🏘️ Archers thread #129: Casey, Macy, Lily, Alice – Decent types or full of malice? Discuss The Archers here.

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

Thank you, @PseudoBadger, for kicking off this long, long series of Archers threads, which has now passed 125,000 posts! (See below for further details.)

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 lust after Russ, or other unusual things.

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/4197199--The-Archers-spoilers-thread-6-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.)

For the thread title I was very tempted to go with @R4's title suggestion of Come follow the exploits of Brine, Lily, Elizabeth, Usha, Ruari, George and Helen. Know collectively as bleurgh. because on the last thread @DadDadDad, our invaluable statistician, identified a post from @ILoveShula as the 125,000th. Many of us felt it was fitting that the post simply said Bleurgh!.

However, feeling that was a bit niche for the casual listener, I adapted @MayIDestroyYou's title suggestion in the end. Thanks, MIDY!

Back to Ambridge this week, after our enjoyable sojourn at Lower Loxley last week! Will we go with Alice to rehab? (Hope not.) Will the petulant Adam make good his threat to leave Home Farm? (Hope so.) What will Jennifer say? (Lots, I hope, and preferably to Brian.) Will the fete be a triumph? (Of course it will.) Will we ever return to Brookfield, or have they all fallen unnoticed into the slurry pit? (Let's hope Pip did, anyway.) WHERE IS PAT? (Can't answer this one.)

Over to you!

I eat lots of veg, but other than carrots, I'm not mad on root vegetables. They are ok in moderation. I like celeriac. Parsnips and jerusalem artichokes, I'd rather avoid. Beetroot is ok occasionally - but I wouldn't choose to eat it.

I grow veg but don't bother with root veg, although I grow some for their decorative value - both types of artichokes.

This year the leeks and spring onions bolted and I have some amazing flowers. The bees love them. The leek flowers are huge.

I don't get the fuss about butternut squash. There are tastier squashes.

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g

Parsnip bake might be less offputting. I like parsnips. Delia Smith's parsnip roulade is very good.

So Ruairi is off to London if he gets the grades. UCL, KCL, LSE, Imperial, QMC, Goldsmiths, City, Westminster, somewhere else? Subject?

Wasn't there a conversation a few months aho between Ruairi and Ben in wjich Ruairi said he didn't intend wasting time on university, but was intending to do something entrepreneurial & lucrative? What was unspecified.

A mandatory part of out Christmas dinner is parsnips wrapped in bacon. We don't have any fewer pigs-in-blankets as a result, we just end up fuller.

I'm struggling to remember what tonight's episode was about. Ben has been accepted on to his nursing course, he and Ruari were gatecrashing somewhere. Did anything else happen?

Ian is agonising about Adam who was stupid enough to say he was on the phone to Lee at a time when Helen blithely confirmed he was watching Peaky Blinders with her. Ian thinks Adam is having an affair. This will run and run because nobody in Ambridge asks anyone else a straight question.

I love bacon, but I'm not keen on things wrapped in bacon. We have Parmesan parsnips at Christmas. Talking of which, saw a Christmas tree advert on TV earlier.

I love parsnips and almost all vegetables but I think passing any vegetable off as pasta is just wrong! Completely unacceptable.

If Alice had access to her mobile she would have been able to order a taxi via an Uber type app. No cash required.

I can’t believe Brian won’t get a penny back after she left a few days into the (6 week?) programme.

Poor Lee will be in both Helen’s and his new BFF Ian’s bad books when they finding out he was keeping Adumb’s secret from them.

@CaptainMyCaptain

I love parsnips and almost all vegetables but I think passing any vegetable off as pasta is just wrong! Completely unacceptable.

Are you dissing my recipe?

Mmm, parsnips wrapped in bacon. Looking forward to trying that.

Many decades ago I was impressed by a recipe (in a diet plan in some women's magazine), which was an ordinary lasagne, but with the pasta replaced with poached cabbage leaves.

As to TA, I don't seem to have anything to say about it atm. It was Kate in the Spitfire (so to speak). There was a note in her voice that I had previously been part of her characterisation of Kate's voice.

I'm very fond of cabbage but a classic lasagne is so wonderful that it seems perverse to try to make a low calorie version. Stuffed cabbage leaves would be less calorific.

The fact that we're all talking about food and not TA is telling.

The fact that we're all talking about food and not TA is telling.

The fact that I'm listening to statistics on Today rather than catching up on last night's episode, also.

Agree that replacing the pasta element of a lasagne is plain wrong. But it must be twenty years since I last made one involving meat. My thrilling existential kitchen journey has taken me from shredded fish to lentils as filling. And I'm thinking of adding naked oats to the mix come autumn.

How I miss Jenny's rightful kitchen.

@CaptainMyCaptain

I love parsnips and almost all vegetables but I think passing any vegetable off as pasta is just wrong! Completely unacceptable.

Passing any vegetable off as something else is just wrong.

Mushroom burger? It's a a mushroom
Cauliflower steak? No it's cauliflower
Cauliflower rice - no it's still cauliflower
Courgetti - no, it's courgettes but in scrappy thin strips...

I remember an old flame couldn't understand why when we went out for a meal I didn't have the nut roast. He thought it would be just as tasty as roast meat.

eating out is sht if you don't eat meat

Jenny without her kitchen is just wrong.

Talking of fish, what happened to the Gills.

Glad that Bruce Lee and Hellin got one over on Vile Kyle.

Ian is agonising about Adam who was stupid enough to say he was on the phone to Lee at a time when Helen blithely confirmed he was watching Peaky Blinders with her

Very surprised to hear Lee and Helen watching boxsets in the afternoon! What’s that all about? Surely they must have other things to do? And I don’t just mean work on Helen’s stupid cow.

And would Ian really refer to the ‘French fries’ on the kitchen floor? I know he’s a chef but he’s from Northern Ireland - I can’t imagine they call them anything other than chips there…

Ruari flirting with the bouncer was just gratuitous flaunting of his bi-sexuality. I can see the point they were trying to make (ie if R was a girl he would have not problem successfully flirting with a doorman) but it was a bit laboured!

I weirdly don’t mind the sound of the cabbage leaf lasagne @TheSilveryPussycat refers to. Oh, and I have finally come to the conclusion that I don’t like butternut squash very much. Or sweet pots. In fact, sweet vegetables are actually just wrong.

Always so many major issues to discuss…

@Roysnewshirt

Ian is agonising about Adam who was stupid enough to say he was on the phone to Lee at a time when Helen blithely confirmed he was watching Peaky Blinders with her

Very surprised to hear Lee and Helen watching boxsets in the afternoon! What’s that all about? Surely they must have other things to do? And I don’t just mean work on Helen’s stupid cow.

And would Ian really refer to the ‘French fries’ on the kitchen floor? I know he’s a chef but he’s from Northern Ireland - I can’t imagine they call them anything other than chips there…

Ruari flirting with the bouncer was just gratuitous flaunting of his bi-sexuality. I can see the point they were trying to make (ie if R was a girl he would have not problem successfully flirting with a doorman) but it was a bit laboured!

I weirdly don’t mind the sound of the cabbage leaf lasagne @TheSilveryPussycat refers to. Oh, and I have finally come to the conclusion that I don’t like butternut squash very much. Or sweet pots. In fact, sweet vegetables are actually just wrong.

Always so many major issues to discuss…

I mean, at least you said "squash". I cannot stand people who say "butternut".

@Urbandweller

If Alice had access to her mobile she would have been able to order a taxi via an Uber type app. No cash required.

I can’t believe Brian won’t get a penny back after she left a few days into the (6 week?) programme.

Poor Lee will be in both Helen’s and his new BFF Ian’s bad books when they finding out he was keeping Adumb’s secret from them.

Well, get to know private mental health providers, of all kinds. Of course they will take the full price.

@CeciledeVolanges, I dislike 'butternut' too. And yorkshires for yorkshire pudding, eccle for eccles cake, roast for roast dinner etc.

I'm not keen on sweet potatoes either. OK in moderation, I suppose.
Potatoes are nice in some forms.

I have always assumed that "a roast" means a roasted joint of meat or a roasted chicken. Using "a roast" for a roast dinner would utterly confuse me, especially since the veg with a roast usually isn't roasted in my house, apart from the potatoes. I mean, roast carrots can be fine, but roast peas simply don't work.

The best vegetarian substitute for a roast that I have ever eaten has no nuts in it. I cherish that recipe, and vegetarian friends I have served it to ask me for it, and compare it favourably with nut-roasts.

www.deliciousmagazine.co.uk/recipes/vegetarian-christmas-roast/ calls it a nut-roast, which is just silly because duh, no nuts...

Potatoes are nice in all forms! I adore potatoes. I'm less keen on sweet potatoes, but they work well in spicy food where the sweetness if offset by contrasting flavours.

That looks like a good recipe, Asking, and quite simple too. I've tried several recipes for a vegetarian centrepiece dish which are a lot of work. Worth it, and I'd do them again as they tasted great, but not quick.

Vegetarians in Ambridge: Lucy Perks, Kate Madikane, Mia (is her surname Grundy?), possibly Usha - anyone else? They seem under-represented, but perhaps that's realistic in a farming/rural community.

Wanders in
A favourite in my household is Lasagne made with Roast Fennel and Butternut squash. Sheets of Lasagne too. It's in River Cottage Veg every day if anyone is interested.
Wanders out again to sit in the garden with a (real) coffee.

@Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g

Potatoes are nice in all forms! I adore potatoes. I'm less keen on sweet potatoes, but they work well in spicy food where the sweetness if offset by contrasting flavours.

That looks like a good recipe, Asking, and quite simple too. I've tried several recipes for a vegetarian centrepiece dish which are a lot of work. Worth it, and I'd do them again as they tasted great, but not quick.

Vegetarians in Ambridge: Lucy Perks, Kate Madikane, Mia (is her surname Grundy?), possibly Usha - anyone else? They seem under-represented, but perhaps that's realistic in a farming/rural community.

Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g That looks like a good recipe, Asking, and quite simple too. I've tried several recipes for a vegetarian centrepiece dish which are a lot of work. Worth it, and I'd do them again as they tasted great, but not quick.

It's quick (apart from the hour's cooking) if you have a food processor. Otherwise all those veg needing to be "very finely chopped" probably take a while.

Why do I always forget to get rid of the original message when I am quoting? bah! Sorry about that.

@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime

Why do I always forget to get rid of the original message when I am quoting? bah! Sorry about that.

AskingQuestionsAllTheTime

Why do I always forget to get rid of the original message when I am quoting? bah! Sorry about that.

I usually forget too and the result is something like this, which makes be feel stupid.

Kate is a vegan (when it suits you dear)
Mere is a vegan (and a PITA)

Usha is, but we've not heard from her for a while, and Lucy Perks could well be eating anything, it's so long since we heard from Kathy.

Kate is not a mere vegetarian: that wasn't special enough nor enough nuisance to her mother, whom she expected to cook for her. She is a vegan. Except when it comes to wine, or chocolates, belonging to other people and consumed without their consent.

It was Amy who was the vegetarian, not Usha: Usha doesn't eat beef but is fine with other meat, as she explained to Alan before their wedding.

Elizabeth was a vegetarian one school holidays, but doesn't seem to have been one since; she's never mentioned it if she still is, and she definitely would because in Elizabeth's world everything about Elizabeth is fascinating to everyone else. Her coming home from school saying she was a vegetarian always felt to me rather like "Elizabeth being difficult for her parents, one of whom felt obliged to cook her special meals because the rest of the family didn't feel like going along with her demands and the other of whom could be constantly browbeaten because his life was spent rearing animals for the table apart from the cows he kept to provide milk."

Amy must be a saint to take on an alcoholic. We've seen how unpleasant Alice can be when drunk, and even when she isn't, people who are pissed are bloody boring anyway. She's so set on dealing with it her way that she won't take any help from Amy. I wonder whether she'll end up back on the parental doorstep when Amy stumbles across one stack of empties too many?