Puzzling Thoughts

Cooking shows were an obsession with me for a while (we won't go into the depression story now ......) but I've always enjoyed reading about cooking as well (I, too read cookbooks, like my mother did.) Mom never taught me to cook, but she did teach me to love to eat!

But I think the cooking shows are less important to me now because I'm finally actually cooking ............ well, I've cooked for years, but it was basic stuff, with lots of cream of mushroom soup sorts of ingredients. But by watching Alton and Sara and Mario and Rachel and Emeril I've gained a knowledge of technique and a certain modicum of derring-do .......... just tonight I made pork chops with a yummy sauce (apricot preserves, dijon mustard, garlic, soy sauce), sliced some yellow squash and onion into a saute pan with garlic, oil, and butter, and steamed some little red potatoes. YUM, YUM, YUM.
Could not have had that when the kids were small because I raised them on cream of mushroom soup concoctions (sorry, kids). But hubs and I are enjoying my new-found cooking confidence!

A friend introduced me to Good Eats, and it did push me to try things I would not have otherwise done - like making my own sausage. But, now that I have seen most of them, I find that I would rather cook than watch TV.

Did you hear Pollan's interview on NPR's Fresh Air today? He talked a bit about how the evolution of the cooking show has changed with our changing eating habits. Julia Child's show had little to no editing - so you sat with her and she chatted while the butter melted and the onions cooked. If you watch those shows today, each step is fast paced and very unlike how actual cooking is. It makes sense that watching it on tv is so much easier to do than actually doing!! It was an interesting discussion and it made me sit down and figure out how much time I spent cooking today!!

I've pondered these same things myself. Hopefully, those who watch rather than cook are actually soaking up some techniques that they can try out when push comes to shove and they simply must cook because otherwise they will starve. Then again, perhaps, I hope too much there.

When I ran off and got married (literally) I knew enough to keep us from starving, but there was tons I had no clue about. This was 1986 - no food network, but there was PBS. I watched every cooking show I could find - Jeff Smith (Frugal Gourmet) and Justin Wilson were my favorites. I learned so much watching Jeff Smith. The Frug taught me tons, and I bought his first 4 cookbooks. Then i just kept buying cookbooks. I read a cookbook like most people read novels - start at the beginning and go thru to the end.

When I was in the hospital for 7 weeks in 1999 (appendicitis with lots of complications) I was not allowed food for most of that time. After the first couple weeks (when I regained conciousness) I would watch Food Network. By that time I really enjoyed cooking, but since I was unable to cook or eat, it was strangely comforting to watch people doing both. Tiny little Sara Moulton and big Mario Batalli were my favorites, and Emeril was entertaining. Bobby Flay, on the other hand, made me not mind when my roommate wanted to watch wrestling instead. He is just annoying!

And I just had to look this up to share - if you've never seen Dan Aykroyd's version of Julia Child on SNL in the seventies, go watch it here:

http://tinyurl.com/6ohv3s

We're entertainment junkies. When we're not sharing every nuance and minutia of our humdrum lives on the interwebs with people too concerned about their own humdrum lives to care about ours, we live to be entertained. We especially like entertainment in such a form as it appears to inform or teach us, so we can justify being entertained more by saying we're doing something productive. Cooking is not entertaining (to most of us, at any rate), but watching cooking is.

Why I watch... I simply envy those people that can cook. I have gotten better, not by watching, but by doing, but it is still fun to watch them, that make it seam almost magical sometimes. I am also the one to watch those crazy house shows and I don't even own a house, so go figure. I am still learning the line between making it from scratch and not.

Intriguing question. I love to watch cooking shows, and I'm really looking forward to seeing Julie and Julia, but I'd probably never eat home cooked foods if my husband didn't do it.

Like Keter said, on television everything is perfect with the latest gadgets, freshest foods, and few if any mishaps.

I do keep things in mind, and I learn a lot from the shows, just haven't gotten around to actually cooking just yet.

I think the initial questions are very valid for our society, and it doesn't relate only to cooking. I have a very troubled relationship with TV. On the one hand, I was raised at babysitters whose basic caretaking technique was to sit me in front of the TV. I watched TONS of tv, and to this day I find it very comforting to veg in front of it. On the other hand, my brain and my ethics lead me to reject the way we over-consume, over-validate, and over-...I dunno..over-everything what we see on TV. We watch and watch and watch, and I think, live, reason, and do less and less and less.

Okay, I went on a big rant there. Anyway, I agree that we do live, much too often, vicariously rather than live and in person. On the other hand, I can contradict myself at the same time and say that I have definitely been inspired to try several of Alton Brown's recipes after watching "Good Eats."

I agree with Jolene!

I received absolutely zero cooking instructions growing up - by the time I was 8 my overworked mom had had enough of us turning up our noses at her hockey puck style meats and waterlogged veggies. From that point on we were on our own. It wasn't until after college (~10yrs ago) that I found the Food Network and learned about roasting, sauteing, broiling, steaming, whipping, folding, kneading...

Life is much better with the skills I picked from my tv!

The obvious answer is that the TV shows kitchens are all well lit, full of great appliances, and the food is always prepped and ready to go (mise en place) and somebody else has to clean it up afterward.

I find cooking to be relaxing, now that my kitchen is at least semi-usable (it was an absolute disaster area and I'm about half done remodeling it) and now that I have finally assembled a full set of reliable, good quality cookware, utensils, serving pieces and dishes. (That only took me 30 years to do...well, I'm still missing a good mixer. Soon.) Making do is always unpleasant and particularly in the case of knives, can be downright dangerous. It also takes a lot of the pleasure out of cooking a good meal if it has to be served on ugly, mismatched plates.

Another reason cooking on TV is more appealing than cooking in real life may be exhaustion, pain, and child interruptions. All of the physical discomfort things are generally more tolerable from the couch. If you glance out of the window to discover that your "napping" toddler has just learned how to work the safety latches on the window in his bedroom and is running down the street stark naked, you're a lot less likely to set the house on fire while you're chasing after him in a panic if you're engaged in "virtual" as opposed to actual cooking at the time! (Um...voice of almost-experience - I ran home, my son tucked under one arm like a football, and caught the smoking skillet just in time. We ate ramen that night because that that was the last of our real food, too.)

Watching the food network has inspired us to cook a LOT more. My 10 year old son and 12 year old daughter developed a passion for cooking. My only job is to print recipes they find online and then to supervise and offer suggestions while sitting back and letting them prepare meals! It's awesome!