Entertainment
How To Make English Roast Potatoes
Two weeks ago, Joanna came back from visiting her family in England and shared a bunch of great photos with us: London! Ocean swims! POTATOES!!! The last one stopped me in my tracks; I immediately sent Jo an all-caps text, demanding the recipe for her cousin Livvy’s gorgeous roast potatoes. Thankfully, I wasn’t the only one (I knew I could count on you, readers!). So, the other day, I hopped on the phone with Livvy herself, and got all the tips and tricks.
“I call them Dilly Roast Potatoes, because this is how our grandfather — Dilly — used to make them when we were children,” she told me. “He’d spend hours peeling potatoes, while everyone was out on the boat in the sea. We’d come back absolutely ravenous and dive into a pile of the dreamiest roast potatoes.” Here’s how to make them yourself…
Step 1. Start with the right potato
“It pretty much all comes down to this,” says Livvy. “I use Maris Piper potatoes, which are a very British variety, but wherever you live, just look for the type of potatoes used for fries.” FYI, my fellow Americans, the best swaps for Maris Piper are russet potatoes or Yukon Gold. Livvy adds: “I’ll often grab the generic bag at the supermarket that’s just labeled ‘roasting potatoes.’ You want the kind that turn fluffy on the inside when cooked — that’s how you get your good roasties.”
Step 2. Peel, chop, and parboil.
Set a large pot of water to boil on the stove. While it’s heating, peel and chop your potatoes into not-too-small pieces. “You want them quite chunky,” says Livvy. “For a medium potato, you’ll maybe just cut it in half. For larger ones, quarter them. Once the water boils, drop in the potatoes and let them parboil for 7-10 minutes.” Test them gently with a fork after 7 minutes or so; They should be soft on the outside, with hard, uncooked centers. Once they’re done, drain them and leave them to sit in the colander.
Step 3. Pre-heat your oil.
“Now this is the trick. You want the oil heated in the roasting pan before you add the potatoes. I fill an aluminum roasting pan with a good 1-1.5 centimeters of sunflower oil, turn the oven to about 165°C (330°F), and let the oil heat up in there for 5-10 minutes, until it’s good and hot. You may need to let it heat longer if you’re using a thicker roasting pan, like a ceramic one. The key thing is that you want the potatoes to fizzle when you drop them in the oil.” Any oil with a high smoke point will do, and Livvy typically uses sunflower oil because it’s readily available. “My mum would use goose fat at Christmas, because it’s kind of a classic, celebratory thing. But it’s quite thick, and has a very strong flavor — and I never have it on hand anyway. Just don’t use olive oil, because it has a lower smoke point!”
Step 4. Roast low and long — and turn often
Once the oil is hot, carefully pour the potatoes into the pan and let them “fizzle” in the oil. “That way they go back in the oven nice and coated. Leave them to roast for about an hour, turning them in the pan regularly (about every 15 minutes). Doing it this way — on a low-ish heat, for a long time, with frequent turning — is how you get that golden, gorgeous roasted exterior. It’s almost like when you’re frying something, and rotating it so each side cooks evenly.”
Step 5. Salt well, and serve.
Check the potatoes after an hour. They should be deeply golden and soft in the center when poked with a fork. “I put them in a bowl, then salt them,” Livvy says. “I like a crumbly type of sea salt (versus a chunkier one, like Himalayan), because it sticks to the hot potatoes really nicely.”
Thank you so much, Livvy (and Dilly)! I cannot WAIT to try this method! Do you have a family potato recipe (or other type of recipes) you’re willing to share? We love potatoes!!!
P.S. Want something to go with your pile of roasties? How about Lulu’s beloved carrot soup, or salmon (for beginners)?
Entertainment
Apple discontinues cheaper Mac Mini, now $799
Apple just axed its cheapest Mac Mini option, a compact 256GB desktop brain that previously cost Apple shoppers just $599.
First reported by MacRumors, the tech giant’s new lineup starts with the Mac Mini at the company’s $799, 512GB option. The more expensive model runs on Apple’s M4 chip and offers 16GB of RAM, just like the $599 model, but with twice the storage.
Mashable Light Speed
Last week, Apple paused orders of the then sold-out 256GB Mac Mini, hinting at a lineup change. Apple CEO Tim Cook — who recently announced his departure from the company after 14 years — said on a recent earnings call that Mac Mini supply was currently constrained under global manufacturing squeezes and that meeting existing demand may be difficult. Tech companies and AI enthusiasts are weathering a global memory chip shortage, which is expected to worsen over the next year.
Cook himself attributed an increase in Mac Mini orders to the device’s AI capabilities, with the Mac Mini now advertised for its Apple Intelligence processing power. Users have flocked to the portable computer amid a surge in interest in agentic AI after the launch of the open-source AI agent framework OpenClaw (previously known as both Moltbot and Clawdebot).
Entertainment
Iconic Star Trek Character Was Written So Badly, The Showrunner Intervened
By Chris Snellgrove
| Published
Here’s a story that dates me (hey, it’s not like anyone else was dating me at the time): I was a high school student when Star Trek: Voyager was on the air. I watched the show with the rest of my geeky friends, and we generally enjoyed the wacky adventures of Captain Janeway and her misfit crew. We also spent hours (and I mean hours) making fun of Neelix. He was the ship’s cook, but he might as well have been its mascot because he was always written as the broadest form of comic relief. Why, we wondered, did Star Trek go out of its way to make a new character such a butt-of-the-joke oaf?
As it turns out, Voyager showrunner Michael Piller shared those same concerns. When reading the script for the Season 2 episode “Twisted,” he began to worry that the writers were transforming Neelix into nothing more than “the buffoon of the ship.” That’s when Piller decided to take definitive action. He didn’t make Neelix into a deadly serious character, but he decided to do the next best thing. In the very next episode, he removed the character’s growing jealous streak that he rightly assumed viewers would absolutely hate.
Orange Man Bad
This all goes back to the most problematic thing about Neelix: his extremely underage girlfriend. In the Voyager premiere episode “Caretaker,” Neelix goes out of his way to save Kes, his Ocampan mate, and they both join Captain Janeway’s crew. Kes presents as an attractive young woman in her early ‘20s, but her species ages at a different rate than those of us here on Earth. She’s only one year old when she joins the crew (no, really!), and the writers had to take care not to present Neelix as the dirtiest old man in the Delta Quadrant.
That’s actually how Michael Piller’s concerns about Neelix began. The previous episode, “Elogium,” dealt with Kes’s mating drive activating years ahead of time, forcing her and Neelix to consider whether they were ready for children. While it’s bizarre enough to watch the weird orange alien try to figure out if he is ready to breed his one-year-old girlfriend, “Elogium” also made Neelix into a jealous figure. Specifically, he started thinking Tom Paris was being too friendly towards her and that the pilot was secretly trying to put the moves on Kes.
Jealousy, That Orange-Skinned Monster
When Piller read the script for “Twisted,” he became concerned about an early plot point in which the crew was celebrating Kes’s birthday (she had finally turned two). Neelix made her a cake, but Tom Paris gave her a locket. Once more, Neelix felt jealous of the hotshot human pilot. According to Captains’ Logs Supplemental – The Unauthorized Guide to the New Trek Voyages, Piller was “terribly concerned about Neelix.” He was “afraid we were going to destroy this character if we made him the buffoon of the ship. If all he is is comic relief, we’re in trouble.”
For better or for worse, Piller decided to focus on only one of the ways the writers had transformed Neelix into the comic relief: his jealousy. “The jealousy he was showing toward Kes was becoming irritating, so we wanted to put that to bed quickly,” he said. Accordingly, Piller made sure that “Parturition” (the episode that came directly after “Twisted”) killed this particular character conflict. That episode begins with Neelix and Paris having a fight over Kes, but then they are sent on a mission where they crash land on a hellish planet. They must fight for their survival and take care of a baby alien, ultimately becoming friends who never fight over Kes again.
It’s a heavy-handed fix, admittedly, but Michael Piller’s decision is one that Gene Roddenberry would have agreed with. The Star Trek creator never wanted his main characters to constantly bicker with one another, but Paris and Neelix were constantly fighting over Kes. Thanks to “Parturition,” Piller effectively killed the conflict that was driving these two characters apart. If you think that kept Neelix from being written as bad comic relief, though, I’ve got a whole shipload full of leola roots to sell you!
Entertainment
The Most Banned Series In America Is About To Blow Up On Netflix
By Jonathan Klotz
| Updated
When someone says they’re an anime fan, it can mean anything. That’s the equivalent of saying “I like watching TV.” Anime is a huge swath of genres, stories, franchises, movies, and shows about anything you can possibly imagine. Who knew a show about giant, naked people would turn out to be one of the best anime of all time? And who would have thought that an anime about an ultrapowerful octopus who destroys the Moon and finds meaning in life working as a teacher for underprivileged children tasked by the Japanese government to kill him before he destroys the planet would be such a touching, thought-provoking, and humorous series?
That’s Assassination Classroom, and with its arrival on Netflix, it’s going to become even more popular. Then again, that also means even more people will judge it for its name, which, coincidentally, plays into one of the themes of your next favorite series.
Assassination Classroom Is Not What It Sounds Like
Assassination Classroom starts off with the mystery of how this strange, yellow creature managed to destroy the Moon. For what purpose? Why is the Earth going to be next? And why does the creature agree to become a teacher for a year, with the instruction that one of his students will be the one to kill him? Finally, why is the creature, named Koro-sensei by his students, so good at the job?
The Junior High students in Class 3-E are the real stars of the series, which quickly reveals itself to be more classroom than assassination. Sure, there’s other assassins that show up periodically, but the real joy of Assassination Classroom is to be found in the comedy of Koro-sensei’s hijinks while imparting real life lessons.
Season 1 follows the basic plot of the students bonding with Koro-sensei and grappling with the idea that, eventually, they will have to kill him. It can be a little slow, and the humor isn’t for everyone, but then Season 2 hits, and the entire series takes off with the speed of a bullet train. By the end, you’ll not only have your own favorite among the students of Class 3-E, but you’ll wish you had Koro-sensei as a teacher.
Assassination Classroom Faces Constant Bans And Boycotts
If Assassination Classroom is an emotional, comedic version of Dead Poet’s Society, then why has it joined a very different type of school anime and been banned in over 50 libraries and school districts across the United States? The name, for one, as Assassination Classroom puts an image in your head that’s technically correct, but there’s so much more to the story than that. Secondly, students having to kill their teacher sounds horrible in a vacuum, but in context, it’s an uplifting journey. Those who pushed for the bans never read the manga, never saw the anime, and, honestly, they likely haven’t read a book since eighth grade.
Now that Assassination Classroom is coming to Netflix in May, you can experience the journey of Koro-sensei and Class 3-E for yourself. Lerche, the animation studio behind the series, isn’t a huge name in anime, but they went on to animate Dangonronpa 3 and Classroom of the Elite, making them the go-to for a very specific anime niche. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll be impressed at Lerche’s animation style, and in the end, you’ll wonder how one of the best series of the last decade could be hidden away from those who would enjoy it the most.
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