanwhile, melt the butter in a small saucepan over low heat and whisk in the hot sauce, cayenne and a good whack of salt and pepper until combined. Remove to a large enough bowl for coating purposes.

When the wings are done, remove them from the oven, toss through the sauce and devour, slathered in blue cheese dressing.

 

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Brookechetta Jowett

Australian Survivor, Australian Survivor (2016), Party Food, Side, Snack, TV Recap

Previously on Australian Survivor, we continued to be told there were divisions in the tribe only for the alliance to stick together and boot our latest queen JL, leaving Kristie as our last remaining hope.

Thankfully the tribe arrived back at camp where my JL’s comments finally seemed to be making headway, with Flick starting to seriously talk about turning on her allies. Could today be our lucky day? Could it?! An episode with actual gameplay, where people don’t just ride out their time accepting the status quo?!

They awoke the next morning with Flick still seething, immediately making her my second favourite person as she talks about turning on Brooke. TBH, how Flick hasn’t been my favourite thus far given her killer deathies is beyond me.

Queen Kristie then dropped by to remind me why, giving a kookie confessional and clearly articulating her game while channelling Crazy Eyes.

Wanting to give me some excitement for when the alliance doesn’t splinter, JLP arrived for the reward challenge which required the boneheaded men to stand shirtless and flex their pecs. I zoned out on some nip and before I knew it, Dim Sam won reward and opted to share his reward – a bed – with Lee.

Boys, you sure know how to win me back! Brooke, however, wasn’t as titillated.

Matt and Brooke then watched as the boys tried out their bed, played around with their skimpy new undies and spooned. I used to hate them for being stupid and so-dominant-that-the-game-was-boring respectively, now I hate them as I wish I was them watching that.

While the boys relaxed post coitus – let me dream – Brooke then got in on the flipping act and pulled Flick aside to discuss voting out Lee and El. Anywho, Brooke then made her riskiest move of the game and spoke to Sam about voting off his lover or El. Sam, surprisingly, made the smart point that booting El was the best option, as Lee would still be around to take the target off them.

That or he’d turn on them. I’m just proud that Sam seems to be thinking. Or just trying to keep his snuggle buddy – which if that is the case, I’m ok.

Not wanting to be outdone, Flick went back into attack mode and approached El about blindsiding Brooke which would actually be a major blindside and the thought makes me so happy. Like Craig and Phoebe still being here, happy.

Lee then gave us an amazing filler clip, modelling his new jocks while Sam spoke wistfully about not wanting to break up their relationship before they stripped off and got into bed together. They then gave each other permission to pursue other options. Seriously, this isn’t even my erotic novelisation of the episode – THIS IS HAPPENING.

Imaging if Kengel was here?!

Jealous El then whisked Lee away to break the news that the man he just woke up next to and Brooke were planning on taking him out, making him invoke his favourite word mateship like he is Mel Gibson in Gallipoli. Thankfully he reminded himself that this is a game that only one person can win, jumped on board and went to Queen Kristie to secure the numbers. Obvs, she was keen.

The editors can’t be leading me that far astray right? Something is actually happening tonight?!

We finally arrived at the immunity challenge where Sam gloated about bedding my man and Brooke was cocky about winning again. Thankfully JLP then introduced what is quite possibly the hardest house of cards challenge, with the stacks having to be built on a rotating platform they had to told steady with a rope. Continuing in the episode’s tradition of the men finally competing, Lee won the challenge, foiling Brooke’s plan in the process.

The tribe returned to camp where they actually commenced scrambling again, with Flick relishing her role as the swing vote, Brooke confident the jury would love watching El get voted out before Matt got scared Flick was playing them and then arrogant that El would be going. The OG Aganoans then went for a walk to discuss the chances of Flick actually voting with them before rehearsing for tribal council and how to hide their blindside from LaPaglia.

We finally arrived at tribal where JoJo worked hard to test Lee’s rehearsal before Brooke threw herself under the bus with her brutal talk. Flick continued to well and truly win me back over, while Matt continued to be a snivelling fail, El was sick of beating around the bush and Kristie was just glad that she didn’t have friends so they couldn’t turn on her.

Everyone was confident heading into the vote where the impossible happened, the alliance cracked and my dear friend Brooke – we’re both v. important in the social media world, remember when I went viral? – was blindsided.

While I’ve had a lot to say – quite aggressively – about how boring the last few episodes have been, it truly came down to how dominantly Brooke was playing the game – she kept her numbers tight and sadly, the boots obvious.

So yes, I’ve been angry with her for my boredom’s sake, but I still welcomed her to the Jury Villa with open arms – hiding my joy that someone else started to play the game – and a plate full of my famous Brookechetta Jowett.

 

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Like the feeling you get when you watch an episode with actual strategy after suffering through a series of obvious boots, bruschetta is a beautiful palate cleanser. Fresh, a little tart, sweet and crunchy, it is the perfect argument for why toast – which let’s be honest, this is – should never be discounted.

Kind of like Kristie – enjoy!

 

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Brookechetta Jowett
Serves: 4-6.

Ingredients
6 very ripe roma tomatoes
¼ cup basil leaves
2 tsp champagne vinegar
¼ teaspoon caster sugar
olive oil
loaf of sourdough, sliced into thick slices
2 garlic cloves
Salt and pepper

Method
Cut the ends off the tomatoes, squeeze out the pips and roughly chop into a small dice – trust your judgement / personal preferences on the size.

Mix the tomato, basil, vinegar and sugar in a small bowl with a tablespoon of oil. Season generously and leave to stew.

Meanwhile toast all of the bread – either under the grill or obviously in the toaster. As soon as it toasted to your preferences, slice the cloves of garlic in half and rub the open side onto the toast and drizzle lightly with oil.

Spoon the tomato mixture on top. Devour.

 

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JL Salkeld Caramel

Australian Survivor, Australian Survivor (2016), Condiment, Dessert, Snack, Sweets, TV Recap

Previously on Australian Survivor, the alliance continued to be led by a dominant trio while Matt lacked the self awareness/respect to see that JL was speaking the truth and that he was well and truly on the bottom – not in a good way – before poor Sue found her way out of the game and into the jury.

We arrived back at camp where Matt continued to be deluded, JL scared for her ever more precarious position and Kristie pissed to have received 4/9 votes. Surely that means we are in for a blindside tonight, right?!

Lol – the ads said it, so no.

In the words of my dear Celine Dion, a new day has come and we opened up with the contingent who have never seen an episode going fishing before Lee opened up to Kristie that he was forced to write her name down because that is what his alliance wanted. Thankfully Kristie is aware that this is a game for half a million dollars and knew that this was a possibility and stayed quiet.

At this point, if anyone other than Kristie wins (or Brooke, as the most likeable of the trio), the season is a waste.

Kristie then approached JL, knowing that since they are the only two – outside of Brooke – with a brain, that they need to make a move and convince the idiots to do something – ANYTHING – to save what started out as a promising season.

Thankfully the power trio then started talking to JL about the fact that they would have to start turning on people – aka the basic premise of Survivor – giving me hope. Misplaced hope probably, but hope nonetheless.

Sam then decide to take a leaf out of that evil snake Nick’s book and commenced plotting the downfall of El and Lee, aka two of his four closest allies … leading to old Saanapu proclaiming that literally doing the bare minimum, is the biggest move of Survivor in all time.

Remember when Craig, Phoebe and even – I hate myself – Andrew were in the game? Who would have thought Andrew was part of the gold old days era?!

We arrived at the immunity challenge where Flick acknowledged that they have to vote people out and JL noted she is fucked if she doesn’t win. So obviously, she didn’t win – Brooke did – but more shockingly Dim Sam was smart enough to do well in an intelligence/memory challenge.

Sam.

Sam Webb with a half-sleeve tattoo of a web like it is witty.

Yep.

The tribe arrived back at camp to commence scrambling, however considering the dominant alliance all applauded and congratulated Brooke upon her victory, it was looking more likely that JL’s promise to not go down without a fight, will still end up with her going down.

Aside, remember Kat? So great. Her hat was more strategic than half the remaining cast.

Two that were smarter than her hat, JL and Kristie, went to find a way out of their hole by playing up their pawn status, Flick and Brooke were feeling bad about having to turn on El and Lee to win – although highly likely, NOT TODAY – and JL told El that she needed to do something if she wants to win.

We then arrived at tribal where JL continued to call out the tribal dynamics and position herself as a valuable number. Lee and Brooke then scoffed at the money, begging the question why the hell do you play if you don’t want to win? Matt then pretended he knows about strategy, El made me pray for that blindside and Lee edged towards losing my love completely and Flick took JL’s bait and announced that their is a smaller alliance within the boring alliance, hopefully waking up El and Lee.

Sadly, despite all of her hard work and Flick’s massive misstep, JL found her way out of the game and into my loving arms.

As we are both Queensland based writers, JL and I have enjoyed a close relationship for many years after meeting at law school where I was mock Annalise-ing my way through a scam. Yes I was found out, but JL is kind, loyal and knows that building friendships with story generators is good for a writer, so we remained very close. The only thing sweeter than our friendship is my Jennah-Louise aka JL Salkeld Caramel … which is coincidentally, what I made her to dull the pain of joining the jury and celebrate her status as the last remaining Vavau.

 

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There is truly nothing better than a salted caramel. I mean, pause, think about it …

Welcome back! How amazing is it? Sweet, salty and smooth – it is life affirming and delicious and uplifts everything it touches.

Hyperbole? Never – try it and see for yourself. Enjoy!

 

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JL Salkeld Caramel
Makes: 500mL … ish. Well technically I guessed the size of the jar, it could be a tablespoon given my spacial awareness.

Ingredients
2 cups raw caster sugar
180g unsalted butter, at room temperature and diced
1 cup heavy cream, at room temperature
1 tbsp maldon salt

Method
Melt the sugar over medium-high heat in a medium, heavy bottomed saucepan, stirring minimally. Every recipe calls for something different at this stage, but I get too paranoid it will burn if I don’t stir, so do what feels right?

Once the sugar has dissolved, let it bubble away until it turns an amber colour, at which point add the butter and whisk like crazy. It will steam, spit and get angry – kind of like me at any given moment – but in the words of Dory, just keep whisking … until all the butter is combined.

Remove the caramel from the heat, slowly adding the cream – again while whisking, avoiding the rage of the caramel. Stir until combined before whisking in the salt.

Set aside to cool for about half an hour before decanting into a jar / your mouth.

No judgement.

If you refrigerate, you’ll need to heat it – very carefully – before use.

 

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