Food for thoughts!! The common saying has been that your thoughts are made from what you eat.
I am very fond of food, not the eating part I have been more interested in the cooking/making process of the food. I am addicted to the praising words, or the emotions when they love and find my cooking very good.
Earlier on Doordarshan rarely we used to get to see any program on cooking. But after 1982, some format changed at DD and with the advent of Sunday morning shows, and aaj savere aaj subah. Then channel became plural in numbers. Formats also increased. Few celeb used to come on TV to demonstrate their favorite, I remember when Smt Uma Gajpati Raju presented a cook show. Then there was e revolution. After the Siddhartha Kak, Sanjeev Kapoor, there were flood of these cookery shows and plurality in the shows. Then there was a gift from skies came and invaded our homes in form of Discovery channel, Star, Zee etc many more. Few I see belong to the Tamil, Keral, Kannad and Marathi channel. I liked the most the show on the Tamil channels. In one the Grand lady used to show the cooking and most precious thing was that she also used to sing the songs. She has got the real talent- bhuimiputri- means the daughter of the mother earth. The lady must have belonged to the pure land of mother India. I could not understand asingle word of those songs but since we the lover of music say that it has got no boundaries or barriers. So the beats the LAYKARI, the PURE “swaras”, the voice coming out of Heart reaches us. Another show is one man who always cook in the earthen pots. I love the stage design, the cooking in these mud pots, the simple way he describes each thing- here too my drawback of not knowing the Tamil does not deter me from listening and watching that show.
Few other programs I saw. One program in Kannad or malyalam was very different. In that show they tell the medicinal property of the herbs And also the cooking. Then many times I watched the show on BANGLA, either the star Bangla, or the doordarshan in bangle I get to know many dishes.
But since the advent of the TLC I am glued to it. Whenever I get time I just switch the TLC.
Earlier there were Nigella, Kylie Kwong, Floyd, Anthony bourdoin (if the name I spelled correctly), then there was program named FOOD BAZAARo the Feast . Most famous Madhur Jaffery is also there. Sanjeev kapoor doesn’t come on TLC? Few episodes I saw of Padma lakshmi. There was Rhode’s scholars. Now I am also familiar with Dr Sikha!!!. Two years back I was on the top of clouds, when I saw the “Take cook to home” Curtis stone- Most handsome and sexiest cook ever came on my television.
Many days I tried to workout how I can work like him!!!. When I went o Lucknow I thought will this type of profession work or viable in Lucknow? I am nobody in Lucknow so who will let me enter their homes. Then immediately I got answer to stop horses of my brain. But I must tell the hangover of Curtis is still there I am not able to come out of it. He always remains behind my head. After that many more came on TLC but no one matched that class!!. There was one who I think was drink maker in some hotel, now tried a cook show-as I could make out by watching him. Few things he told were very good. His show is so so. In this year few more came on the air (Sky) but same actually by looking at them I got pain in eye as I felt I have to make efforts to keep my eyes on him. Since they always dance or move their bodies while doing everything from chopping the fish or onion, or pouring the oil, and keeping tray in oven always their bodies moving in some fashion which I find irritating- means their body language is not correct. They need to work hard but Sky has no limits!! I cannot criticize the people on TLC. I don’t find their program attractive- They are FUNKY type or so to say since I belong to old fashioned age, it was like when in 70s or early 80s the hippies were defined. Then, there is another very handsome program of James martin( read the person not program). To me he is very good looking too. but what I found is that he is most innovative of kind. When he made mango ice-cream or something the way he plans all his ingredients and process and when the last products comes out on screen my eyes lit up in wonder!. how come he is able to decorate so innovatively?.(which, I never could have imagined).
Bizare food is always bizarre!
The most innovative and most refreshing show is the FOOD SAFARI on FOX TRAVELLOR. The concept is full of research and planning. Lots of things packed in a short time capsule And mostly everything available in Australia. By Kismet production. This programme is so nicely edited and presented that you don’t need any coffee table book to know the food of a particular region. I think this program is also most suited for the mobile APPlications. Where in , through the mobile one can know about food of a region. The cooking session are shot in a very friendly way/ambient. And most importantly the involvement is evident. That is most essential for nice cooking. Unlike- If I may say so’ not like Floyd’s idea. Where the presenter is always looks somewhat detached from the nice things of cooking. Sometime the cook does the things in haste. Sometimes I feel the program is full of the aristocratic lookout of India, for them it is still like a COLONY. I mean the programme format is of like of colonial era. But I like the way Madhur does the things. No aristocracy, no sophistication just everything raw, everything is dropped in the pan in very simple way. Most naturally and not in a decorative way. As is happens in james show, every now and then I see the towel cleaning on the kitchen table etc. And other thing which I found in programmes of west is that when they taste something they use the last finger of right hand. But I think if I would ask anybody from India Mostly I would find them using the first finger for tasting anything or they would use the spoon.
In Floyd show the cook while feeling hotness of the furnace or the stove still enjoys a sip of his drinks! How? In James show everything is kept on that circular wooden piece on that the cutting/chopping is done, on same the bread or some other vegetables are also kept or the pots or utensils are kept. Some thing on my back of head thinks that it is not hygienic, But the towel cleaning is edited I think which is evident in other of his show. Jokes apart these shows are good enough to watch.
These days some shows are becoming trap of pluralism! Since the quality, the content is being diluted.
In India now we have got a new dedicated channel on food. Nobody could have imagined this type of thing 30 years back. Everybody was looking down upon these creative fields. Be it performing arts or the hotel/house keeping or the chef. Now Indian Television even had Master Chef program, though there had been a program on Master chef in Australia. Through the star world channel one can know from where the Indian television is inventing its programmes. Be it Idol, talent search, quizzes, KBC, even cookery shows are being localized. But never mind “der aye durast aye” Now platter is full for Indian Audiences.
Food is also the most basic things human or any living being needs. Since child age every human get acquainted with the food and fooding with the help of their mother or family. First the mother, then family after that neighbourhood, then school, then the region affects the fooding habits in that order. Then off course now-days people get trapped in their surrounding fad. There are so many fad now-days which comes through the beaming of Media. Now-days people from small semi urban or rural areas are becoming addicted to the noodles, chowmein, now they now the Italian pasta, spaghetti etc.
When I attend any marriage or social functions in the area near Kanpur, Lucknow, Unnao, Hardoi I find that people keep stalls of such things, like chowmein, pasta, cheese salads, sprouts salad, veg or chicken rolls-(which in my 40 years of life never had been anywhere in these places)
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