Entertainment For Lively Minds
Is Cooking The New Rock N' Roll?
Sad I know, but I feel a strange sense of loss,now the latest series of Masterchef has ended.(Even although some of the judges seemed in awe at the sight of a well cooked apple crumble in the early rounds.)
It seems that cooking is the new rock n' roll on TV these days, there are perhaps more cookery programmes than music shows).
There was of course none of this back in 1988 when I was a first year 706/1 City & Guilds Catering Student; struggling with flakey pastry and producing mutant, giant sized viennese fingers as I couldn't control the piping bag. Cooking didn't seem to be as cool back then.
Have you ever dined in the same restaurant as a well known musician, what's the best dining experience you've ever had and there's really no need for Gordon Ramsey to f****** swear so much on TV is there? And is The Ivy as good as people say it is, the closest I will get to celebrity cooking is a visit to Jamie Oliver's 15 next week.
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When I was around 14 years old...
I went to a dinner party where I found myself sat between Salman Rushdie and Paul Samwell-Smith of The Yardbirds. Rushdie talked a lot and was boring, and I'd never heard of him. Samwell-Smith told me about playing with Eric Clapton, which was much more my cup of tea.
Not at a restaurant, I know, but I thought I'd share it anyway.
Master Shout
Is a hoot, isn't it? An object lesson in how to make as much broadcast time as possible out of two old frauds, a gaggle of amateur cooks and a kitchen set somewhere in a shabby building in central Lahndan, for as little cash as possible.
Television doesn't get any cheaper than this.
This Desert Is Heaven On A Plate
I bet IT HASN'T CHANGED YOUR LIFE either, agree with your comments. The programme seems to favour a lot of mild drum n' bass as background music. Wogan's mockery of the show was funny too.Perhaps the BBC should start a new show,Master Song, where musicians have 45 mins to an hour to come up with a song,theme and instrumentation chosen by the judges.
Gregg Wallace
should come complete with a volume control. I even involuntarily went "shhhhhhhh" at him a couple of times as he bellowed like a stuck pig.
Cmon Greg is a legend - I
Cmon Greg is a legend - I have even bought a vegatable box from his online shop.
Wife is fumung about it, I have to find a way of cooking a jerusalem artichoke !!!!
Jerusalem artichokes
are the bane of all veg box schemes.
Jerusalem artichokes
I disagree. Swiss chard is the real bane of veg boxes, as any fule kno. Jerusalem artichokes are a far superior proposition and make a fabulous soup. Bugger to peel though and make you fart like hell. Though that's not necessarily a bad thing.
Shouty shouty shout shout
What is that shouting all about? I can only presume the show is filmed in a wind tunnel, the noise of which is edited out later, in order to give the show a cutting-edge thrusty shouty feel.
It's interesting to note that the two presenters seem to attempt to outshout each other, in a style reminiscent of a terrible middle-management meeting.
I think
It's their version of bad cop, bad cop.
I still hanker for the original series
The new version, whilst entertaining on the whole, stretches out a cookery competition too far. We sky+ it and tend to whizz through the restaurant and battlefield/steelworks type bits to see the kitchen bits.
Don't mind Greg and John though.
It's not the new rock n' roll though.
I agree
The sections in the 'real' restaurant kitchens are repetitive and do not play any part in the final selection. I blame the direction/voiceover - each chef always starts badly and improves. Well who'd have thought!
Eating with the stars
Eno bought me dinner once. Indian, and very good it was too, although at this great distance (over twenty-five years ago) I can't remember what I had - other than the Royal Bengal tea, which was subtly spiced and lovely.
Brian's motivation: not to elicit my opinion on ambient music or Talking Heads, but the fact that I was living with his sister at the time.
One bit of good advice he gave me: to treat accusations of name-dropping with scorn and contempt.
HP Sheets
I was thrilled to discover the other day that my bonding over beans with Van Morrison all those years ago apparently made such a mark on him that to this day he insists on having 24/7 access to a full English, wherever in the world he may happen to be.
You think I jest? Check out his rider:
Riva in Barnes, SW London
This is/was once AA Gill's favourite restaurant in London. It is tiny and pretty ordinary to look at, but crucially (as well as the great food) it is around the corner from Olympic Studios. So I have been there "with" Bryan Ferry & Chris Difford and Simon Le Bon.