Most people who know me really well, know that I am a CBC junkie. I love CBC Radio, the website, News Network and of course CBC Hockey Night in Canada…. can I still call it that?!! So, when I was looking through the website getting my daily information and news updates I noticed this icon for a series called Eat. Cook. Love. I thought, “Wow, something right up my alley” and clicked on it. What came up next on the screen blew my mind. A two part series on food, cooking and eating.
The website http://eatcooklove.cbc.ca is filled with amazing information and the actual documentary is well worth the sit down to watch. The first episode deals with the concept of “health food” and the confusion that is out there regarding what is healthy and what is not. A special focus on the Mediterranean diet is featured and the program reveals that the Mediterranean diet is now protected by the culture category of UNESCO. There is a brief highlight on the banning of foie gras in California, and the efforts of some states to ban salt all together. Doc Zone also discusses the fact that people and families all over the world aren’t cooking as much as we once did and are turning to frozen and prepared foods. The scary part is that the family Sunday Dinner is pretty much a relic of the past. This is due in part to the fact that family cooking and family recipes are not being passed down to the next generation like they were years ago. Mothers would pass along the family secrets to daughters and the family recipes were sacred and well looked after. Much like how it was in the Mediterranean culture and I guess why it is now a protected culture. The lack of family cooked meals is also due in part to the rise of the convenience products and frozen/prepared meals to go.
Now really, you all know how I feel about frozen dinners and prepared take out meals. I have written about it before. But this documentary researched how much we eat out or have prepared meals/ fast food and it’s an alarming average of one meal a day. WOW. I just about fell off my chair when they threw that statistic out. Scary. Sad too. I guess I find it scary because I’m gluten-free and so the opportunity for me to do that is minimal without feeling completely ill so I’m used to preparing my own meals. But for those who eat gluten, your quick meal choices are endless.
Eat. Cook. Love interviews several chefs and food journalists or anthropologists too. All talking about how food has changed over the years and how we eat has too. We are becoming more and more “on the go” eaters. It’s amazing how many of us eat at a desk or in the car. Very interesting and very scary. Then something extremely sad appeared on the screen. I froze because I couldn’t believe my eyes and ears. The program featured a restaurant in Las Vegas that actually prides itself on selling meals that are over 8000 calories. That is a whopping 4 times what the recommended daily intake is. Four times. They go on to say that if you want to work it off, you’d have to run for 20 hours straight. YIKES. Come and dine on fast food at it’s best in the aptly named “Heart Attack Grill” – oh and just so you know, people over 350lbs eat free. Oh my what is this world coming to?
Fast forward to part 2 of the series. Food preparation techniques and the rise of the food network audience. There’s a neat little piece they do about how it’s called “food porn” and that the teaching part is no longer the focus but more the sensuality of food prep. Food porn. Everyone calls it that! It’s the Nigella in the low cut shirts and the flashy, beautiful smile of David Rocco that keep us all coming back. Funny. They speak about the sensuality of food preparation on TV and how we are just as satisfied with watching food being made and food in all its photographed glory that we don’t need to make it ourselves.
Here’s another piece of info for ya… the French, who have been seen all over the world as having cornered the market on food preparation and culinary genius, are now the second largest consumers of McDonald’s products after the United States. Say what?! Am I the only one who finds that completely ironic? I mean if that doesn’t get the alarm bells ringing I am not sure what does. The home of culinary language and birthplace of the grand Daddy of the kitchen, Escoffier, is now the number two consumer of Mickey Ds. Escoffier is probably rolling in his grave.
The entire focus of the documentary is, essentially, that we need to get back to the kitchen, to food preparation, to the family dinner. One of the last segments with the featured chefs and journalists asks what meal can be made in 15 minutes. The answers are all over the map and give any picky eater a choice from fish, pasta, a hearty salad, couscous, etc. The possibilities are endless. The point being that good food doesn’t need to take 3 days too cook. It was a nice reminder to me that sometimes simple wins out over elaborate. Everyone wants to impress with their cooking and sometimes its just the simplest meals that can take all the glory. A nice pasta sauce, a beautifully cooked egg, a piece of broiled fish, some roasted vegetables. It’s not all that hard and we need to do more of it. We have got to return to our roots and cook the food we grew up on, the food that has been in the family for generations. We need to teach our kids to cook and involve them in meal planning and preparation. Just like the grandmothers in the Mediterranean countries do. There is a reason why that culture is protected and we can learn a thing or two from them! So, get in the kitchen and cook. Go on, dig out your favourite recipe and get back into the daily family meal. I think we all owe it to ourselves. Thanks CBC, for yet another great show!
