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Doug Ford’s Cheesecake Is Here, And We Have Some Burning Questions

Why is he wearing gloves? Whose kitchen is he in?

Like many people during the coronavirus pandemic, it appears Ontario Premier Doug Ford has got really into baking in the past few months.

After cryptically teasing it all week, Ford dropped a how-to video for his “famous” cherry cheesecake on social media Friday.

“Today, we’re going to make the famous premier’s cheesecake,” Ford says in the video.

He said the recipe comes from a recipe taught to him by his mother when he was 10 years old. The cheesecake — a simple recipe involving a lot of Dream Whip, cream cheese and canned cherry filling — honestly looks pretty tasty.

Here’s the recipe, if you’re curious for yourself.

Doug Ford's "famous premier's cheesecake" recipe.
Twitter: @FordNation
Doug Ford's "famous premier's cheesecake" recipe.

But Ford’s sudden turn into a Food Network star and the two-minute video leave us with a lot of questions.

Why is he wearing gloves?

This is honestly the most pressing question here.

Why is Doug Ford wearing gloves to make cheesecake?
Twitter: @FordNation
Why is Doug Ford wearing gloves to make cheesecake?

Throughout the video the premier is wearing what appears to be blue surgical gloves. If he were kneading bread or doing other hand-intensive activities I might understand it, but this is cheesecake. It’s not very finger-involved.

Maybe Ford just really wants to keep his hands clean, or maybe it’s a nod to the ongoing conversations around personal protective equipment and COVID-19 crisis. We may never know.

Whose kitchen is he in?

Some Twitter users were quick to point out that Ford seemed to be cooking from the same kitchen as his nephew and Toronto city councillor Michael Ford. The younger Ford tweeted a photo of himself in a similar cooking arrangement a few weeks earlier.

So whose house is it?

Canadaland editor Jonathan Goldsbie noted that it appears to be the Ford family home, still registered to Doug’s late mother.

A source from the premier’s office confirmed to HuffPost Canada that the location was Ford’s late mother’s house, and that a videographer was there abiding by social distancing recommendations.

No word on if Ford broke the rules on gatherings again to have his kids over to eat the cheesecake, though.

Why call it the “famous premier’s cheesecake”?

Notably, this is not the Ford family cheesecake. This is not Doug Ford’s cheesecake. It is the “famous premier’s cheesecake.”

I don’t have an answer to this, but I’m curious. Is there some secret pact among premiers that once elected you learn the “famous” premier’s cheesecake? Or is it just an Ontario thing and former premier Kathleen Wynne passed on a can of cherry filling to Ford when he took office?

Did Doug Ford just give me permission to eat an entire cheesecake alone? Because I will.

To complicate things further, in the video Ford calls the cheesecake perfect for “self-isolation” which to me reads as permission to eat the entire cheesecake by yourself.

“Friends, stay safe, stay healthy and these are some of the fun things you can do when you’re self-isolating,” Ford says.

We’ve spent the duration of the pandemic listening to the advice of our government and health officials about social distancing and mask wearing and whatnot. If the premier of Ontario says to eat a whole cheesecake alone, you better believe that’s what I’ll do.

Did he mean a factory for cheesecake, or the popular family dining establishment The Cheesecake Factory?

At one point during the video, Ford quips that if he wasn’t premier, he would “open up a cheesecake factory.”

The sign for a Cheesecake Factory restaurant.
LPETTET via Getty Images
The sign for a Cheesecake Factory restaurant.

But is Ford referring to an actual factory that makes cheesecake or the family casual-dining establishment, The Cheesecake Factory? The latter makes total sense — in a weird way Ford reminds me a lot of my first general manager at the East Side Mario’s I worked at in Red Deer, Alberta in 2011.

The man has strong casual-dining restaurant manager vibes.

Is “Cooking with Doug” going to become a regular thing?

The video includes a cute little graphic logo of a chef’s hat with the words “Cooking with Doug.” This suggests there could be more Ford-centric cooking videos in the coming days and weeks.

People are already suggesting recipes for the next episode.

Honestly, there are a lot of creative cooking show names Ford could’ve gone with.

DoFoodie. Food For Ford. Douglicious. Queen’s Kitchen. Knife And Ford. Ford’s Food Nation.

The list goes on.

What’s the deal with those ingredients?

Two observations here:

  1. Glad to see that despite being in Ontario, the bagged milk capital of the world, Ford does the sensible thing and uses milk from a carton.
  2. I had to Google what powdered “Dream Whip” is. Why didn’t he just use whipped cream or whip up some cream?

Does his shirt have a special meaning?

Throughout the video, Ford sports a shirt reading “We’re all in this together.” As much as I wish it was a reference to the seminal 2006 Disney Channel original film “High School Musical,” it’s actually for a good cause.

The shirts are being sold by Lindsay Sportsline, an Ontario custom clothing outlet, to raise money for the Kawartha Lakes Food Source.

You can get one for yourself here.

What are people saying about Doug Ford’s cheesecake?

Lots of people seem to like it.

Cheesecake: it’s the great political uniter.

Most importantly: is the cheesecake good?

Ford seems to think so. Any fans of the reality competition television series “The Next Food Network Star” know that you always have to taste the food. And taste the food, Ford does.

After plenty of satisfied mouth sounds, he ends the video with a hearty chuckle.

“Ho ho!” he exclaims. “I haven’t had one of these in years.”

Now all I want is Claire from the Bon Appetit Test Kitchen to do a “Gourmet Makes” of Doug Ford’s cheesecake. Or should I say, the “famous premier’s cheesecake?”

Someone please make that happen.

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