A Taste of My Life (Monday6.30pm, BBC2)
There’s something comfortingly lovely about A Taste of My Life, with Nigel Slater’s gentle meandering through the life of a different personality each day using the evocative power of food and eating as its touchstone. Tonight, veteran actress Liz Smith is sitting in Nigel’s kitchen. Always a pleasure, albeit an undemanding one.
Mary, Queen of Shops (Monday 9pm, BBC2)
One of the better of the buck-your-ideas-up reality shows sees Mary Portas walk into failing clothes shops/boutiques and very sternly point out what the proprietor’s are doing wrong - which is usually everything. Tonight’s task seems to be a particularly tough one as Mary gets shouted down by the manager’s husband (who just happens to be the shop’s owner) at every turn. A frustratingly entertaining watch.
Dickens’s Secret Lover (Monday 9pm, C4)
Charles Dance introduces this docu-drama that attempts to set aside the gruffly avuncular image of Charles Dickens as presented for many years. Family man Dickens, a popular figure of British respectability to this day, went to great lengths to keep his affair with Nelly Ternan, an actress 27 years his junior, a secret, and this biographical piece attempts to lift the lid on the scandal that bubbled beneath the author’s literary veneer. The excellent David Haigh stars as Dickens.
The Supersizers Go… Elizabethan (Tuesday 9pm, BBC2)
More entertaining culinary adventures in the company of Giles Coren and Sue Perkins who this week jump in their gastronomic TARDIS to soak up some Elizabethan cuisine. It’s perhaps the most arduous task the Supersizers have taken on yet and you’ll need a strong stomach just to watch Coren and Perkins dive into some of the feasts on offer. Sheep’s head with offal, anybody?
Battlestar Galactica (Tuesday 9pm, Sky One)
Oooh, it’s all getting tense on board the Galactica as the fourth season gets to the mid-season break so we can all catch our breath - will we find out who the last Cylon is, where Earth is and whether Adama will ever crack a smile again? It’s fast, it’s furious, it’s Battlestar Galactica!
Neighbours (Wednesday 1.45pm Five)
Awwww, it’s time to say goodbye to a Ramsay Street legend (again) as Harold Bishop (the always loveable Ian Smith) turns his back on Erinsborough. It’s enough to bring a tear to the eye of the most-hardened Neighbours devotees, but fear not, the old fella may, we hear, be popping back from time to time. One thing’s for sure, Ramsay Street will be a quieter place from now on.
EastEnders (Wednesday 8pm, BBC1)
A double helping of EastEnders action tonight that crams a bit of everything in there. Mad May is back for Summer and she isn’t leaving Albert Square without taking her from Dawn’s arms. There’s some quite tense stuff in here, with both Amanda Drew (May) and Kara Tointon (Dawn) on good form as the loony GP locks them in the house. Elsewhere the Albert Square Best of British day is underway, and there’s a real sense of community that’s been missing from the soap for some time. In the past, ‘Enders would have attempted to give the Dawn/May face-off the self-contained two-hander treatment, but the other events in Albert Square help to texture things nicely and move things forward.
Holby City (Wednesday 9pm, BBC1)
Gordon Ramsay? In Holby City? You are having an F Word laugh!
River Cottage Spring (Wednesday 9pm, C4)
I like Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall. He’s like a cross between a batty Oxford professor and Hugh Grant, all packaged up in a gangly, earthy frame. I hear women go weak at the knees as he talks with passion about podding peas, and why wouldn’t they when he enthuses with this much passion about the work of River Cottage? In tonight’s final episode, Spring is on the cusp of Summer and the gang are working flat out to make elderflower champagne and spit roast the pigs for the Spring fair.
Britain’s Lost World (Thursday 9pm, BBC1)
A nicely revealing natural history documentary that sees buff historian Dan Snow, naturalist Steve Backshall and breathlessly enthusiastic Kate Humble head for the remote British World Heritage site of St Kilda. St Kilda is a jagged wasteland, home to thousands and upon thousands of birds, from puffins to gannets - and until 80 years ago was home to a small population before the island was abandoned in the face of failing crops. It’s nicely done with some beautiful photography and some genuinely interesting insights into what life must have been like for the islanders who performed death defying feats every day just to catch their dinner on a sheer cliff face.
Heroes (Thursday 9pm, BBC2)
Hiro finally returns from the past to discover his father his dead, and immediately jumps back into the past to prevent his murder. What else will he discover there? Mohinder is still droning on (does he ever shut up?), Matt’s mental abilities are still growing and Claire is kidnapped. Finally this season is starting to pick up, just as it’s about to finish. Ah well, better luck next time guys!
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