House Isolation Olympics

February 1st 2021

St Peter's 13-18 Lockdown

The House Isolation Olympics have returned with a range of challenges to help pupils stay connected and learn new skills at home.

We will be publishing Miss Mounter's pun-laden reports on this page each week as the results are announced.

Challenge 1

The Challenge: Treasure Hunt

Each House was given a list of thirty items to photograph and collate.

The Results:

So, for the first time since last July we have an Isolation Olympics Report...

According to the Office of National Statistics, it was the longest January since records began. Undeterred by the winter gloom, however, Isolation Olympics returned to our lives to join hands around the world in a truly global treasure hunt. With pupils unable to be in school, the images came from far and wide, from the Isle of Man in the UK to Macau in China.

As with all good treasure hunts it was good to see pupils DIG DEEP in this Xcellent challenge. AAAAAARRH, and I can tell you that it feels good to finally get those puns off my CHEST.

Of the many locations and objects, some PONDered where to find a body of water, while others appreciated that there really is no place like GNOME. For some, the building site objects were merely a hop, SKIP and jump away. There were TAILS of people going NUTS about their Squirrel snaps, and I was especially delighted to see pupils enthused about agricultural machinery – I’m an ex-TRACTOR fan myself.

Some of the church photos were inSPIRED, AISLE have you know. And in these days of iPhones and Galaxies, it was nice to be the RECEIVER of so many excellent pictures of phone boxes, but this was a hard CALL to make. Dron were experts in their FIELD. With all MANNER of excellent shots was The Manor. And RISING to the challenge was….The Rise.

And so to the judging - with so much pupil involvement, some excellent commentaries, and many wonderful images from these three Houses, this week we have a Holy Trinity of boarding winners – The Rise, The Manor and Dronfield take joint first place!

Challenge 2

The Challenge: Frugal February

Pupils were challenged to wake up their inner student cook and engage in some frugal cooking inspired by Miguel Barclay's Meat-Free One Pound Meals.

Local, seasonal vegetable dishes are often both environmentally and economically sustainable, and pupils were encouraged to use their imagination to create a tasty meal for their families.

Pupils sent in a snap of their ingredients as well as a photo of their finished meal. Each House received 5 points for every entry plus 5 bonus points for meals containing ingredients sourced from the UK only (excluding spices), and 5 bonus points for vegetarian entries.

The Results:

School House came up with some great recipes. In particular, the excellent fried cauliflower pieces from Alice Braim deserve a special mention. Or, to put it another way: Super Cauli fragile nuggets - expert Alice - School House (supercalifragilisticexpialidocious).

Also with a place at the table were Hope – Jodie Leon’s loaded veggie stir fry got special mention. No mere wok in progress, this was a great combination of Tofu, Cashew nuts, soy and hoisin sauces with beansprouts. Of course, some people say that Tofu is overrated – that’s just a-curd to me.

Queen’s delivered the goods with their local farm shop sourced meals – vegetarian sausages from Tudor Maude and Fraser Rigby, but I want to make special mention of Charlotte Oglesby’s innovative use of Brassica Oleracea in her memorable kale gratin – thanks a bunch.

Clifton came up with lots of veggie soups (particularly from the staff!!) - including some made from our very own pastoral newsletter recipes. I had hoped to sample a variety of the soups on offer, but made the mistake of trying a particularly hearty one first – and there wasn’t mushroom after that.

In Temple – Phoebe McKelvie put together parsnips, beetroot and rhubarb – all from her own garden – and cooked with ginger and spices to make a tasty broth – it was a souper combination.

There was so much wonderful world cooking from Dronfield that it’s hard to know where to begin. I should mention Polina Andreeva’s excellent red cabbage soup – it was simply the borchst. Or I could go on about the wonderful Wensleydale omelette made by Hope Simpson, but un oeuf’s enough.

Wendi Zhang was certainly currying favour with her Thai creation for The Rise. And it doesn’t get better than Lauren Wood’s Bruschetta. There were some excellent Paellas too – you could say Rise by name and Rise (rice) by nature….

However, it would be Tortellini accurate not to mention The Manor, who take their place at the head of the table this week with some standout Italian dishes. It’s true that some of their pasta efforts haven’t always put them in a winning position, but this week Jack Allard and Giacomo Grelli sauced some great ideas. I Cannelloni add my thanks to all of you who took part in this week’s challenge, and wish you all a lovely half term. Pasta la vista.

Challenge 3

The Challenge: Pets in Fancy Dress.

I’m pleased to say that there was a great number of entries from across the school and from around the world. As this is likely to be the last of the dreadful wordplay reports for a while, I should probably set to it right away, I don’t want you to think I’m not being punctual.

The Results:

Special mention goes to:

Masie Shaw’s pawfectly charming Cat in a Hat for Dronfield.

Mr Noy-Scott’s dog George sported a Manchester City kit, for your infurmation.

I want to mention Dronfield’s Holly Bletcher fur her canine entry. Let’s face it, there snoutbetter than a Dog in goggles.

The Grove’s Jasmine Nixon had a terrific snap of a dog dressed as action hero – Supawman

Dronfield’s Serene Kong submitted an excellent picture of a very cute, brown dog wearing a pink tie sitting at a wooden desk – as you may not have seen the picture I’m just trying to give you a ruff outline, you understand….

There was an excellent snap of Monty the Dog sporting a Clifton House sports top - worthy of the puparazzi, that one.

Ed and Ella Roebuck’s Hope House inspired dog – complete with glasses and tie was also notable, I have to say it was a really fetching outfit.

And Toby Search’s homemade masked dog video. It just goes to show that when you put your mind to it, anything’s pawsible. (Feign cough then say) Don’t worry, I’m not unwell, I’m just a little husky.

And now to the prizes:

Bleating other entries into 3^rd place this week was Dronfield with Phoebe Frank’s lamb. Well done!

Just tipping the scales and Finishing in 2^nd position was Clifton’s Finlay the 20 year old fish, who sported the Clifton House crest. Really wonderful! I don’t want to carp on about it, it’s neither the time nor the place.

And now to the 1st Prize. Throughout Isolation Olympics I’m proud that we’ve managed to present the good, the bad, and the rugby. Kitty Black’s ‘ready for the match’ rugby inspired dog really raised the woof. Well done, Kitty, your tried hard for Hope House!

Thank you to all of you for taking the time to participate in this series of Isolation Olympics challenges. Special thanks to the Heads of Houses who have coordinated this.

Now to the all-important overall winners of Lockdown 3.0 Isolation Olympics. It was a fierce competition. The Monitors and Heads of Houses gained extra points this time for their own challenges completed at our weekly meetings. My personal favourite was balancing a piece of fruit on their heads!

In the end, it was a very close call. In third place overall was The Rise; Dronfield took second, and just ahead of them was The Manor.

Well done. A trophy and treats will be on their way to you very soon.

Well, I was feline apprehensive about reading this report but, like Phoebe’s lamb, it wasn’t as baa-ed as I thought it would be. Huge thanks to Miss Mounter for creating the Isolation Olympics which has been such a positive feature during all the strange times of the last year or so. A fond farewell or perhaps au revoir.