TV Times tops picks for tonight
What’s on telly tonight? Here the TV Times team of expert reviewers highlight three of the best shows on telly tonight for Friday 1st December
Christmas on Gold, from 7.45am, Christmas Gold
You wait all year for a Christmas special of your favourite show, then fall into an eggnog/trifle/turkey-induced coma the second it comes on. Gold has the answer, and is rebranding itself as Christmas Gold to deliver an entire month of seasonal faves. Usual but very welcome suspects include Mrs Brown’s Boys and The Royle Family, but other gems include Citizen Khan, The Good Life, One Foot in the Grave, The Two Ronnies, The Vicar of Dibley and Last of the Summer Wine. The standout this evening must be part one of the Only Fools and Horses Christmas trilogy from 1996. Yes, the caped crusaders one. Rating: ****
Jamie and Jimmy’s Friday Night Feast, 8.00pm, C4
The Absolutely Fabulous Joanna Lumley drops in on the boys at their café at the end of Southend Pier, and in her honour they have put together their first ever vegetarian menu. Jamie makes a delicious m’hanncha or ‘snake cake’ – a spiral of filo pastry stuffed with pearl barley and butternut squash – while Joanna cooks her favourite Malaysian dish, conjuring up memories of growing up in Malaysia. Later, Jimmy creates a vertical vegetable patch for a 10th-floor city balcony, proving there’s no excuse not to grow your own, no matter where you live. Rating: ****
Australian Wilderness, 8.00pm, ITV (ex Scot, NI, Wales)
Ray Mears ventures into the ‘Valley of the Giants’ or Walpole Forest in Western Australia, home to some of the world’s widest (24-metre girths) and tallest trees – the tingles and karris. But it’s the creatures that live here that Ray wants to find, so he enlists the help of environmentalist Prue Anderson, who takes him to the best areas to spy possums, bandicoots and a small, shy marsupial – the quokka. Rating: ****
More previews tomorrow
