Arab television kind of leaves me cold - and it isn’t just that I don’t understand the language. It’s really about why most TV internationally fails to hit the mark when compared to the BBC - it just isn't very good.
Naturally, I have subscribed to a cable TV package here in the UAE which provides me with news, movies and documentaries to while away those boiling summer evenings, when it is just too damn hot to go outside. After largely ignoring the ubiquitous CNN and MTV offerings, my cable box seems to be stuck on one channel for about 90% of the time - the wonderful, indulgent, decadent BBC Food Channel. . .
This is cable TV at its best - a 24 hour TV channel devoted to just one thing. Food. Yup, BBC Food Channel does just exactly what it says on the can. It brings food, gastronomy and culinary chaos to my screen every hour of the day and every day of the week. I like to think of it as gastro-pornography.
You know that watching it now and again probably isn’t too bad. But, you can’t help watching it all of the time - and I mean all of the time! It becomes an addiction, a craving which, until you have had your fill of Lancashire Hotpot, Bouillabaisse, Dim Sum, Thai Green Curry, Asparagus Risotto and Shrimp Tempura, you cannot resist.
Does the Food Channel inspire me to cook? Well. . . no. Does it inspire me to go to new restaurants? No again. In the same way pornography does not inspire you to become a better lover or seek out new sexual partners, the Food Channel is about living vicariously, about voyeurism and about acts of unashamed gastronomic indulgence. A spectator sport par excellence and without any shopping, chopping or washing up.
Like pornography it is, of course, artificial, fake, unreal. You, the viewer, cannot smell the food, taste the flavours, or feel the textures. Just like pornography, where one has to rely on the grunts and groans of the “actors” to communicate stimulation and satisfaction, on the Food Channel the viewer is reliant on the expressive gestures and gasps of the presenter or Chef to be convinced that everything tastes good.
Suspension of disbelief is also a major feature - just as some of the more bizarre positions and contortions featured in blue movies look like they might be rather painful, some of the stranger recipes on the Food Channel programmes (chicken entrails in vegetable broth springs to mind) look and sound disgusting. However, just as the smiles of pleasure in porn flicks convince one otherwise, so does the cheesy grin of the TV chef as he puts the entrails in his mouth - and yes, the TV chef does swallow . . .
TV chefs are the new celebrities of the modern generation - with the same or similar levels of recognition as singers, actors, politicians and the business elite. They influence fashions, opinions, purchasing behaviour and the way we view the world.
In the microcosm that is the world of TV cuisine, we meet food liberals, food communists and food fascists. We meet modernists, traditionalists, futurists and the avant garde. We meet the old, the young, the middle aged. Some are rigorously scientific, some are slapdash improvisers. Some are pioneering, open minded experimenters - others are treading the well worn paths of gastronomy, but simply wearing new shoes. To coin a phrase and risk a pun - food TV is the melting pot with something for everyone.
Jamie, Delia, Antony, Nigella et al are our friends, our guides, our leaders. Follow their instructions and the world will be a better place. We will be happy, we will be satisfied and of course we will be the envy of our friends. Their books sell more copies than the Bible in any given week and are probably read and consulted more religiously.
In the MTV world, food has replaced sex - easier to plan, often more satisfying and there are no taboos or restrictions. And if you don’t have time to cook, then you can always get your jollies by watching someone else do it better than you ever could on TV.
What has this to do with Arabia I hear you ask? Well perhaps not much, other than the fact that I haven’t seen any TV Cooking programmes on any of the Arabic channels and the vast array of restaurants here in the UAE are packed with people merrily enjoying the real thing, with doubtless many more people practicing “safe food” in the privacy of their homes and behind closed doors.
Having said that, His Highness Gordon Ramsay (Chef Extraordinaire and full blown gastro-celebrity) has recently arrived in Dubai, grabbing the front cover of Time Out magazine talking about guess what - food!
I suppose now it is only a matter of time before I start tuning in to the Al-Jazeera Food Channel to get my pleasure of an evening . . .
