Archers thread #160: Ram a lamb a ding dong! To rate the mass wisteria in Ambridge, tap the feedback tablet here.

[Gasp0deTheW0nderD0g]

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

All views on The Archers welcome here! New blood welcomed, and of course we are always delighted to welcome back former or occasional listeners/posters. We don't all agree on all points, although we do mostly try to be civil about it. Most of us are posting tongue in cheek a lot of the time, so don't worry about revealing that you'd have given a home to Hilda the Hellcat, 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/4636789-the-archers-spoilers-thread-7-cant-wait-for-702pm-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 @MerryChristmasToYou, @OverArmour and @LillianGish for the thread title ideas.

This week is a bit better than last week, but the Brad/Adil/Lily stuff is very odd. Coming up to the anniversary of Jennifer's death (22nd January last year). We need a new matriarch - could that be Natasha? I find her quite an interesting character. Sometimes she's awful and then she has moments as last night where she utterly redeems herself.

Over to you!

I don’t really like Wensleydale so the addition of cranberries is an improvement. There, I’ve said it <folds arms>

This business with Harry is most odd. If he’d had a riding-career-ending injury then he wouldn’t be putting a young horse through its paces. Sure, he might ride something more reliable but not something that - as babies do - might throw out an unexpectedly flamboyant move.

His dealings with Azra where he tried to steamroller her discussion AND the bit where he manufactured a next day shoeing appointment with Chris (which was unlikely in itself, most in-demand farriers would hum and haw before telling a non-client that they could possibly do a fortnight on Wednesday)? Hmm. Throw in the fact that no-one recognised him (EVERYONE knows who the big local horsey names are, even if they’ve only seen them in H&H) and it’s all very odd.

What does the 🔮 have to say about all this?

to be fair i can now buy 2 brands of actual cheddar in my supermarket I really feel for you! I’m spoilt. Not only am I in the land of Booths, but my local supermarket (Morrisons) has a range of cheeses including Comte, Yarg, Ossau Iraty, Langres, and umpteen varieties of cheddar. And I have a M&S food just down the road.

I must live in the land of cheese. Not only can I get a variety in the supermarkets but, in my moderately sized market town, there is a fantastic specialist cheese shop. And I still like fruit in my cheese - white stilton with apricot anyone?

Foreign cheese is no issue here - I'm in Germany but the Netherlands, Belgium and France can all be reached easily. And I'm in UK every other month so i can stock up on The King Of Cheese sans cranberries when i'm there.

Am back to not listening to TA. My blood pressure is much improved

I don’t really like Wensleydale so the addition of cranberries is an improvement I always buy a lump of Wensleydale with apricots as a Christmas treat. But the trouble with flavoured cheese is that you can’t eat it with your own choice of accompaniment (fresh fig, quince paste, or a russet apple).

@Brefugee I see your problem. It’s a shame, British cheese has improved greatly over the last 20 years, with so many small independent dairies.

Very much a side question, does anyone know why Shula is called Shula / whether it means anything?

Just feels like quite an exotic name alongside Brian, Elizabeth, Peggy etc.

Borchester Blue with cranberries - bleugh!

I just caught myself wondering what Brian’s favourite cheese might be. Is it too stereotypical to suggest Stilton? Jim would like a crumbly piece of Keen‘s cheddar; Lilian Brie; Jolene a babybel; and Elizabeth may be a Roquefort…

Oh this is going to keep me going for days…

I think they threw down a handful of Scrabble tiles or something and made the name up from that.

Blue cheese and cranberries would indeed be disgusting.

Apparently Jill and Phil threw a handful of Scrabble tiles up in the air and named the twins after the random letter patterns this threw up . What this proves is that Archers SWs have slipped in idiotic nonsense that makes no sense, even in the halcyon early years when the nightly audience was in the tens of millions.

I am bemused Delete what? I have no issue with you, only the BBC continuity people after the 7pm news and just before TA.

My issue re cheese is only with my Sainsbury's Local - small, and 3 minutes walk away. Their range is understandable restricted - but unvarying and missing things you'd expect - e.g. for a long time they had double cream, sour cream, but no single cream. There's another Sainsbury's Local two miles away which has a much better range of stock.

Durham Market has a very good cheese counter. I must go there and see if they have the one cheese with additions that I like - Sage Derby.

🔔 raking up old dingdong alert (I've just caught up with nearly 2 weeks of thread)

The childless women ONS data you keen people are looking for is here. It shows that of the most recent 18 cohorts, around 17-20% remain childless. So it's good to see Fallon represent that.

End of dingdong 🔕

But blue Wensleydale (if you can find it) is amazing.

is that true about the scrabble tiles? I always assumed Shula was short for something, or a pet-name.

Oh christ don't open that ding dong back up again! (But thank you for the data that validates my existence and representation in TA!).

The trouble with Wensleydale cheese is that it's shit by itself. It's made much better with apricots, and even by ginger, but is made worse by cranberries.

The most confusing cheese I ever tasted was wensleydale with mincemeat (as in the Christmas mince pie filling not the cottage pie one). I liked it, to my shame, but it was too sweet to want to have with anything savoury, and too "cheese" to want to have as something sweet. I think it may have had brandy in it too.

The best use for plain wensleydale is as a slice with some fruit cake.

Things Fell Apart isn't Michael Mosely, it's Jon Ronson... While I can see your point about their voices, they deal with very different subjects! (Qualified doctor with evidence vs conspiracy/culture wars blurgh)

British cheese making really suffered during WW2 when the government mandated that dairies make only one type of standardised cheddar. Yes, it was to make production as efficient as possible and therefore feed as many as possible with the reduced resources available but a lot of regional cheeses were lost. IIRC, of the several hundred farms that were producing cheese before the war, only around 60 were still producing at the end.

It’s taken a long time for small-producer/regional cheeses to recover not least because during the 60s/70s and into the 80s, demand for good produce and good food was really not there. I’d say it wasn’t until the later 80s/90s that we generally* started seeing food as something to be relished and enjoyed rather than endured!

(*I know this is a sweeping statement but food in post-war England and the decades that followed was generally absolutely dire, much as this wouldn’t have been the case for all.)

Thanks for replies on Shula’s name, that is very funny! What were the scriptwriters thinking?!

I think Tracy and all would like Dairylea triangles. I was watching someone making Welsh Rarebit which involved making a roux adding beer and then cheese on the toast. It looked nice but I think I will just stick to chedder on my toast. I fancy that now.

I love blue cheese but not with cranberries .

Definitely true about the scrabble tiles.

I am a fan of the softer French cheeses - coulommier, reblochon etc and those would always be my go to. Prefer the Swiss hard cheeses for sandwiches/toasties.

However, guilty pleasure is 2 slices of cheap white bread, slice of strong cheddar and ridged salt and vinegar crisps. Yum.

I always have Christmas cake with cheese. Preferably Wensleydale but, at a pinch, any cheese will do. Except blue cheese and it has to be plain.

Perhaps we need an archers thread dedicated to food!!

I quoted the continuity announcer's statement of what was happening tomorrow, and since tomorrow hadn't happened at the time, it was a reaction to your post only in that it made me think "Shit, I've just posted a spoiler".