Year Released: 11 seasons, beginning in 2011
Starring: Brenda Blethyn, Jon Morrison, Riley John, Kenny Doughty, David Leon
(Not Rated, 130 per episode)
Genre: Mystery and Suspense

“I couldn’t care less about the way I look on screen. If you did, you’d never play the interesting parts.” Brenda Blethyn, actress who plays Vera

*Season 12 has just been released here in the States, one episode a week. Continued excellence with our reincarnation of a modern/medieval monk.

Forget America’s all too beautiful Charlie’s Angels or those sexy Law and Order chicks. Meet Britain’s Vera. Bedraggled, frumpy, both brusque and vulnerable, she has an eye for detail that can almost compete with Sherlock Holmes, as well as a cache of little grey cells to rival Hercule Piroit. And yes, a frumpy trench coat that reminds us of Columbo.

With her caustic wit and singular charm, DCI Vera Stanhope and her trusted right-hand man face a series of captivating murder mysteries set against the breathtaking Northumberland landscape.

The series is so popular with the Brits that Vera is actually a Shabby Chic icon:

That long brown raincoat that DCI Vera Stanhope never takes off isn’t really a raincoat. She even sleeps in it, slumped in an armchair at her cold cottage after slugging back a couple of teacupsful of whisky . . . but it isn’t a nightdress either.

Other detectives have special coats, such as Sherlock’s student greatcoat, or Ellie’s orange anorak in Broadchurch. But the brown gabardine in Vera (ITV) …looks as if the costume department found it in a skip outside a charity shop. –Christopher Stevens

In fact, inspired by Vera, Stevens does a bit of detective work himself and concludes that the coat is really a monk’s cassock, with buttons sewed down the front to disguise its real nature. But Vera isn’t just a monk; she’s a cursed one at that:

Everywhere she (Vera) goes, people are barbecued, torched and incinerated. She’s probably been walking the earth since the Middle Ages, dragging her terrible fiery secret with her — it would explain why that cassock looks so battered. –Christopher Stevens

Not to mention the floppy fish hat, her modern version of Holmes’ famous deerstalker.

***

Vera is more proof that British mysteries are superior to most of ours across the pond. In addition to more subtle plots and acting, they do not feel the need to make their females ageless. As Different Drummer remarked earlier:

The 2012 delightful The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel features the twin 78-year-old stage and screen icons, Judi Dench and Maggie Smith. In that production both wear their wrinkles with pride, especially Maggie Smith, whose role is pivotal, stealing every scene as she waves her wattles with the same panache as an aged rooster.

Of course, it’s not Vera’s fashion sense or rotund body that viewers like. It’s her brain and the deep-seated compassion lurking under her shell. Not that you’d notice the latter when she speaks to her Northumberland detectives like an aged schoolmarm about to ruin their hands with a ruler, but underneath she is a sweetheart. Even if her pet detective, D.S. Joe Ashworth (David Leon) refers to her as “Mussolini” to his family, a fact spilled by his too-young-to-know-better-daughter when she greets Vera with that epithet.

Maybe the only indication of her underlying sweetness is that she calls just about everyone – even occasionally a murder suspect – “love.”

As in “I’m going to have to get your confession soon, love, or you won’t be able to have that cup of tea you are craving.” The steel hand in the velvet glove.

Just as in the equally good Shetland and Hinterland, this is rough and lonely country, not the post card pretty Midsomer Murders. And those lonely places are home to some grisly murders, too.

Different Drummer offers an episode sampling. (Notice how many die soggy deaths at sea. Or in flames.)

An apprentice electrician washes up on shore, two bodies found in water surrounded by flowers, a social worker murdered while swimming in a remote river, a former detective badly burned when his house is petrol-bombed, a screaming man on fire from top to toe, his blackened body found in the sea, a young man’s body found in a quarry, near a burnt-out poacher’s van, an old lady knifed in the back aboard the Metro train in Newcastle, a fisherman’s body tangled up in a trawler’s net, a shoeless woman found dead on the moors, “a lonely place to die as the wind shrieks in the bracken,” the body of a young man trussed up in bin bags, a young blogger jumping from a university roof, and a wildlife ranger found dead on a remote island.

Just a few of Vera’s grisly cases, which of course, are not nearly what they first seem. But that’s why we have Vera, who might not get it right at first, but like that medieval monk we compared her to earlier, she persists until she finds the truth.

Be her acolyte and follow Vera on her lonely path thought cropping moors and ragged coasts, cold water and raging fires to catch the culprit. She may even start to call you “love.”

–Kathy Borich
🥁🥁🥁🥁

Trailer

Film-Loving Foodie

Singing Hinnies is a specialty of the Northumberland area where Vera lives and works. And we know that eating good things is one of Vera’s weaknesses. Here are two variations of that magically named sweet.

A singin’ hinny is a type of scone cooked on a hot griddle pan. Baking powder is added as a raising agent to a mixture of flour, butter, lard, currants, salt and milk. As the mix cooks on the hot griddle, the fatty ingredients melt causing a hissing noise – as if the scones are singing. Hinny is simply a term of affection in Northumberland, proof of just how beloved this humble little scone is. –BBC Good Food.com

These gorgeous little cakes are traditional and popular in the North of England. The texture of the singing hinnies is very similar to scones, they’re light and crumbly. The name of these lovely cakes is very interesting, “hinnie” means “honey” that’s just how honey is pronounced in Northern England especially in Newcastle, and “singing” comes from when these cakes are cooked in a hot flat griddle pan, skillet or hot plate. The butter and the lard start to sizzle and start to sing. –Little Sunny Kitchen.com

Singing Hinnies

The Northern griddle cakes mixture is quite similar to scones. You have to make sure that the butter that you’re using in the recipe is super cold, it shouldn’t be frozen but cold. And so must be your hands and any equipments that you’re using. If your hands are warm, this can melt the butter and result in tough cakes.

Traditionally these gorgeous cakes are served warm with a knob of butter on top, but as I’m a person who loves sweets I ended up pouring a bit of honey on my cakes. BEST DECISION EVER. Next time I make these, I’m going to add some condensed milk! –Diana (Little Sunny Kitchen)

Ingredients

· 450 g plain flour

· 1/4 tsp bicarbonate of soda

· 1/2 tsp cream of tartar

· 1/2 tsp salt

· 4 oz. butter (cold)

· 4 0z lard

· 6 oz currants

· Milk

· Oil or butter for frying

Instructions

Step 1. Start by sifting the flour and salt.

Step 2. Rub in the super cold butter and lard with the dry ingredients.

Step 3. Mix in any dried fruit that you’re using, I’ve used dried currants.

Step 4. Start adding milk, but only enough to create a firm ball of dough.

Step 5. Roll out the dough ball, and using a very sharp knife cut into pieces. Lightly press down the pieces of dough with your hands, make sure that your hands are cold and not to press down the dough too much as it might prevent it from rising when baking.

Step 6. Grease a flat griddle pan with oil, and heat it. When the oil is hot, fry the cakes and turn them when the bottom starts to brown. Serve with a piece of butter on top and enjoy!

Little Sunny Kitchen.com