Nicola on Celebrity Master Chef

Recap by Contributor, Mandy Mulford

pic courtesy of Mr. Ian Wylie

Recap

Celebrity Masterchef is a UK reality programme which features local celebrities as contestants. For the current series, the three finalists are : actor, Nick Pickard; England rugby player, Phil Vickery and TV journalist Kirsty Wark. Their challenge this week was to cook lunch, on location, for the cast and crew of Spooks. The three contestants were asked to complete this task within 3 hours whilst working in a catering truck which did not give them too much room to move, and with equipment with which they were not familiar.

The programme started at 2:15 pm GMT and it was already half past two when thanks to Twitter I was told about this programme, specifically the Spooks connection in today’s episode and I immediately tuned in.

For all Spooks fans there was far too much time spent on showing the contestants cooking and not enough “behind the scenes” stuff, although we did manage an occasional glimpse of Simon Russell Beale (Home Secretary, William Towers) filming a scene in his office. Back outside, as filming wrapped up for lunch, we were lucky enough to spot Nicola Walker in the queue for the catering van. She was on the phone, engrossed in what looked like quite a serious conversation. Dishes available on today’s menu included Pork Belly, Vegetable Curry or Cod with a Parsley Sauce. In addition, cast and crew were able to have vegetables, cous cous, mash potatoes and tomato and fennel bake to go with their main course. For dessert, they had a choice of banana cake or caramalised pineapple.

Next time we see Nicola is at “the pass” ordering the Cod in parsley sauce with mash and carrots with a very big smile on her face. Max Brown (Dmitri Levandis) ordered the same. In the dining room, Nicola appeared to be thoroughly enjoying her meal, and actually wished her portion was larger. She also revealed, with a mischievous grin, that Max would have liked to order the Pork Belly but didn’t because he was “getting his kit off” later in the week and was therefore on a very strict diet in preparation for those scenes. Max responded with an embarrassed grin. Max said he didn’t like the fennel, thought it was quite tough. They then showed us Nicola’s empty plate and her very clean knife and fork. We never found out whether either Nicola or Max ordered any dessert.

pic courtesy of Mr. Ian Wylie

This episode of Celebrity Masterchef will be available on the BBC iPlayer for the next seven days, for those who have access to the iPlayer.

Screencaps

[screencaps provided courtesy of Lisa]

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