Celebrity MasterChef Christmas Cook Off
Rating: 
Great British Truck Up
Rating: 
Three days to go and the telly schedules have officially hit Christmas overload — 24 shows with the C-word in their title across the six main channels in one day.
It began on BBC2 at 8.20am with A Very Country Christmas. Then came Dancing Through Christmas. BBC1 Morning Live At Christmas followed. Even after midnight was over, fairy lights kept flashing on BBC4 as The Truth About Christmas Carols.
In between, there was Christmas University Challenge on BBC2 and Jamie’s Quick And Easy Christmas on C4, ITV’s The Savoy At Christmas and C5’s Harrods At Christmas, as well as Christmas editions with Kirstie Allsopp, Paul Whitehouse and Bob Mortimer, Lucy Worsley, Sarah Beeny, Nigella Lawson and many more, all in party hats.
Celebrity MasterChef Christmas Cook-Off (BBC1) was the best. That had Strictly’s Oti Mabuse dressed as an elf-on-the-shelf and actress Su Pollard with shiny red baubles swinging from her outsize specs.
Fake snow falls on Celebrity MasterChef Christmas Cook-Off after Judi Love (pictured) was presented with her Golden Whisk trophy
Judges Gregg Wallace and John Torode dressed for the occasion — one in red and green with sprigs of holly, like a badly wrapped present; the other in a jumper showing a turkey disguised as Santa.
Joey Essex made a gigantic Yorkshire pudding inspired by his Toby Carvery. He filled it with sausages, roast turkey and stuffing, and dubbed it the ‘Essexmas dinner’. He then drank a bowl full of fruits in brandy.
Judi Love used Guinness Ice Cream to make a West Indian-style Christmas Pud, called Jamaican Black Cake.
John and Gregg loved it. Actually, they enjoyed everything. They were probably cheered by the alcohol-laced studio. It was almost like a cuddle.
Neil ‘Razor’ Ruddock got the gentlest reproof for mashing up his Christmas dinner and serving it as meatballs; and Su was scolded with a smile for serving a fruit salad that involved no cookery at all.
Joey Essex (pictured) made a gigantic Yorkshire pudding inspired by his Toby Carvery menu. He filled it with sausages, roast turkey and stuffing, and dubbed it the ‘Essexmas dinner’
Judi, the winner of her Golden Whisk trophy was so exaggerated there was even fake snow.
This whole experience felt almost as if you were being crushed with mince pies. This is exactly how Christmas should feel.
We wouldn’t be having Christmas at all without lorry drivers, as The Great British Truck Up (C4) was keen to remind us.
This one-off documentary followed a group of trainee truckers through a week’s course in handling a heavy goods vehicle, before a demanding test in which the smallest mistake could mean failure. Similar shows also found that the footage of drivers staying on their lanes in learner driver documentation is quite dull.
YouTube has made it possible to view footage of an articulated 18-wheel lorry that scatters traffic over six lanes before plowing into a snowbank. This is a good thing because such films are often shot on motorways from Kazakhstan.
The Great British Truck Up follows a group of trainee truckers through a week’s course in handling a heavy goods vehicle. One of the trainees was vicar John Hayhoe (pictured), who felt he could serve his fellow man better as a delivery driver than by giving sermons on Sunday
Two apprentices were looking for new careers that are lockdown-proof: a pilot and an instructor in car driving.
A vicar from Exeter was the most unusual. He felt he could better serve his fellow man as a delivery driver, rather than giving sermons Sunday. He did admit that he missed the weddings.
God’s grace is beyond all understanding. But the Rev Hayhoe passed his test first, and it was a good thing.