Its quite cool that they often film things at work:

Rather excitingly Rache was selected to be part of Simon Cowell’s new £15m TV gameshow on ITV called “Red or Black”, to be hosted by Ant and Dec. Top prize on the live show was going to be £1 million! This weekend was the start of the elimination rounds to cut down thousands of contestants to just the lucky seven people who over seven nights on live TV would get a chance to become a millionaire … simply by choosing red or black on a giant roulette wheel. The chances of Rache getting through were pretty small – there were ten of these stages to get through!!

The lead-up to the giant roulette wheel was that contestants would have to choose from one of two outcomes on a series of challenges – one would be marked black, one red in keeping with the concept of the show. The challenges are supposed to be fun and exciting and exhilarating and involve celebrities.

I was very happy when Rache asked me if I wanted to be part of the audience (contestants get to bring along a guest) and of course I jumped at the chance. It ended up being a very very long day! Fun, but long. I’ve been to my fair share of TV recordings so shouldn’t have been surprised at the level of disorganisation there was today. I guess we have to be slightly forgiving in the sense that this was the first day of the whole program so there were bound to be a few teething problems. But my biggest nitpick with today’s event was the lack of communication – not only a lack of it actually, but also the total mis-communication. For example, telling us we needed to be in seats or at the arena by a certain time (10.15) but actually they didn’t start moving us in until 11.30, or when there were delays in the stunts we were told there would be sweets and prizes distributed and that delays would only be a moment (when in fact in most instances the delays were over an hour), etc. etc. They didn’t even really ever tell us what we could expect during the day which was really annoying.

The way it worked today, from how we worked it out and from gossip amongst various people, was that the contestants were separated from their guests and sat in various sections of the Arena. This was so when they were filming who got chosen to choose red or black it would seem like random blocks of the audience when in fact people had been pre-selected. We had to practise the cheering and contestant selection a few times.

There were actually a couple of thousand contestants who came down to Wembley for today’s event (with several more thousand coming later that tonight and more tomorrow) and from speaking to everyone around me found out they’d come from all over the UK including as far away as Scotland (like Rache.) There were about four “groups” to get through in the day session we were attending. Luckily Rache was in the second group – because of how long the day took with all the pauses, re-shoots etc. she didn’t get done with her bit until nearly 5pm … not sure what the other two groups are going to do!

It was lucky I was sat around some pretty friendly +1s – from what they were saying the majority of them were professional game show applicants – having applied for every game show there was to enter! Ha ha. One of them even knew a person who won £0.50 and another who won £30,000 from Deal or No Deal.

The first “challenge” featured the “celebrities” for the day: Jedward. I know. I was like really? Well, I guess they have links to Simon Cowell and, say what you want about them, they certainly have plenty of energy and are great for getting the crowd going. The event was Twinball – which basically involved each of them getting into a human hamster ball and running around an obstacle course with little tippers batting them back like they were in a pinball machine. It was absolutely hilarious. I don’t think they really practised with the balls before hand because it ended up being a lot tougher for the twins to get through the obstacle courses than producers imagined. Unfortunately one of the twins, Jonathan, actually got injured so had to get stretchered off. Oops! Too bad for the people who chose his colour!

Rache’s challenge was Overdrive which basically involved two stuntmen on top of the roof of cars who then have to race to the end of a straight course whilst jumping and ducking under various poles. They were going to run a few practise runs in front of the contestants but changed their mind and got the contestants to leave before they did their runs … which was probably a smart move because the practise run said everything. One guy was terrible! The rumour goes that one of the original stunt men had got injured the day before so his replacement hadn’t had a chance to refine his skill …

Rache, pictured below, unfortunately chose Black, who was the replacement stunt guy. It wasn’t quite the wipeout that we were all expecting it to be … though one suspects that was a bit of a ploy by the producers to make it a little bit more interesting (the race was best out of five.)

Ah well … guess she’s gotta find another way to make £1 million …

Four months ago Jenny and I attended the filming of Food Poker. Ever since we have been wondering if, and when, our episode would be screened and finallly yesterday it was. Gary was kind enough to record it for us and it is because of him that I have little video clip of our highlights – our first sighting is at about 1:45 minutes:

I’ve described how it works before:

… a group of four chefs “play a hand” of poker which would decide which ingredients they would be allowed to cook with for the relevant rounds – Savoury and Sweet. For each round, the four chefs have a few minutes to convince the panel that their dish was the best and the two chefs with the most chips would then go into the round cook-off. The winner of each round, as voted by us the panel via poker chips and counted by Charlie the Chip Machine, would then cook-off in a finale – the results of which would be judged the chefs who didn’t make the cook-off – leaving Food Poker with a Food Poker Champion for the day.

I can tell you now that the day of filming was once again very long. We got there for around lunch time and didn’t leave until around 9.30pm that evening! I guess it didn’t help that the day we went to was only the second day of filming so there was still quite a bit of feeling out. By the end of the series I’m sure they had the filming down to a few hours only.

As for the tasting though we did get to sample each of the chef’s cooking the portions were so tiny it was lucky that before filming had started we were treated to the crew lunch – basically lasagne, salads, quiches, etc. It was very yummy and for me the highlight of the day nearly! Ha ha.

Here were the four dishes we got to sample:

Round	Chef	Pic	Dish Title	Our Call
SAVOURY	Theo Randall		Pan-Fried Tofu & Roquefort	Did really well to incorporate a cheese and tofu. Who would have thought he could get through on those ingredients.
	Peter Gordon		Sea Bass Sushi with Dill & Watercress Dressing	Not bad but was too messy for eating on TV. Sushi fell apart and was difficult to manage.
SWEET	Martin Blunos		Caramelised Bananas with Strawberry Sauce	Hardly an adventurous dish but did the best he could with his ingredients.
	Clodagh McKenna		Coffee & Chocolate Trifle	Felt truly sorry for Clodagh as she was so happy to be cooking but she just mis-managed her time and her whole dish fell apart.

At the end of the day, Theo went up against Martin and their main ingredient was rump steak. They both produced a very yummy dish each but we didn’t get to taste it. Food Poker Champion for the day ended up being Martin. A good come from behind win.

Fresh off our latest TV appearance on the F Word Jenny and I were invited to appear on a new BBC food show – Food Poker.

The concept behind Food Poker is that a group of four chefs would “play a hand” of poker which would decide which ingredients they would be allowed to cook with for the relevant rounds – Savoury and Sweet. For each round, the four chefs have a few minutes to convince the audience/panel that their dish was the best and two chefs with the most chips would then go into the round cook-off. The winner of each round, as voted by us the audience/panel, would then cook-off in a finale – the results of which would be judged the chefs who didn’t make the cook-off leaving Food Poker with a Food Poker Champion for the day.

When Jenny and I were originally signed up, the concept behind Food Poker was that there would be an audience of about 30 people large – some would get to vote on the dishes, some would get to taste, etc. but a few days before the filming we were told the audience had been reduced to seven people only. I thought that people had pulled out but it turns out the production company decided it would be better to have only a panel of seven! So, unless severe edits are made to the episode, I think Jenny and I have a fair chance to be on TV.

I don’t know how the chefs felt but I felt pretty nervous whenever the cameras focussed on us – we had to stutter out some descriptions of the food but the worst bit was being filmed whilst you were tasting the food. On both occasions I nearly dropped my cutlery!

Anyway, as again with the F Word I’m not sure how much I can say about the day’s filming so once our episode screens, if it screens!, I’ll be back with more details. I’d like to say though that the four chefs (Martin Blunos, Theo Randall, Clodagh McKenna and Peter Gordon) who featured on our episode were extremely friendly and suprisingly approachable – even got a kiss from Martin and Theo.

Food Poker is supposed to show during the Ready, Steady, Cook slot at 4.30pm weekdays so look out for it!

The F Word episode which I spoke about nearly a month ago finally aired Tuesday night (the same night as the Quiz Night actually) so I guess I can now speak about our experience.

Jenny and I were lucky enough to be seated with a very friendly couple, Fran and Chris. Like us they too were reserves so out of the whole room I think our table was the most genuinely excited and interested to be there. It may be harsh to say but many of those around us looked like posers ..

It was just as well that all four of us got along so well because we were stuck at the filming for nearly six hours! Although forewarned that it may take that long I don’t think anyone of us genuinely believed that it would take six hours to film what was essentially about 15 minutes, maybe 20, for the show. Granted it was amateur chefs in the kitchen and they had to serve 3 x 50 dishes but still. In actuality the reason we were there for so long was that between courses they would come around and survey everyone’s opinion of the food and then film some footage for the show plus give everyone (Gordon and Co) a break.

The celebrity “guests” for the evening were David Gest and Faith Brown. David was true to his big life character and was certainly loud and the centre of attention. I’m not sure it was partly self-serving but it was still nice that he came around and shook all of our hands. Not something I think a lot of the other celebrities on the show do.

I wasn’t at all interested in appearing in an interview for the show and Fran and Jenny were the same way … until they observed that a lot of the other tables were getting a lot of camera attention (interestingly not many of them eventually ended up on the broadcast.) After that the job was on to try and get some screen time. Jenny’s comment on her uncooked potatoes will surely go down in history: “The potatoes were a bit hard. Al dente is nice for vegetables and pasta but not potatoes I think.” Classic.

Oh, our three courses and my opinions below:

Starter		Seared Tuna Nicoise Salad	I could see where Gordon (first name basis of course) was going with the salad but unfortunately I think what I received was the bottom of the bowl as I ended up with an overcooked tuna, and triple the amount of capers, anchovies, olives and dressing as everyone else. As a result I ended up with a fairly unbalanced starter.
Main		Pan Fried Chicken with Asparagus served with Morel Mushroom Sauce	Although disappointed with the unadventurous meat choice I was pleasantly surprised with my chicken and the good clean flavours. It was cooked to perfection and the sauce it was served with was delicious if a little watery. A few more asparagus and potatoes (cooked a bit more) would have been nice also.
Dessert		Cameralised Apples and Pears served with Madelines and Home Made Vanilla Ice-cream	The star of the night, this dessert was superb and would have had us licking our plates if it wasn’t impolite! Normally I find at the end of the dessert that there is never enough ice-cream but that wasn’t a problem tonight. Surprisingly the combination of the madelines and ice-cream were enough to compliment the richness of the sauce.

Overall, I had a very good evening and I’m assuming that Jenny did as well. It was definitely a unique experience and at the end of the day a great opportunity to sample some of Gordon’s food. The only way it could have gone better was if we’d had a chance to speak to the big man himself! Some clips from our episode can be found here.

The F Word is a cooking show hosted by Gorden Ramsay set in a restaurant (though actually a studio) with a 50-60 guests. Next week will air the first episode of the third series.

In the first series every week he would take on a group of trainee (commi) chefs and would whittle them down tournament style until he came up with an ultimate winner. This was interspersed with other segments including street reporting by food critic Giles Coren. The second series it changed slightly with Gordon inviting groups of amateur chefs in and they would compete based on the number of customers willing to pay for their meals. It seems that its the same concept that has been carried over to the third series which is where Jenny and I step it.

I’d applied to be part of the F Word guests in season two but was unsuccessful but applied again for the latest series. I wasn’t expecting anything but to my surprise late last week I got a call to say I’d been put on the reserve list. So I had to turn up (and I could bring a friend) at 3.30 this afternoon at their studios hoping that someone was a no show. Happily we got in! To say that Jenny and I were excited is a bit of an understatement.

I’m not sure when our episode is going to air but can’t wait to see how it turned out.

N generously invited me to tonight’s recording of Never Mind the Buzzcocks. For those not in the know (and before tonight’s experience that would have included me) Never Mind the Buzzcocks is billed as a music gameshow but runs more as a comedy. It is hosted by the very dry Mark Lamarr and features two teams: one generally permanent team captains in the form of Phill Jupitus (I think a radio host) and the very funny Bill Bailey who I know best as the funny long-haired chap from the TV series Black Books. These two are then joined each by two guests.

I think there were about 4 rounds of “quizzes” – What’s the Connection (where teams have to connect two apparently disparate musical groups by some wierd fact, such as the connection between Nsync and John Denver), Intros (two team members play out an intro to a song and the other member has to guess what it is), The Identity Parade (hilarious – as each team tries to pick out an old band member from a popular band from about 20 years ago out of a choice of five), and the final rapid-fire round where Mark says a line from a song and teams have to give the next one.

The experience was definitely very enjoyable though a very very long one. I think we were in there for over three hours just to film a half-hour spot! But thanks N for the ticket.

Apparently there is more to domestic goddess Nigella Lawson then hotting up the kitchen. In this new chat show she brings together the ingredients of cooking, agony aunt dilemmas, and of course the draw-card celebrity line-up. I wouldn’t normally draw attention to the fact that Nigella has a new show except for the fact that I had the chance to be part of the studio audience. It was my first time at one of these things and it was strangely fascinating.

Guest star for the episode was the lovely Brooke Shields. On the set she seemed different from how I saw her in Chicago. Although she genuinely seemed the friendly sort, Nigella and her seemed to have an awkward chemistry together – maybe it was the way Nigella seemed a little frozen and uptight. Perhaps she couldn’t relax as she was conscious of her children in the audience (whom I had the pleasure of sitting next to) though the love between them was obvious and the kids just seemed excited to be there.

I won’t otherwise comment on the show too much. I was just happy to be in the audience experiencing it. I must say I loved the way Nigella kicks off her shoes for the last segment of the show and walks around the “kitchen” in her bare feet (though I’m sure you won’t see that onscreen!)