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[Muse_Of_Fire]

Well I meant it insofar as food is (for lack of a better word) "religion" for me. Do I eat mac and cheese out of a box? Sure. Do I consider it "beneath" me to do so? not really. I'm still getting nutrients and satisfying the hungry feeling. But it's not the same for me as when I go to the farmer's market and get locally-grown organic cheese, and make my own pasta, and do it all from scratch myself. To me that seems more satisfying on a physical and spiritual/emotional level, and is therefore more "real."

Understand, I'm coming at this from the premise that self-nourishment can be a spiritual activity, which is not a viewpoint shared by most of the population. So right there I know my perspective is skewed. I view food, and the preparation of it (from birth of the animal/veggie/fruit to plate) as art, and as such have a high standard of quality for my expectation of it. This is tempered by the fact that I understand the reality of the world we live in, and that it's a global economy and that expediency and market forces have an effect on peoples' food choices. This is what prevents me from being a total food Nazi, and enables me to participate in the "mac and cheese out of a box culture" as it were without too much cognitive dissonance. It just means I don't settle for that as my relationship to food.

God, I sound like a total snob. That's so not my intention. It's hard to explain.

[CortJstr]

There are shows on FN other than Good Eats?

I tried watching Iron Chef America back when it was a 4 episode special and it just wasn't good. AB could not handle a one-man booth and the host kept saying Alton in a weird way.

[slink]

But to claim that that's "real" food? No way in hell.

Can'd, for being a fellow food nazi. It's the only way to be.  My brother and I were discussing just the other evening (he's a total foodie as well, and another Bourdain fan - I just passed him all of  No Reservations as they refuse to show it over here) that while we know vegetarians who stopped eating meat because they don't like  bad, processed meat, we stopped eating bad, processed meat for that reason. That said, I wouldn't eat mac and cheese out of an anything! There are... literally only three things I use from a can - the best brand of tinned chopped tomatoes I can find, for sauce mostly, chick peas and other beans that will cope with it, and Confit de Canard, which may as well not be considered canned!
I am still proud of the fact I have never eaten a McDonald's or Burger King 'burger' for instance, as they smell so foul, and not in the way a durian fruit does or something. There's no promise of a treat lying behind that smell of death and sewerage.
Maybe I'm predisposed to not mind eating the 'icky' stuff, having grown up with haggis as my national dish...

Lunch today - fresh bread, roasted eggplant, slathered in olive oil and good salt, with a quick garlic yoghurt thrown together. 20 minutes work...

[Bjorn the Destroyer]

Lunch today - fresh bread, roasted eggplant, slathered in olive oil and good salt, with a quick garlic yoghurt thrown together. 20 minutes work...

Can'd for good nutrition.

[side_show]

Rachel Ray reminds me of the sort of girl who was a highschool cheerleader because she actually liked football, then she married the quarterback, and now they just sit there and swear at the t.v. playing clips of games they've already seen.  And their lives are empty.  They're just so empty.  I think in all honest that Rachel Ray just wants to make buffalo wings and let her body go.  That is what I think.

Also, I no longer get the Food network, which is for the best, because Iron Chef always came on at Midnight, and I kept staying up and being so fuck*ng tired the next day, but damn if I didn't know how to make mushroom sorbet.

[Choop]

Jeez. Last night (Thursday) the missus and I made a rack of lamb and carrot-pea risotto for dinner, and shared a bottle of Shiraz while and after we ate. We even used the special Italian carnaroli rice, which is perfect for risotto.

In our defense, the peas were frozen and the shiraz was Two Buck Chuck.


I have a hard time watching Alton, because he skips steps in some shows that he insists you never skip in other shows. Consistency should be required. As for the rest, Sandra Lee can die masturbating with a bazooka for all I care, and take out the whole Deen family with her. Rachael Ray needs to be disappeared, and Giada can teach me a recipe whenever she wants. I'm just glad Michael Chiarello isn't on Food Network, as then I would have to gouge out my eyes with a length of coaxial cable. Emeril needs to hang it up: I know how to melt down a chocolate bar and dip a pretzel in it, thanks. Bobby should calm down and take a lesson from Jamie Oliver: film a season or two, then drop it, go away for a couple years, and come back with a new show. I don't need three hours a day of Bobby Flay. Finally, GOD am I glad The Best Of is only on while I'm working. Jill Cordes and Mark Whatshisfuck can go fuck themselves into a coma. Jesus they're awful.

[Carlos del Vaca]

Finally, GOD am I glad The Best Of is only on while I'm working. Jill Cordes and Mark Whatshisfuck can go fuck themselves into a coma. Jesus they're awful.

They're kind of lame, sure, but that show isn't so much about them.  They're the annoyingly perky hosts, sure, but to a fair degree they stay out of the way and show the restaurants or what have you that they're covering.  It's nowhere near as personality-driven as much of Food Network's other fare.

I like that George Duran's show, somewhat in spite of myself.  Goofy as hell, but enjoyable.

[littlefallsmets]

Bobby Flay just screams to me:

"I am the sort of douchebag who thinks that I am street because I am from the NYC area, never mind that I am from the North Fork of Long Island or whatever and made more on tips as a caddy during my high school summers than you do in your adult job! I am a tough douchebag! I am from the mean streets of Suffolk County, represent!"

Fratty dipshit.

Alton, at least, is just a full-on unabashed nerdlinger. I identify with nerdlingers. I am a nerdlinger.

[slink]

Alton, at least, is just a full-on unabashed nerdlinger. I identify with nerdlingers. I am a nerdlinger.

That's the thing. While he may not be the best cook out there, and an awful lot of the stuff he makes I either make already, or feel is beneath my palette (I need homemade corndogs about as much as I need gastro-enteritis, or bought corndogs - what next? How to homecook pancake-wrapped sausages on a stick!?), he will actually teach you some really interesting shit about food. Even when making the mundane stuff. I just dig learning shit I guess.
I gave up downloading Good Eats after a while though. The effort wasn't quite worth the payoff, and I had a lot of other stuff to grab. I probably caught the first couple of seasons or so at any rate.

I havent seen an awful lot of the other people that are spoken of. I really just trust Bourdain's word for it, and now you guys. Rachel Ray sounds fuck*ng awful for sure. Emeril is obviously unavoidable, and well there are vast sections of Futurama I'd be lost through without knowing him. Flay and the likes also we just never got over here.
We had a  Mario Batali series on over here recently. While I was mostly underwhelmed by what he made on it, I wasn't really paying attention as it was on at the wrong time, and having seen the No Reservations featuring Salumi (oh man, what I'd give to have that in my lunch repertoire) I wouldn't mind seeing some more to possibly redress my judgement.
Back in the day I used to dig watching Jacques Pepin's show, and wonder where shows of that quality have disappeared to...

As for the shows we do get... Jamie Oliver I have some real issues with, but by and large he cooks some good looking food on his shows. I could do with less of his lifestyle and tongue mind you, and his Italian series seemed a bit pompous (some Essex lad going to Italy to show them how to cook and all). But he's one of the best TV cooks we've had in a long time, if not ever. There have been a couple of others - the bikers one of late has been quite interesting, the Two Fat Ladies, while bonkers, can be quite good.
One of the best things on at the moment is the new version of Masterchef, since after the first half of the first season John Torrode stopped seeming objectionable, and has actually been giving people really good advice on how to get better, and we've seen some interesting cooks going through it. Oh, and I can't forget Rick Stein, who will wax lyrical about good, fresh, honest local produce, and cooks some really good food (as well as having the best sidekick in all of food TV). Nick Nairn and Paul Rankin used to do good TV cookery (to fulfill the Celtic contingent), but neither of them have done anything on TV in a long time, though I was pleased to see Rankin show up on No Reservations this season.

Unfortunately, we have also spawned the evil trio! Ainsley Harriett is straightforwardly one of the most irritating men on the planet, and a dire cook, if you can call him a cook. Anthony Worrell Thompson is a man who claims to be a great chef, and yet will cut the fat off a piece of lamb, apparently thinking it will make it better... He also prepared 'good old British faggots' when competing on the Great British Menu to cook for the Queen's birthday. I think he was the only chef there (all professionals) to actually burn his food, the fuck*ng jackass. You couldn't pay me to patronise one of his 'grillhouses'. And then there's Gary Rhodes. The chef with no tastebuds. Literally! I can't remember why, but he basically has a very limited sense of taste, and it shows. He will make a wild mushroom risotto, then top it with black pudding, bacon bits, parmigiano, herbs, and will likely not stop there. He just does not know when to stop. And, the three of them now appear alongside each other in one of the most irritating washing-up liquid adverts ever, just to write them all off.

Most of our UKTV channel is just filled with Rhodes, Worrell Thompson, Harriett and garbage 'food magazine' shows that treat you like a child (reviewing which supermarket does the best frozen ham and pineapple pizza, for those nights when you don't have time to cook... 'cause making some dough on the weekend, sticking it in the fridge and spending the extra couple of minutes preparing it yourself is just too much effort for good food?). And the rest is just repeats of the good shows, if you're lucky.
And while I have respect for Ramsay as a chef, and his cohorts (there was a good program featuring him and Marcus Waring assisting Angela Hartnett when she got the job at the Connaught), I don't rate any of the shows he does, and he's not a good presenter.

Anyway, enough ranting... If it isn't apparent, food may have become my second biggest vice, after music (and pot).

[littlefallsmets]

The only thing that bothers me about Mario Batali is that he isn't out of the closet.

I don't know why this bothers me so much, I am usually supportive of gay folk who feel the need to stay in for their careers or families or whatever... as a straight man, I probably have no right to judge him for that but... he's just SO gay. SO VERY GAY. Gayer than Tom Cruise mounting Vin Diesel in a field of wild flowers. He once had Michael Stipe in his audience, for God's sake!

He's a chef! A television chef! He can totally admit he is gay.

If the little bald troll dude with the DYI show can admit he is gay and have his career flourish, Mario can admit he is gay.

I don't know why it bothers me so much. But it does.

Also: Emeril without audience, in his "essence" show? I like well enough to watch for a half hour.

It is Overthetop Live Audience Emeril that is Terrible.

[CortJstr]

That's the thing. While he may not be the best cook out there, and an awful lot of the stuff he makes I either make already, or feel is beneath my palette (I need homemade corndogs about as much as I need gastro-enteritis, or bought corndogs - what next? How to homecook pancake-wrapped sausages on a stick!?), he will actually teach you some really interesting shit about food. Even when making the mundane stuff. I just dig learning shit I guess.
I gave up downloading Good Eats after a while though. The effort wasn't quite worth the payoff, and I had a lot of other stuff to grab. I probably caught the first couple of seasons or so at any rate.

To be fair the idea behind Good Eats is to give regular people a jumping off point for ingredients that they might not otherwise try. It more bugs me when he goes super home-made. "Here's how to make pocket pies (a convenience food) with dough you made yourself. I could tell you what kind of store-bought dough to use and how to use it, but that would actually help you in real life."

[Muse_Of_Fire]

Slink, I think I love you. And the only way I can express it is with a can.

I think what bugs me so much about the FN and the "bobbleheads" that populate it (and the bobblehead groupies of the bobbleheads that populate it), is that they feel this need to talk talk talk about the food like it's something mystical.

Okay okay so I just got done going on and on about how food is spiritual for me, and it is. So you're probably thinking that, given that, the above is a contradiction. But it's not.

If I start from the premise that food is a spiritual thing; that the cultivation and preparation and consumption of it is spiritually fulfilling, then we can operate on somewhat of a religious analogy. This would make the "bobbleheads" and their fans, in my worldview, kind of like Jehovah's Witnesses or Televangelists:

*knock knock*

"Hello! Let me tell you about roast rack of Sisteron lamb studded with rosemary and garlic! Let me tell you the Good News!"

*slam*

You know, it just bugs me. Like these people are Prometheus, uplifting the unwashed masses from their Big Macs with totally gimmicky stuff.

It's just so... commercial, and fake. I dunno; when the people who claim to get it act like they don't get it, I have real beef with that.

I wish I could be more articulate about this.

[slink]

To be fair the idea behind Good Eats is to give regular people a jumping off point for ingredients that they might not otherwise try. It more bugs me when he goes super home-made.

I guess it comes from having a bread maker, although I'm tempted to stop using it for mixing certain dough too (that's right, I'm getting so bad I'm considering trying 24hr dough), but the only dough I don't buy made is puff pastry, what with it being a total bitch and all. I don't even bake bread in the maker, but with about 5 minutes work I can have a wad of pizza or pitta bread dough. That said,  I don't know of anywhere you can buy these doughs pre-made but unbaked. Store bought pittas here are like cardboard, and ready made pizza bases are even worse!

And damn, Muse, but you pretty much just summed up my problem with pretty much all those chefs I just said I hate. Worrall Thompson, Harriett and Rhodes wax lyrical about how incredible their food is (not helped by how annoying each of them are in their delivery of a fuck*ng sentence, Harriett with his 'percy pepper and suzy salt' ohmygodithinkmybrainjusthaemmorhaged!), and how important ingredients and flavour combinations are, almost as a good chef would, and then they go on to obliterate whatever they start out with.
From the sound of it I am so very glad we don't get Rachel Ray here, as she sounds like the Pat Robertson of food!

[littlefallsmets]

From the sound of it I am so very glad we don't get Rachel Ray here, as she sounds like the Pat Robertson of food!

She is more... the Susanne Sommers of food.

Cute and perky when we first met her, more and more annoying and plastic as she became more and more of a weird semi-liminal cultural phenominamamana... until you eventually just wanna strangle her bleached blonde ass with the goddamned Thighmaster.

[wombat]

It more bugs me when he goes super home-made. "Here's how to make pocket pies (a convenience food) with dough you made yourself.

Sometimes lately I think Alton has lost his mind. One day he will be telling you how to assemble Pop-Tarts from their constituent molecules, and then next day he will (as I have ranted about previously) make eclair pastry from scratch and fill it with instant vanilla pudding.

I mean sure, in real life, one day I will make pasta from scratch and the next day I will eat a frozen pizza. But in a work of art like a TV show, I think you have to choose a point of view and stick with it, you know?