Wednesday 21 December 2011

21.12.11 What's Cooking?

What's cooking?  Too fucking much, that's what!  I have counted the cooking programmes in this week's TV listings, as I got annoyed with what appeared to be far too many of them.  From last Saturday through to this Friday, there are loads - and I'm only talking about the 5 terrestrial channels.

Saturday
BBC1      Home Cooking Made Easy (R)
BBC1      Saturday Kitchen Live
ITV1       Countrywise Kitchen: Stocking the Winter Larder (R)
Ch 4       Sunday Brunch: Saturday Starter
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)

Sunday
BBC1      Masterchef: The Professionals (R) (BSL)
BBC2      The Hairy Bikers’ Twelve Days of Christmas (R)
Ch 4       Sunday Brunch
Ch 5       Meals in Moments (R)

Monday
BBC1      Hairy Bikers’ Best of British
BBC1      Masterchef: The Professionals (R) (BSL)
BBC2      The Hairy Bikers: Mum Knows Best at Christmas
BBC2      Junior Bake Off (R)
BBC2      Raymond Blanc’s Christmas Feast
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)
Ch 5       Meals in Moments (R)

Tuesday
BBC1      Hairy Bikers’ Best of British
BBC1      Masterchef: The Professionals (R) (BSL)
BBC2      Junior Bake Off (R)
BBC2      Rick Stein’s Christmas Special (R)
BBC2      Nigella’s Christmas Kitchen (R)
BBC2      The Hairy Bikers’ Christmas Party
ITV1       Best Dish: The Chefs
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)
Ch 4       Jamie’s Christmas With Bells On
Ch 5       Meals in Moments (R)

Wednesday
BBC1      Hairy Bikers’ Best of British
BBC1      Nigel Slater’s Simple Christmas
BBC1      Masterchef: The Professionals (R) (BSL)
BBC1      The Hairy Bikers’ Christmas Party (R) (BSL)
BBC2      Junior Bake Off (R)
BBC2      The Hairy Bikers’ Christmas Party (R)
BBC2      Nigella’s Christmas Kitchen (R)
BBC2      Rick Stein’s Spanish Christmas
ITV1       Best Dish: The Chefs
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)
Ch 5       Meals in Moments (R)

Thursday
BBC1      Hairy Bikers’ Best of British
BBC1      Nigel Slater’s Simple Christmas (R) (BSL)
BBC1      Rick Stein’s Spanish Christmas (R) (BSL)
BBC2      Nigella’s Christmas Kitchen (R)
BBC2      Rick Stein’s Spanish Christmas (R)
BBC2      Junior Bake Off (R)
ITV1       Best Dish: The Chefs
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)
Ch 5       Meals in Moments (R)

Friday
BBC1      Hairy Bikers’ Best of British
BBC2      Junior Bake Off (R)
BBC2      Raymond Blanc’s Christmas Feast (R)
ITV1       Best Dish: The Chefs
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me (R)
Ch 4       Gordon’s Christmas Cookalong – Get Ready
Ch 4       Come Dine With Me: Comedians Christmas Special



57 slots in the schedule in one week, with the BBC having 32 of them.  Channel 5 has a lowly five entries late at night, as really cooking cannot compete with casino/gambling airtime, shit films, or CSI.  Fifty-fucking-seven in one week, swamping us with shit - worse than programmes on property or antiques!  The irony is that so few people actually bother to cook anything other than what they have done for ever and a day.  We generally stick to producing the same sort of things, using the same ingredients and have to keep an eye on time - and money.  Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall was last week pissing about at River Cottage serving a 'festive' [another cunt-of-a-word that I hate] menu with "the team helping him to prepare wild boar, muntjack deer and greylag geese".  What the fuck?  Get real, Hugh!  First, we don't have teams of people helping us; second, you're a fucking pig (pun intended) and a bore (second pun also intended) and that's far too much food; third, we cannot afford to eat that well; fourth, even if I could justify spending a bit more, those ingredients for a banquet are not readily available at the local Co-operative (Shit With Food) store.

Food, Food, Food - we're obsessed, and as a nation, fucking fat.  The nation sits on the sofa stuffing crisps and chips and ready meals, downing ketchup and dough at an alarming rate, watching cookery programmes while the kids are on the computers above them, tapping away and becoming obese.

We are fucked in the UK.

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