I’ve done it my friends! I have done the Jane Fonda Workout! It was excellent fun. I loved it! Mind you, I was quite amazed at how flexible La Fonda was, and by contrast how feeble I was. She is AMAZEBALLS in the workout video and can get her leg right up to her ear....
If anything can scupper my month of living like Jane Fonda by trying to eat healthily and exercise, it is THIS. If I was a chocoholic, I wouldn’t have a chocolate fountain in my house would I? So why, oh why, as a self-confessed-guilty-pleasure-style-slightly-ashamed-of-myself-addict do I have a huge Kilner jar of Thousand Island Dressing...
I have a day off work today to do some editing on the Columbo book. As I’d heard Jane mention in her YouTube video about breakfasts that oats were good for the brain I decided to make myself some of her Apple-Raisin Oatmeal for breakfast. In fact, Jane’s headnote to this recipe reinforces her...
It is official. This month I am living my life like Jane Fonda. When my friend Sanja gave me this book, I vowed to spend a month eating and exercising like Jane. That month is now here. I am fully prepared and have pledged on social media to recreate this photo in the Silver Screen...
I made a batch of this to kick off my month of living like Jane Fonda – more about this coming soon…. It produced 2 x 1 litre Kilner jars of granola so lucky Mr Rathbone got one for scoffing on his holiday, and I kept one for myself. Now, this is not a CRUNCHY...
As some readers will know, I am a big fan of the #ColumboTV tweetalong that happens once a month on the big old Twitter machine. Folks all around the world press PLAY on their DVD machines at the same time and much fun is had tweeting away as we all watch the same episode. This...
Imagine my surprise to open the work fridge last week and find this in a door shelf. YES! It is back! I wrote a post back in May about Frankie Avalon’s Salad Dressing and my disappearing salad dressing bottle. Pinched from the work fridge for a second time! One kind reader called Sherry even took the time...
I have been wanting to make a Jane Fonda recipe ever since I saw this photo, which to my mind is the best movie star cooking photo EVER. and on Sunday, my friend Sanja gave me a gift. This… which I didn’t even know existed. Imagine my excitement! So I have decided that September will...
This is my absolute FAVOURITE Silver Screen Suppers dish. Out of the many hundreds I have made, this is the best. Sanja and Sasa loved it too. Sanja is my friend from Belgrade. She cracks me up, as does her brother Sasa. Nights at their place always involve a lot of food, and a lot...
Today I’ve been recovering from the #cowboydaycookalong at Battenburg Belle’s – it was a humdinger of a hoedown and I am feeling a little worse for wear… Mr R has gone off to record his radio show, so I am home alone, and the brilliant thing is, I have just found my DVD of Giant...
Yee-haw and giddy-up! It was National Day of the Cowboy yesterday and those who know me well, know that cowboys are my weakness.. Also, I will grab ANY opportunity to wear a cowboy hat. I absolutely love hats and I do not know of a single person who doesn’t look fabulous in a cowboy hat....
Everyone agreed. If you are going to make Vincent Price’s Tropical Chicken, you’d better get yourself to a funfair that has a coconut shy. Because the coconuts you get from Waitrose are TOO SMALL to contain a whole chicken breast when chopped in half and hollowed out. If you read a lot of cooking blogs,...
Very sad to hear about Martin Landau going to that Hollywood in the sky yesterday. Had to cheer myself up a bit with a big helping of his very own Martini recipe. Martin is one of my favourite Columbo villains and I’ve written about the episode he is in here…. If you wanted to have...
You know when you walk from your kitchen to your bedroom to go and get something, and when you get to your bedroom you’ve forgotten what you went there for? I felt a bit like this about Peter’s Pork Chops. I made them ages ago, and forgot to write about them. Then I found a...
I absolutely LOVE internet cookalongs, and the first one I ever got wind of was over at Dinner is Served 1972. At that point I wondered if I’d ever be invited to participate in one, like a schoolchild desperately hoping for an invite to the cool kid’s party. But now I know that these things are...
We’ve been having a heatwave here in the UK on and off, and it’s been too hot to cook some nights. All I want to do when I get home from work is switch the fan on, and eat a bit of watermelon. It’s most irregular! It’s a British tradition to moan about the...
Ooh, these were a revelation! Really, really good! I’ve never had blintzes before but I liked these very much. When I told Mr R what I was planning for breakfast he did his best John Lennon impression saying: “put them over there, not near the food”. This was apparently what John said when presented...
Until recently, these were the house cocktail here at Silver Screen Suppers Towers. I had quite a few of these over the festive season before the Bourbon ran out. They are so good, they make you go a bit berserk. Two maximum I would suggest. I’ve worked out the perfect way of making them chez...
When did you first hear about chia seeds? For me it was only a few months ago. On the health food front I am definitely not what you would call an “early adopter”. Also, I made my first ever smoothie only this year. Deliciously Ella I am not. What a tortoise… Mind you, the tortoise...
I made this dish recently because the caretaker of my building threw away my cauliflower. Yes, a perfectly good cauliflower. But I guess it was my fault. I’d put it out on the fire escape because my old dinky fridge was too full, and it was cold out there. When I looked for it, it was...
This has been the week of the frozen archives. My new fridge arrived on Friday and I am stupidly excited about it. It’s a FRIDGEMASTER. Have you ever heard Ken Bruce’s music quiz POPMASTER on Radio 2? If you have, you will know that I will be referring to my fridge as the FRIDGEMASTER in a kind...
This is a photo of me, many moons ago, pretending to play a Wurlitzer dressed as Natalie Wood. Why? It’s a long story. I am almost at the stage where I know how to rustle up Natalie’s Huevos Rancheros without looking at the recipe. It has become the default “Spinster’s Saturday” breakfast. Mr R has to work...
Divine! As is tradition, while we are on our holidays on beautiful Mersea Island, staying in this fab fisherman’s cottage… we always buy freshly caught fish from the jetty, and make something film star related. This recipe was a BIG HIT. I know nothing about fish, and to be honest, am rather nervous about cooking...
I’ve been receiving brilliant feedback from the lovely folks who have volunteered to test cook recipes for the Cooking with Columbo book. There is still lots of time to join in – just check out the Columbo Cookbook page and choose something that takes your fancy. The first person to report back after my initial...
I had a boyfriend once who could make chips. Proper chips. Like you would have here in the UK from a fish and chip shop. I was always VERY impressed by this. I have never, ever made chips. Not even oven chips. Until now. Who knew it was so easy to do? I’m guessing that...
Quick as a flash, after the horrorfest that was Robert Quarry’s Beer and Cheese Soup, he has redeemed himself. Mmmm – this is GOOD potato salad. I don’t know about you, but I LOVE potato salad. I always make it the same way though. To my friend Alastair Hendy‘s recipe from Home Cook. Man I...
I should have loved this. Beer. Cheese. Soup. Three things I love. Also bacon. Alas, it was not the beer and cheese soup that was in my mind’s eye. It was very weird. I think I made it look pretty good for the photo though…. The truly odd thing about it was the ball of butter...
Spring has finally sprung here in London – I think – and now we are on the way to summer. We’ve had a few false starts. Here’s a way of cooking chicken that feels summery to me somehow. Constance provided this recipe to several cookbooks with occasional variations, but this is the one I am...
I have made a grown-up decision. I am going to buy a new fridge. The fridge I have in my rented flat is small and CRAMMED with jars and bottles. It has a tiny freezer on top, also crammed with foodstuffs. The main reason for getting a new fridge is for bread making purposes. When...
It has been the week of the bad back. Painkillers haven’t touched it. Alternation of the application of a frozen slab of parsnip soup with a hot water bottle has had no impact. The only thing that helps with the constant pain is BOOZE. Luckily there is a new house cocktail – Astor’s Painless Anaesthetic...
Mmmm – I like! This is, I think, the final of the core 69 recipes I’ve settled on for the episode specific dishes in the Cooking With Columbo book. Sam Wanamaker directed the Grand Deceptions episode, and this is the recipe I’ll be recommending. Unless, maybe, I can get hold of Robert Foxworth and persuade him...
There is a tale to be told about this salad dressing bottle. It’s one of life’s great mysteries… I bought this bottle when I was first really getting into cooking, I lived in Crouch End then, it was about 10 or so years ago, and I lived with someone who didn’t have much cooking...
I learned something fundamental last week. You cannot stir a curry with one hand and try and film it on your iPhone with the other. The saucepan spins and spins and spins! Just like the little coloured spinning wheel of death I get on my computer screen all the time, as my bedroom is an...
Who would win in a fight? Rhonda Fleming or Theodore Bikel? Well, me and Mr R considered the benefits of each of their meatloaves on Saturday as I took two big chunks of each out of the frozen archives. Rhonda on the left, Theodore on the right. At first Mr R said: “I do have...
Ooh, this was DELICIOUS. Soooooo good. So easy too. Rustled up, scoffed up and washed up before sundown. Fab for a week-night dinner. It’s a bit of a variation on another recipe I have from Hector, his Famous Pasta Pomodoro – similar ingredients, although no garlic in this one. Cor. Give this one a go...
When I wrote about Tyne Daly’s favourite cocktail – The Greyhound my chum Lindy asked on Facebook if I had any recipes for Sharon Gless: and indeed I do. Tyne and Sharon appeared together in groundbreaking kick-ass cop show Cagney and Lacey: If you are of a certain age, I can guarantee that you’ll have...
I’ve made a couple of these lately. Once for the brilliant cheese & wine party we had at my place, organised in order to drink all of the 24 bottles of lovely wine my ma and pa bought me and Mr R for our big birthdays. That, as you can probably imagine, was a VERY...
Peel me a grape! Well, actually, peel me 24 of them, as Kim’s recipe calls for 2 dozen peeled grapes. On Friday I spent the day in my kitchen tending 4 batches of dough to make 20 loaves of bread to sell at my nephew’s brewery. I decided to make some of Kim’s Chili Rellenos...
I cannot believe that Feud: Bette and Joan is over already! That just flew past. I am a few episodes behind though. I don’t have a TV, a friend at work grabs the episodes for me and puts them on a memory stick so that I can watch on my laptop in bed. DON’T TELL...
I’ve been on a little holiday to Whitstable and very lovely it was too. Four days in a fabulous and oh-so-peaceful little home from home, that was full of books and a beautiful orchid: It was a perfect place to write – and cook – and eat – and drink – and try to remember...
I am over-excited about next Saturday as I’m hosting the monthly #ColumboTV tweet-a-long. Anyone can join in, just line up the DVD of How to Dial a Murder (Season 7, episode 4) and press play at the appointed time, then enjoy the madness of the tweeting. It is the most fun a Columbo fan can...
Those of you familiar with how Yotam Ottolenghi treats a beetroot might not be too impressed with the simplicity of Peter’s supper dish. But this is how Peter liked his beetroot and who are we to diss it? It’s a very simple, homely vegetarian dish and I had a huge frying pan of it to...
I’m excited to let y’all know that my chum Peter Fuller is organising what promises to be a fabulous party on Tuesday 30th May in Islington, London. All the details are on the Vincent Price London Legacy website here…. but for now just let me tell you that this is a MUST for all Vincent fans....
I am loving Feud: Bette and Joan and decided this month to offer TWO recipes for you to try out, one by Bette and one by Joan. More pix on the Recipe of the Month page if you are looking in April 2017 including a cute dog chewing on a ham bone, and Mr Rathbone...
Vincent usually gets things absolutely perfect in his recipes, but this one was a bit screwy. Serves 6? Me and Vic ate the lot between the two of us! Perhaps we are just greedy… Vic said: “Serves 6? 6 leprechauns maybe.” My ex is a different man since he had his near death experience. I...
I finally got to see episode one of Feud: Bette and Joan and I LOVED IT. So utterly brilliant! It’s got me wanting to cook like Joan again, so I’ve pulled out my copy of the Joan Crawford Cookbook (a book what I wrote) and am getting inspired… The book is available from www.blurb.com or...
I had a LOT of sweet potatoes hanging around the flat after filming the making of a Sweet Potato Pie a couple of weeks ago. Whose Sweet Potato Pie? Patti LaBelle’s Sweet Potato Pie of course… Some of you may know all about the craze for Patti LaBelle’s Sweet Potato Pie, set in motion by...
More exciting news for Vincent Price fans! Some of you may know that Vincent and Mary’s Treasury of Great Recipes was reprinted and released in 2015 in a 50th anniversary edition. We had an amazing day here in London at Harrods for the book launch… Me with Vincent and Mary’s daughter Victoria Well I’m pleased...
I wonder if Vera was a glamorous name in the 1980s in America when this recipe was published? For me, the name Vera always brings to mind Vera Duckworth from Coronation Street, so the name of this recipe is kinda humorous for me… In a way, it is probably the kind of thing Vera Duckworth might...
This is it! The last of the Columbo cookbook recipes is tested! Whoopee! Well, the last of the core batch of recipes anyhow. It’s a chicken pie landmark… I’d been putting this one off as Laurence’s recipe is a bit odd. But it turned out to be really good. Several things about this recipe kept...
Wowee! I had an amazing day on Saturday with Master Baker Paul Merry and a baker’s dozen of Bread Angels! In the idyllic setting of a beautiful watermill in Dorset, we kneaded, we folded, we baked, and more than anything, we laughed like drains… I’ve been on a major bread making journey since August 2014 when...
No sniggering at the back please! Prunes have all kinds of negative connotations here in the UK, I wonder if it is the same in other parts of the world? Ah, I see from a quick Google around the block, that it is the same everywhere! I am doing that thing that many, many...
Yesterday was James Dean’s birthday so I thought I’d make a little something from my chum Greg’s fabulous “In the kitchen with James Dean” cookbook Recipes for Rebels. There are so many fab recipes in this book (I’m looking at you Eartha Kitt’s Crocked Rabbit with Winter Vegetables) it was hard to choose, but as...
Ooh, another veggie one for the Columbo cookbook. This is a super easy, but very nice way of perking up asparagus. Seen here beside the very last recipe I needed to test for the book, Laurence Harvey’s Chicken Pie. I’ve done it! It was a gargantuan effort, and I’ve been piling on the...
George’s recipe sounded very tasty on paper, and indeed, the result was really good. But it is a tricky thing for a Brit to make due to amount of things our supermarkets don’t have in common with American ones… I have moaned away on this blog before, about the fact we can’t get frozen...
The key to this recipe is seasoning I think. Plus giving your potatoes plenty of time to fry to get them all crispy and tasty. I think I could have given these a bit longer… This is a very simple, but a fun way of using up leftover potatoes for breakfast or brunch I reckon....
I had a nice piece of veal left over from Lieutenant Columbo’s Veal Scallopini so I decided to rustle up a Weiner Schnitzel. I love Oskar’s serving suggestion for this dish: lemon, beetroot, anchovies and capers. I love these fat, tasty anchovies from The Fickle Fish… I took the photo above, before I remembered about...
I think 2017 might be the year that I conquer my fear of the mushroom. If I’m ever invited out to dinner at someone’s house and they ask if there is anything I don’t eat, mushrooms are top of the list. Followed by aubergines and shellfish. It’s a texture thing… But actually, I don’t even...
Another first for January, Key Lime Pie. Much discussion about the name of this pie with Mr R, the Key relates to the Florida keys right? Aha, I see from Wikipedia that I am indeed right! But more than that, Key limes are a particular type of lime that are “naturalized throughout the Florida keys”....
On Friday I took the day off work and spent the whole day in the kitchen baking bread for my nephew’s brewery. All of these loaves have BEER in them. On the day before a bread sale, there is frantic activity early morning making all the dough and poolishes (if that is a word)...
When I have folks around for dinner, I try and remember to ask them if there is anything they don’t eat. Well for Battenburg Belle’s birthday dinner I had quite a few things to juggle with. 2 vegetarian guests, one guest who is dairy free, and one who is allergic to chilli and red peppers. ...
This recipe found its way into the Cooking With Columbo cookbook. My word, I think this was the best steak I have ever eaten, no kidding. Martin’s marinade was divine. Also, I had learned some stuff from Harry Eastwood’s steak masterclass in January’s Delicious Magazine. Cooking steak always makes me a bit nervous, but there...
Murder Under Glass is the BEST Columbo episode for foodies. There is so much brilliant stuff going on with Cioppino, “Bon Snacks” biscuits and Japanese blowfish I cannot even begin to explain… If you have never seen it, seek it out on DVD and get yourself a bottle of Margaux and a Spong Corkette and...
When my chum Corinna was studying for her Masters degree, Vic promised her that when she finished, he would buy the three of us a KFC Bucket. Well, Corinna finished in 2011 and we are still waiting for our Bucket. In the 6 years that have passed, the KFC in Muswell Hill has closed, and...
Broccoli is my default vegetable. It always seems like the healthy option. I eat it a lot. I do love Yul Brynner’s method of jazzing up the green stuff, but my word, Pearl’s way of doing things, is even better. Oh yum. Very, very tasty indeed. I’m going to perfect this! Seen here with Robert...
I am excited about tonight’s #ColumboTV tweetalong, as the episode we’ll all be tweeting along with, is one of my absolute favourites: Double Shock. Martin Landau plays Dexter Paris, host of a television cooking show, and he gets the Lieutenant up out of the audience, to assist him in making hollandaise sauce. Everyone is welcome...
It’s a month of firsts. I’ve never poached a pear before… But I have now… Vanilla pudding mix is not something we have here in the UK, so many moons ago I asked my friend Heather to bring me back some from a trip to the USA. After I’d got it, it sat in a...
I have never cooked Ramen before, in fact, I have never eaten Ramen before, so this dish was quite an adventure for me. The lovely folks at www.souschef.co.uk emailed me out of the blue to ask if I’d like to try out their Ramen kit and I said HELL YEAH! One of my resolutions for...
In the first non-pilot episode of Columbo, Murder By The Book, our favourite TV detective makes an omelet. Well, he starts to make an omelet but we don’t get to see anyone eat it, as events interrupt his cooking session… Work continues apace on the Columbo Cookbook test cooking, and yesterday morning I made myself...
I love the monthly #ColumboTV tweetalong, and it was a no brainer to decide what to cook for the December one. The episode was Dagger of the Mind, starring Honor Blackman and Richard Basehart. Columbo in London?? What larks! These were SO GOOD when I made them for me, myself and I a couple of years...
I was so sad to hear the news about Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher. Two great talents gone. So, in a tiny tribute, I have decided to make Debbie’s Chicken a la Honolulu the first recipe of the month for 2017. For me, it’s a dish that reminds me of the spring, most specifically, May...
I can think of lots of names for Donald’s curry. Donald Pleasence’s Weird Curry. Donald Pleasence’s Bizarre Curry. Donald Pleasence’s No Chop Curry. Last but not least, Donald Pleasence’s Troublesome Curry. But he calls it No-Name Curry, so No-Name Curry it is. I don’t blame Donald for his curry being troublesome. I blame John West....
