Kids in the Kitchen

*** Warning: food puns ahead ***

No matter what else I might watch on the old teev, one thing that never fails to catch my attention is cooking. I don’t know whether it’s my pretensions to being some kind of dinner party host to the stars (or at least my friends), but I have always been intrigued by cooking shows, ever since my mother would let me watch King’s Kitchen (or as I liked to call it, “King’s Chooken”) while my sister had her afternoon sleep.

And haven’t there been a mess of cooking shows in the last decade? If it isn’t Jamie this, it’s Nigella that, and Gordon and Rick besides. Celebrity chefs are so thick on the ground you could use them as a handy alternative to porkers at a spit roast.

Given that the format of cooking shows is somewhat static, the appeal of cooking shows is based either on the expertise of the presenter or their folksiness (or in outstanding examples, such as ‘The Best’, a mixture of both). So here is my deconstruction of the currently available fare:

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The Cook and the Chef – ABC, 6:30pm, Wednesdays

If there are three words which define The Cook and the Chef, they are “nut-brown butter”. For crying out loud Maggie, isn’t it possible that you don’t always need your butter to be nut-freaking-brown? Every time butter is used, I hope that she will use some other adjective. But no. It’s nut-brown or nothing. Another friend claims that the utter lack of chemistry between Simon and Maggie is off-putting. I don't know. I kind of like the idea that they aren't pretending to like/respect/tolerate each other.



Iron Chef – SBS, 8:30pm Saturdays

Who doesn’t love Iron Chef*? The kitchen stadium, the ridiculous cravats, condescending commentators, the mindless consumption of raw capsicums. This show has it all!




My major beef with Iron Chef is that the theme ingredient is often incidental to the dish prepared. I wouldn’t argue, for example, that in a dish which features lobster, foie gras, saffron and the tears of a sentimental duck, the defining ingredient is zucchini.

The other thing that bugs me about this show are the celebrity guests. They seem to INSIST on having a woman on the panel, and then constantly ridicule her for her lack of knowledge about cooking. What is the point of that, other than to make me cross?

Ready, Steady Cook – Ten, 2:00pm weekdays

I like the idea of this show, though it is a complete rip off of Iron Chef. What a shame that the host has the kind of knowledge about cooking that David Reyne has about placebos. The chefs are good – but I do wonder why they bother with audience participation – it just seems to slow everything down.

Jamie at Home – Ten, 7:30pm, Fridays

One of my friends remarked recently that the great benefit of Jamie Oliver is that he has identified his niche. His niche appears to be people who can’t be bothered undertaking some kind of Homeric Odyssey to discover the oregano growing on the side of a forbidding cliff, picked by raven-haired virgins at midnight on a blue moon. His niche, therefore, is people like me, who are just pleased that their local supermarket actually stocks fresh kaffir lime leaves. Having said all of this, boy oh boy am I sick of Jamie Oliver.

Karen Martini on Better Homes and Gardens – Seven, 7:30pm Fridays

If only I could stand to wade through all the other home-renovations crap that is this show, I would quite like to see more of Karen Martini. She makes great food – and she has the ability to avoid talking-down to her audience without selling herself as some kind of skills-vortex.






And it doesn't stop there. You'll notice I haven't mentioned: Food Lovers Guide to Australia, Vasili's Kitchen, Huey's Cooking Adventures, Fresh, Surfing the Menu, Heart and Soul, the Hairy Bikers Ride Again, or the veritable pantheon currently available on pay-TV.





Or Two Fat Ladies, the Naked Chef, Cooking with Kurma, Yan Can Cook, Nigella Feasts, Delia Smith, Rick Stein's Fruits of the Sea, Surprise Chef, Nick Nairn, Captain Cook, or the BBC's amusing sit-com starring Lenny Henry, Chef!



Okay, so at the end of the day I’d rather be at Jacques Reymond, but in the meantime I’m happy to keep watching cooking shows. Who knows, one day I might even cook something.


* Mr Fix.


Also - you have no idea how difficult it was not to label this post "nut brown butter".