His Royal Gordness

I think I've written before on how I get obsessed with certain chefs. After reading Heat I wanted to find out everything I could on Mario Batali, and of course, cook some of his dishes. I didn't go as far as searching for strips of Lardo (pork belly fat) to place on people's tongues (read Heat: "you can actually taste what the pig ate in his final days"). But I did introduce my family to fennel - now a must for all my red sauces.

A few months back I was killing time on the food network, waiting for Iron Chef to come on, and I thought I'd watch this show I'd heard a lot about: Kitchen Nightmares. After a couple of weeks, I was hooked, and Monday night was Ramsay night. And then I found out about the F word, and Hell's Kitchen, and biographies and cookbooks appeared on my bookshelf (and under my Christmas Tree). Now my family is getting inundated with fresh herbs and root vegetables. They're not complaining, I am a pretty good cook. But now they think everything I make is a Ramsay recipe. "No, it's one of mine. I call it the Grilled Cheese Sandwich!"

Still, they reap the benefits of butternut squash and apple soup, pasta with portabello mushrooms and stilton cheese, masala chicken with couscous... and on it goes. Looking at the difference between the body shapes of Batali and Ramsay, its probably good that I switched obsessions.

But I tend to swear a lot more in the kitchen.

Fuck yeah.

Comments

[mark heath]

Now you're just being mean. It's bad enough we don't live next door to exchange words and potables. Now I'm denied a neighbor with leftovers.