A Lesson in Loss From the Greatest Come Dine With Me Contestant Of All Time

We are not very good at losing here on this little island. Whenever Gareth Southgate spoons a crucial penalty into the palms of Andreas Köpke we say: well, we always lose on penalties. We sigh and go: well, let's just politely cry St. George's Flag facepaint down the front of our face. We go: let's not make a fuss, just quietly fold up into a ball and be sad about it. We go: we'll laugh about this, one day, in the form of a Pizza Hut advert starring Chris Waddle.

Haha, hold the fuck on:

Obviously this is amazing in every way. The little Brent-esque look to camera after he accuses his fellow Come Dine With Me contestant of being functionally idiotic. The way they all sit still in that unique way children sit when one of them is being told off. The line "with all the grace of a reversing dump truck without any tires", which he'd 100% already practised under his breath in the kitchen while fanning £1,000 out under a silver cloche. That quiet, precise kind of fury, cold-blooded, that in any other nationality would come out in the form of serial-killing, but in Britain we just funnel into parring off competitive dinner party guests about their gnocchi. Beautiful. Trembling. Artistic.

Listen: I have watched a lot of Come Dine With Me in my time. More than you might expect for someone who actually has a job. The brassy young nans who wear fascinators whenever they are asked to dress up. The bald men with puce sunburn and a single gold earring artlessly making paella. Someone called Shan saying "I like it hot" and throwing a hundred chillies into a jambalaya. A man in a tight striped shirt who stoically doesn't eat pudding. A chemistry student who doesn't know how to ribbon a courgette. I love them all.

And so to east Oxfordshire, where this week we have Charlotte – a sunbeam in the shape of a human, an exceptionally chirpy blonde; Jane, a quite hard-seeming fun policewoman; and Adam, an ancient-looking medical student and American man. Then you've got Big Peter Marsh.

Big Peter Marsh is basically clean-living Nick Griffin. Right: imagine Nick Griffin never had his eye exploded out by a discarded shotgun shell, and never withered in that kind of Disney villain way extremely racist men wither – heads sinking into their necks, wrists limping evilly, their backs cowing under the intense pressure of hating the EU – and went to a lot of spa weekends, and didn't go out much in the sun, and spent a lot on hand and face creams, and you've got Peter. That's not libel, is it? You can't get sued for saying someone looks like the Sliding Doors version of Nick Griffin who got into detox tea instead of hating Islam. I'm pretty sure about that.

Peter is competitive. Peter is a salesperson. Peter wears khakis. Peter, on the popular pyjamas shape the onesie: "they should all be taken out in the middle of the street and burned." Peter, on chicken wrapped in ham: "I'm not a fan of things wrapped in other things." Peter has a teatowel holder in his kitchen which is made of plastic and is in the shape of a cat, and the actual holder bit is the arsehole (of the cat). This is the kind of man we are dealing with. We are dealing with a plastic arsehole liker. A man who – daily – pushes a damp teatowel into a plastic cat's arsehole.

So Soft Skin Nicky Griff is here and he's arguably cooked the nicest dinner of the week – Happy Charlotte literally made something called 'Chirpy Chicken Wrapped in Hooray Ham', Jane made fishcakes, and Adam the American made deep-dish pizza starters and milk and cookies for pudding, the maniac – and Pete's out here banging out pecorino salads, three-ways desserts, unctuous slow-roasted beef. Motherfucker grilled a peach. He was the winner. His food was the best. He won.

But watch it again:

Because Come Dine With Me is not just about the food, is it, it is about atmosphere, and I would say Peter's biggest error was – possibly, but can't be quite sure – calling Jane a "fat troll" over the beef course. That was maybe… I mean, that was maybe an error. Doesn't matter how you spin it: that, perhaps, soured the night a bit. Shouting "I AM A BETTER COOK THAN YOU" and saying the other two competitors were "there for the experience" immediately before the crucial final round of scoring was tactically inept. Doesn't matter how good a posset you just whipped up. Calling one guest a troll and two others child-brained food idiots tends to lose you points for atmosphere. This is Come Dine With Me 101.

But while yes, he's causing chaotic scenes not suited to the genteel teatime entertainment of competitive cooking, he is teaching us all a lesson in loss. Loss is the absence of something, and we don't mourn it enough. We are bad at anguish. Anguish is your voice wobbling slightly while saying "take your money and get off my property". Anguish is kicking an entire TV crew furiously out of your house so you can cry weakly while doing the washing up. Peter has a £1,000-shaped hole in his life, and he is expressing his disgust astutely. He'd already spent that £1,000 in his head (new printer, new dressing gown, £120 bottle of wine), and now that is gone. Is that any way different to losing a limb, a shot at the title, a beloved friend or pet? I would argue that it is not.

Come Dine With Me is an exceptionally British show – quiet, cosy, competitive without being fierce, an underwhelming prize, most of the competitors are just students hoping to spend their allotted food budget on actual food for the month – but the moments when it soars are when people are quietly told that they have lost and then they go purse-lipped and berserk, spooling out conspiracy theories about deliberate low scores and clusters of tactical voting. And this is the best. This is the best one yet. "Take your money and get off my property" is a Come Dine With Me battle cry for the ages. Losing at cooking so hard you say, "Dear Lord, what a sad little life, Jane" makes for an iconic adult tantrum. Suggesting the winner spend her money on "lessons in grace and decorum" – which I have Googled, and do not exist – is amazing toy-pram displacement. Furious Come Dine With Me losers is what makes Britain great. Peter Marsh is arguably the greatest.

@joelgolby

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