Saturday Morning with Jack Tame

Baked cheesecake
Serves 10-12
This is a great basic recipe for a baked cheesecake and feel free to innovate with flavours – add some orange zest, or swirl through some melted chocolate or coffee syrup, top with baked whisky-soaked figs or berries – the options are endless and a cheesecake is always a crowdpleaser.
It’s best to make this cheesecake the day before you intend to serve it to allow it to settle.
Base:
180g biscuits  - I use superwine but gingernuts, digestives etc all work too
¼ cup hazelnuts
1 Tb caster sugar
80g unsalted butter, melted
Filling:
250g cream cheese, room temperature
250g mascarpone
120g sour cream
½ cup coconut sugar (or use ¾ cup caster cugar)
1 tbsp cornflour
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs, separated
50mls pouring cream
Pinch salt

Preheat oven to 150 C. Line the bottom of a round 23cm springform cake tin with baking paper.
Make the base: crush biscuits and hazelnuts to a fine crumb in a food processor. Add  sugar and melted butter and mix thoroughly.  Tip out into the lined tin and press evenly into the base. Chill whilst you make the filling.
In a large bowl (or bowl of your cake mixer), beat cream cheese until smooth. Add mascarpone, sour cream, sugar, cornflour and vanilla extract and beat until combined. Add in egg yolks, cream and pinch of salt and beat until smooth.
In a separate bowl whisk the egg whites until stiff peaks and fold this gently into the cream mix. Pour mixture gently on top of the chilled base, smooth the top.
Bake for 1.5 hours until the top is golden brown and the very centre is only slightly jiggly. Turn the oven off, crack the door open a touch and leave cheesecake to stand in the oven for 2 hours. Take out and chill for at least 3 hours or overnight before serving.
To serve, run a knife around the edge of the tin before removing the ring, then carefully transfer cheesecake from the baking paper to a serving plate or board.

This week, Catherine Raynes reviews two new exciting books for you to read. 
The Nancy’s - RWR McDonald
A schoolgirl and her uncle and his boyfriend have two weeks to solve a murder in a small town style forgot…'A delight - moving and hilarious. I loved every minute I spent with these characters.' - Paddy O'Reilly, author of The Wonders Tippy Chan is eleven and lives in a small town in a very quiet part of the world - the place her Uncle Pike escaped from the first chance he got as a teenager. Now Pike is back with his new boyfriend Devon to look after Tippy while her mum's on a cruise.Tippy is in love with her uncle's old Nancy Drew books, especially the early ones where Nancy was sixteen and did whatever she wanted. She wants to be Nancy and is desperate to solve a real mystery. When her teacher's body is found beside Riverstone's only traffic light, Tippy's moment has arrived. She and her minders form The Nancys, a secret amateur detective club. But what starts as a bonding and sightseeing adventure quickly morphs into something far more dangerous. A wrongful arrest, a close call with the murderer, and an intervention from Tippy's mum all conspire against The Nancys. But regardless of their own safety, and despite the constant distraction of questionable fashion choices in the town that style forgot, The Nancys know only they can stop the killer from striking again.The Nancys is gripping and glorious, a heart-warming novel for anyone who's ever felt they were on the outside looking in. At its heart it is about the family we make and how we must summon the courage to face the truth, no matter what the cost may be. 
The Unhoneymooners - Christina Lauren
Olive is always unlucky: in her career, in love, in…well, everything. Her identical twin sister Ami, on the other hand, is probably the luckiest person in the world. Her meet-cute with her fiancé is something out of a romantic comedy (gag) and she’s managed to finance her entire wedding by winning a series of Internet contests (double gag). Worst of all, she’s forcing Olive to spend the day with her sworn enemy, Ethan, who just happens to be the best man.Olive braces herself to get through 24 hours of wedding hell before she can return to her comfortable, unlucky life. But when the entire wedding party gets food poisoning from eating bad shellfish, the only people who aren’t affected are Olive and Ethan. And now there’s an all-expenses-paid honeymoon in Hawaii up for grabs.Putting their mutual hatred aside for the sake of a free vacation, Olive and Ethan head for paradise, determined to avoid each other at all costs. But when Olive runs into her future boss, the little white lie she tells him is suddenly at risk to become a whole lot bigger. She and Ethan now have to pretend to be loving newlyweds, and her luck seems worse than ever. But the weird thing is that she doesn’t mind playing pretend. In fact, she feels kind of... lucky.

Monarch butterflies in winter.
Many people believe that butterflies live just for one day – or maybe a few days
Some insects just live long enough to mate and reproduce (mayflies and such critters – yes, perhaps.)
Butterflies tend to go on for weeks and weeks, especially when the weather is warm and when there’s plenty of food.
Monarchs can live for six to 8 weeks in the spring and summer months – no problems, but in winter it’s a totally different story: The species hibernates as adult butterflies and that means they can be around for 6 to 9 months.
Here’s their winter lifecycle:
Last generation monarch butterflies emerges from pupae around April / May.
They feed as long as they can until winter sets in.
Prolonged winter temps below 12/13 degrees will make them look for a hibernation place: usually a park or a group of tall trees.
There they tend to congregate (pheromones??) in variable numbers and simply hang from twigs and branches for day after day. Sometimes weeks and weeks.
Only start flying when it really warms up in the middle of the day/afternoon, before returning to their hibernation spot again to conserve energy.
Unlike the North American monarch populations (that make huge migration journeys to Mexico, where they hibernate in spectacular fashion), our monarchs literally wander around in no particular direction.
Good hibernation sites I’ve known were:
Tauranga Bay (Northland) (thousands!)
Whakatane in Kopeopeo (Hundreds)
Nelson near the cathedral (hundreds)
Various parks in Christchurch (hundreds and hundreds)
And even in Liffy Reserve Lincoln, just a few years ago (hundreds)
When spring arrives, the butterflies (often quite frayed-looking) find a mate and start laying eggs again.
You can support your monarchs (and other nectivorous insects and birds) by planting good flowering plants and shrubs.
For more information become a member of the Butterfly Trust:
https://www.monarch.org.nz/

Can't decide what TV shows you should be watching? TV critic Tara Ward joins Jack Tame to gives us her top picks for your viewing pleasure!
Straight Forward: The best elements of Danish and Kiwi TV combine in this electrifying new crime drama set in both Copenhagen and Queenstown (TVNZ OnDemand)
The Loudest Voice: an unrecognisable Russell Crowe stars in this seven-part miniseries based on Gabriel Sherman's non-fiction book The Loudest Voice in the Room, about the rise and ultimate fall of Fox News founder Roger Ailes (SoHo, Thursdays, 8:30pm)
Race Across the World: a BBC reality show where pairs of travellers race to reach the Far East without taking a single flight, and without a smartphone in sight (TVNZ1, Wednesdays, 8:30pm)

Touring pop star Troye Sivan has faith the LGBTIQ+ community can move past and "hopefully forget" the Israel Folau saga.
Perth-born singer Sivan is set to perform in Auckland in September and earlier announced a portion of ticket sales would be donated to local LGBTIQ+ charity RainbowYOUTH.
Sivan has enjoyed a meteoric rise from making YouTube songs in his bedroom to becoming a global star.
His sophomore album Bloom features the US Top 100 and New Zealand platinum hit My My My!, which he performed with Taylor Swift at her Rose Bowl show last year.
Other singles from the album included Bloom and Dance To This, featuring Ariana Grande.
Sivan told Newstalk ZB's Jack Tame he had "loosely" followed the controversy over Folau's sacking by Rugby Australia for making social media posts condemning homosexuals and others to hell, and called it a "real shame".
Public figures may not always realise how much weight their words could have on "closeted, confused" young people, he said.
He remembered such moments from his own childhood "very well" where people he cared about or films or people at school said comments, like "oh, that's gay".
They can be small examples but they all added up.
"It really does make a difference, and so I would hope people consider that and choose their words more wisely," he said.
"At the same time, I have faith in our community and all of the good work people are doing and we will completely survive this and forget about it one day."
Sivan said he was reluctant to embrace a tag of being a spokesperson for the LGBTIQ+ community because it was too diverse for any one person to speak for it.
"My reaction is to keep telling my own personal story because I can really only speak for myself," he said.
"At any opportunity I can, I try to pass the microphone onto someone else, who maybe wouldn't typically be heard as loudly."
Sivan's first EP TRXYE, debuted in the Top 5 on the US Billboard Charts in 2014.
His debut album, Blue Neighbourhood, released the following year and went Top 10 in Australia, New Zealand and the US, and topped the iTunes chart in 66 countries.
It led to two sold out North American tours.
His 2018 follow up album, Bloom, debuted at number three on the New Zealand Album Chart, and number four on the US Billboard 200 and Top 10 in many countries, including the UK.
However, Sivan's talents are not confined only to music - he is also model, director and actor.
He debuted on the silver screen playing young Wolverine in 2009's X-Men Origins: Wolverine and more recently appeared in Joel Edgerton's Boy Erased film and soundtrack.
Tickets for all his shows went on sale yesterday at 1pm.
The Bloom Tour 2019 – New Zealand
SPARK ARENA, AUCKLAND
FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 13
For complete tour, ticket and VIP Experience information, visit: troyesivan.com & livenation.co.nz

Every Saturday morning, movie critic Francesca Rudkin joins Jack Tame to take a look at what is playing at the movies this weekend.
TOY STORY 4
Woody (voice of Tom Hanks) has always been confident about his place in the world, and that his priority is taking care of his kid, whether that's Andy or Bonnie. So when Bonnie's beloved new craft-project-turned-toy, Forky (voice of Tony Hale), declares himself as "trash" and not a toy, Woody takes it upon himself to show Forky why he should embrace being a toy. But when Bonnie takes the whole gang on her family's road trip excursion, Woody ends up on an unexpected detour that includes a reunion with his long-lost friend Bo Peep (voice of Annie Potts). After years of being on her own, Bo's adventurous spirit and life on the road belie her delicate porcelain exterior. As Woody and Bo realize they're worlds apart when it comes to life as a toy, they soon come to find that's the least of their worries.
YESTERDAY
Jack Malik (Himesh Patel, BBC's Eastenders) is a struggling singer-songwriter in a tiny English seaside town whose dreams of fame are rapidly fading, despite the fierce devotion and support of his childhood best friend, Ellie (Lily James, Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again). Then, after a freak bus accident during a mysterious global blackout, Jack wakes up to discover that The Beatles have never existed... and he finds himself with a very complicated problem, indeed.

Think of all the things you could do in 16 months. 
You could learn an instrument in 16 months. You could train and compete in a marathon, hell, in 16 months you could probably train for and complete an ironman. In 16 months, you could become reasonably proficient in a new language if you were really dedicated. You could meet a new partner, fall in love, conceive a child, and have them settled in daycare within 16 months.
Yet we’re 16 months from the U.S election. 16 months!! Half an electoral term in New Zealand. And the race for U.S President has kicked into gear.
Donald Trump launched his campaign with one of his typical rallies, we’re gonna see a whole lot of those over the next year and a half. I dunno if you saw it, but actually there was nothing much to differentiate the rally from one that he would have given four years ago. He railed against the media. He railed against immigration, even though he’s been in charge since the start of 2017. And despite the fact she isn’t his opponent this time, he launched into attacks on Hillary Clinton, sparking the old ‘Lock Her Up’ chant. 
The Democrats then kicked off their primary contest with two nights of debates. They needed two of course, because there are so many Democrats vying to become the nominee next year.
Is that a risk? Only if the primary contest gets super nasty. If they’re spitefully cutting each other down, and the lowlier contenders don’t exit the race fast enough. One of the things we learnt from the last election is that Republicans are much more effective at quietly moving on from their nastiest barbs to coalesce around a candidate. Some of Trump’s harshest critics from the Primaries – the likes of Lindsey Graham - are now his strongest political allies.
The last election was actually decided by a minuscule number of votes. Hillary Clinton comfortably won the popular vote, but by the structure of the electoral college, Trump won by 77,000 votes across Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. 138 million votes cast and a group of people smaller than Palmerston North proved all the difference.
There are now some big strategic decisions for the Democrats to make. They have to decide whether to simply chase those 77,000 votes with a candidate who might appeal to previous Trump voters, or whether to try and blitz Trump with someone completely different. 
Is it better to go with someone like Joe Biden, who would effectively represent a reset, a return to the norms of U.S politics? Or better to go with someone who represents radical change? Bernie Sanders is vowing to wipe out 1.5 trillion in student debt. He wants universal healthcare! 
Having lived there and covered the last two U.S elections, I can’t tell you at the moment what I think is the best of those two strategies. Because I think there’s one other.
It has been mooted firstly as a joke, but increasingly seriously. My favourite American politico is the comedian and provocateur Bill Maher. He made a good pitch for this candidate last week. A candidate who would dazzle the electorate with their star power. A candidate who would cut across economic and racial lines, the groups by which we try to define voter blocks. A candidate who says they’ve been offered campaign financing by billionaires who’ve pleaded with them, desperately, to enter the race. 
Bill Maher reckons this candidate is the only sure thing. The only person guaranteed to unite Democrats and independents and to sew the first in unifying a divided America.
It might sound absurd but I can’t think of a good argument against it.
And just imagine, 16 months from now. President Donald Trump defeated, by President Elect Oprah Winfrey.

This one-pot dish is tasty and wonderfully easy to throw together and it contains all-important lentils.  We ought to be eating pulses/legumes 3-4 times per week for optimum body function so get cooking beans, chickpeas, lentil, split peas and the rest this winter.
Serves 2
½ cup brown or puy lentils, soaked overnight  (see note)
1 ½ cups well-salted water
2 tbsps olive oil
4 pieces chicken
1 onion, diced
1 carrot, peeled and diced
Few sprigs of rosemary
1 cup vegetable to chicken stock (can use water)
2 tbsps pomegranate molasses
Salt and pepper to season
Small handful parsley to garnish

Drain soaked lentils then boil in water for 20-25 minutes until beginning to soften. Drain and set aside. Rinse saucepan.
Heat oil in rinsed saucepan and brown chicken. Add onion, carrots and rosemary and sauté for 2-3 minutes. Pour in stock and pomegranate molasses and drained, par-cooked lentils. Cover and simmer for 20 minutes or until chicken is cooked through and lentils are al dente. Simmer with lid off for 5-10 minutes if still too liquid. Taste and season with salt and pepper.
Garnish with parsley and serve. 

Note: Alison’s Pantry has just introduced some quick cook pulses which take less than 5 minutes to cook so feel free to use those or canned lentils in this recipe.

This week, Catherine Raynes reviews two new exciting books for you to read. 
The Tenth Muse - Catherine Chung
From childhood, Katherine knows she is different, and that her parents are not who they seem to be. But in becoming a mathematician, she must face the most human of problems—who is she? What is the cost of love, and what is the cost of ambition? 
State of the Union - Nick Hornsby
Tom and Louise meet in a pub before their couple's therapy appointment. Married for years, they thought they had a stable home life--until a recent incident pushed them to the brink.Going to therapy seemed like the perfect solution. But over drinks before their appointment, they begin to wonder: what if marriage is like a computer? What if you take it apart to see what's in there, but then you're left with a million pieces?

LISTEN TO THE AUDIO ABOVE AS STEVEN DROMGOOL SPEAKS TO JACK TAME