🎄Archers thread #122: Deck the Hall with Eddie, Freddie 🎵 'Tis the Season to be jolly (but orange juice for you, Alice)

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

Thank you, @PseudoBadger, for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads.

All views on The Archers welcome here! New blood welcomed. We don't all agree on all points and most of us are posting tongue in cheek a lot of the time, so don't worry about revealing that you love Bert Fry’s poetry (as I do), or other unusual views.

Spoilers: not on this thread, please. We don't wait for the omnibus to discuss the weeknight episodes, but we do try our best to avoid cross-contamination from www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3853783--The-Archers-spoilers-thread-5-Cant-wait-for-7-02pm-Join-us-here, where spoilers are positively welcomed!

For newer listeners, lurkers or those who just have no idea what we're talking about, @DadDadDad has created this useful thread: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/radio_addicts/3557323-For-Archers-fans-a-guide-to-acronyms-on-the-long-running-discussion-threads-and-any-other-meta-thread-questions-you-may-have - BOOP point for him! (See thread for explanation.)

Thanks to @C8H10N4O2 for requesting an annoyingly cheerful thread title which might take us up to Christmas and to @Prestissimo for the title suggestion. I was strongly tempted by @LillianGish’s suggestion: Eddie’s turkeys, Freddie’s show, village green with lights aglow, Stir Up Sunday, Deck the Hall, Merry Christmas one and all - with apologies to Bert Fry and @R4’s suggestion Wassail to the Ambridge Not-A-Panto where Freddie gets nine LESSONS in directing from CAROLe Lynda. Top work, all!

Three days to go until we can return to Ambridge.

My list for Father Christmas

In the next few weeks I’d like:

• Freddie’s show to be a huge success

• Philip and Gavin to be driven out of the village with pitchforks into the waiting arms of the police, and the three ‘horses’ rescued and taken in by kind people who will help them turn their lives around

• Pip to take a perpetual vow of silence and leave for a nunnery

• a terrific Grundy Christmas (although the travails of Alice and Chris will overshadow things)

• Alice to lose the baby, as this seems the least grim option for us listeners; she leaves Chris and makes a fresh start of some kind

What do you all want for Christmas from The Archers?

I've never made mincemeat so I had no idea and neither did the SW
I can't remember when I last ate any. Christmas, presumably.
Thinking about it, it doesn't have a jammy constituency.

The chunks of peel sound a bit grim.

Not really a cake person.

@MikeUniformMike

Shame Leonard isn't the one called Vince - it could be vincemeat

My rogue brain threw up an unfortunate visual image, and now I need brain bleach. (Sorry to lower the tone )

My prediction if Rex doesn't get the council farm, one on the Lower Loxley estate will suddenly lose its tenant - and Rex will end up there. He seemed to have some real chemistry with Lily - and anything to get her away from Russ.

I like that idea, Molly.

I did spend a fraction of a second earlier wondering why Leonard couldn't make his own mincemeat - but I really didn't have the energy to continue ...

Leonard strikes me as someone who would happily buy mincemeat @PoulePouletteEternellement (or, indeed, just ready-made mince pies). Whereas Jill makes everything from scratch and runs a large family farmhouse despite being 90 and living with many younger people who clearly don’t pull their weight. I suppose her big concession recently was giving up the chickens...

Agree @MollyButton there was definitely a suggestion of chemistry between Rex and Lily some time ago - would be good to see that reinstated.

I think most people fall into that category, Prestissimo! I don' tknow many other people who make mincemeat, and not many seem to make mince pies either. Most bought mince pies are made with puff pastry, which I find too rich, or a very sweet crumbly pastry, which I don't care for as much. I make mine with a crisp shortcrust pastry, unsweetened as a contast to the filling.

It's actually extremely easy to make mincemeat - it's mostly just weighing things out and putting them in the mixing bowl. The apples need to be cored, peeled and chopped, but that's not onerous. Oranges and lemons have to be zested, a job I loathe, but my daughter enjoys it and is much better at it than I am, so I usually enlist her for that part. Juice squeezed out. Nutmeg grated in (I like that bit). Make sure the storage jars are spotlessly clean, as with all preserves.

Very little more to it than that. It tastes great, if you like mincemeat (obviously not if you're afflicted with not liking candied peel, like Mike), and you know what's gone into it. Most commercial mincemeat has a lot of suet, sugar and apple and less of the dried fruit and citrus. Artificial spice flavourings sometimes instead of the real thing. Not sure how much real brandy would be included. Mine has lots.

I wasn’t criticising Leonard at all. Just commenting that I don’t think he would ordinarily care enough about mincemeat to do anything other than buy what was readily available. He seems the uncomplaining type to me, and I suspect made an off-the-cuff remark about candied peel, which had given Jill something to fuss over.

I did make mincemeat once, but the result wasn’t great and I think I decided it wasn’t worth the hassle - it joined the long list of things ‘for which there is no time’ once I had small children. I do religiously and enthusiastically make my own mince pies though - I do unsweetened shortcrust on the bottom and puff on the top

I'm sure you're right about Jill. I like Jill, possibly unusually here. She reminds me a lot of my Mum, who is also a fusser, and who is only a little younger. She doesn't make mincemeat, btw.

Puff pastry on top is an interesting idea! I could see that working well.

Ooh yes please to all these mince pies! They sound delicious and I can’t wait for things to move on to the sausage roll chat next.

Talking of Christmas baking, I swung into action at the weekend and did 2 Christmas cakes using my Nana’s recipe from the cookbook that came with the New World has oven she bought in 1953 (it served her until the day she died 49 years later). Over the years we have tarted up the recipe a bit and I don’t think the NW original had the same level of nuts, cherries and brandy that my version had on Sunday! I’m soo looking forward to cutting a slice though we never eat it before January. It usually doubles up as a birthday cake for my Dad who doesn’t mind the snow scene which serves as the backdrop for his candles...

I suspect made an off-the-cuff remark about candied peel, which had given Jill something to fuss over this is my reading of the situation. I have made my own mincemeat when I lived in countries where I was unable to buy it. It is actually incredibly easy and as others have said it’s more the chopping and assembling of ingredients that takes the time. It also makes the house smell heavenly. I’m not a fan of peel at all so I just leave it out - another benefit of making your own. Now I can buy mincemeat at M&S I don’t really bother, but I sometimes tart up the bought stuff with some extra booze and raisins (I find the bought pies are too heavy on the pastry which is why I prefer to make my own - practically open top with just a little star of pastry) I think Jill Archer is someone who would never buy anything ready made and having a large family living with her gives her an excuse to do just that (unlike so many old people who live on their own most of the time like my own mum).As others have observed - fussing is Jill’s raison d’être (spell check just corrected that to raisin d’etre which would really be more appropriate for mincemeat related fussing )

Just to add that I’m far more interested in Jill’s mincemeat making and pondering why she bothers and whether she is doing it right than the metal detecting drama.

I’m a new convert to making my own sausage rolls @Roysnewshirt There’s a lovely butcher nearby where I can get free-range sausage meat, then I make Delia’s quick flaky pastry and they are absolutely delicious. They freeze well so I can scoop one out each morning for the dcs’ packed lunches.

Completely agree that Christmas kitchen pottering is much nicer to listen to than detectorist nonsense.

The mention of Susan as town crier re Chris confiding in her or not made me think - this is one bit of gossip she'd be desperate not to spread about. I wonder if it might cause her a moment's pause and empathy - but then again probably not tbh.

I dozed off when the archaeologists were at Brookfield. Did they find anything of interest?

My maternal grandmother used to make industrial quantities of mincemeat/puddings and cake for the family (she had 9 kids). I dread to think what proof it all was. Looking back I think my grandfather added a lot of brandy to keep all the grandchildren quiet for the Boxing Day 2nd "Christmas" lunch.

I'm the only person here who likes sausage rolls so I rarely make them or buy them. Maybe I might knock a few up for Christmas. My daughter will be here then and she likes them.

@Prestissimo

Agree *@MollyButton* there was definitely a suggestion of chemistry between Rex and Lily some time ago - would be good to see that reinstated.

The 🔮 predicted this a while ago. In the fullness of time it shall come to pass.

Another MysticBore™️ and 🔮 prediction coming up...

this is one bit of gossip she'd be desperate not to spread about.

Yes ... Plenty of drama could be derived from Susan hurtling around the village insistently attempting to stem the flow of gossip about her DIL. And issuing a stern radio tirade against the very concept of gossip.

... Josh will relocate his hen business to Rex's Council Farm.

I have to confess to liking the cheap sainsbury or Aldi mince pies best. I think it is because they don't have a lot of mince meat.

@BoreOfWhabylon

... Josh will relocate his hen business to Rex's Council Farm.

But why, Bore, when Rex is being moved on to make room for Josh at Brookfield?

(Actually it's exactly the sort of topsy-turvy turbulence that Brookfield excels at. No sooner do they spend a million on one scheme than some bright spark amongst them works out they can save two million by spending three million to change everything. )

@MadameButterface

The mention of Susan as town crier re Chris confiding in her or not made me think - this is one bit of gossip she'd be desperate not to spread about. I wonder if it might cause her a moment's pause and empathy - but then again probably not tbh.

But she would go straight to JD!

Gasp, a tiny bit of candied peel is ok. I don't go a bundle on spices. Vanilla is the work of the devil - vanilla ice-cream is ok but no other vanilla anything (although if you didn't refer to is it by using the dreaded pod name, you know what is rather nice).

Not keen on pastry either so mince pies need to have plenty of good filling and not too much pastry.

poor, poor, poor JD, this is really going to hammer her. She's another poor bugger whose festive season memories are mainly sad or traumatic. didn't the Siobhan thing all come out at Christmas?

re mince pies: the Greggs ones are vegan. I love Greggs. who needs stir up Sunday when Greggs exists?