Friday, July 10, 2009
Food Fight Declaring Independence from Nigella, or Limey Go Home
Posted by Nicki Wood on Fri, Jul 10, 2009 at 9:42 AM
I just sailed off an email comment to NPR's Morning Edition, though I usually keep my questions to myself. Just curious, though, after hearing Nigella Lawson yesterday, why the American public radio audience needs a British cookbook writer to explain how to cook.
The rich vein of humor that is British cooking works because of England's unfailing ability to turn wonderful ingredients, sourced nearby and raised more naturally, into a much less appealing result. Summer pudding puts perfect summer berries between soggy layers of white bread. Fluffermuffin's babysitter in England used to boil giant zucchini until they were limp. WTF, x 2?
There's an even richer, and more annoying, irony. Nigella's books succeed with a British public in part because a many of the recipes are American, so they seem new and different. Just from her breakthrough How to Be a Domestic Goddess is this long list of cadged recipes: Rhubarb Crumble, New York Cheesecake, Molten Chocolate cakes, Chocolate Cupcakes, Christmas Morning Muffins, Cranberry Upside Down Cake, Snickers and Peanut Butter Muffins, Blueberry Muffins, American Pancakes, Snickerdoodles, Peanut Butter Cookies, Carrot Cake, Boston Cream Pie, Grapefruit Marmalade, Key Lime Tarts, Coca-Cola Cake. Like, where are Brits getting these blueberries, cranberries, rhubarb and salted peanuts?
One especially cheeky recipe is Maple Pecan Bread, neither maple nor pecans existing in England. But probably the honor of Cheekiest Recipe should go to Halloween Cupcakes, because even the concepts of "halloween" and "cupcake" are virtually non-existent in English culture.
Maybe a larger issue is the insult to hard-working American food writers. I can rattle off a dozen great American prospects for a radio interview. Molly O'Neill, Sheila Lukins, Bradley Ogden, Colman Andrews, Corby Kummer, Charlie Trotter, Ina Garten, Deborah Madison. That's just the celebrity generalists; there are many other well-known, extremely knowledgeable general food writers, not to mention the regional and ethnic specialists like John T. Edge, Joan Nathan, Darra Goldstein and Jessica Harris.
Maybe none of them is as adorable as Nigella, but "looksism" is the last thing you expect from public radio, or even any radio. And maybe none of them is blessed with a daughter-of-an-chancellor-of-the-exchequer accent that Nigella, not coincidentally, has.
So that's what I asked NPR to explain. But I'm sure they will read between the lines to get the message that there are more energetic, and imaginative way, to cover food. Am I wrong? Is she the best choice ever for American food coverage? Or are opinions like armpits: everyone has one? Do you have an opinion?
Comments (21)
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sorry to point out what seems to be the obvious irony, but at least the food discussed is local to the audience served. (As opposed to say, running a series on one city's food in another city's local paper...)
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I'm not sure I get the outrage here. You also seem to be missing the hook of someone like Nigella, which is: Cooking ain't that hard. It can even be fun/sensual/nurturing. Learn to feed yourself. See how easy that was?
We need MORE people evangelizing on that point, not less. Sure, there are tons of wonderful American writers who do the same thing, but on the other hand a lot of (non-canned-soup-genre) American food media has been focused on he-man antics, impossible feats most non-pros couldn't do, and trying to out-twee each other in how "local, sustainable, slow, green, authentic" they are.
So what if they are from another country? Even if they are repackaging American food? It's a long-established tradition, anyway. What was the British Invasion in the '60s, anyway?
I was advised not to purchase Nigella's cookbooks because many of the recipes fail. You can expect that from a community cookbook, when the recipes are from different sources. That's what bugs me about NPR having Nigella on as a semi-irregular guest. If NPR's going to have someone on to talk about food (and by doing so, publicizing her latest cookbook), it would be nice of them to have someone who actually knows what they're talking about
I think NPR interviewed her for a simple reason: she gives a good, entertaining interview. And I agree with jamiealex, I like Nigella for her whole "cooking isn't hard" attitude. I'm not a fan of all of her cookbooks, but I have gotten a rather surprising amount of use from How to be a Domestic Goddess. I heard the NPR interview you're so irked by and thought it was fun, although certainly not earth-shaking.
@trw: I've failed with a couple of Domestic Goddess recipes. Usually it's related to flour and iquid -- British flour is formulated differently and absorbs either more or less liquid. But I've also encountered too much filling for the crust and wrong pan size.
And it wasn't the interview that was annoying -- like all Brits, she collects her thoughts well and answers the question. It was the fact of the interview. It just should be someone American. She's on, like, five times a year. Maybe her contract is coming to an end.
I get nervous whenever I see her cooking something...like I always think there'll be a hair in the food somehow.
"sorry to point out what seems to be the obvious irony, but at least the food discussed is local to the audience served. (As opposed to say, running a series on one city's food in another city's local paper...)"
Right on, S L. Good thing Bites readers don't travel or have interests beyond the city limits.
wow, I'm a little surprised by this. I'm not a huge fan of hers, but as far as food personalities go she isn't the one I would attack. There are lots of folks out there who's food does a lot less for me (bobby flay or that woman from almost homemade). I work in a restaurant, so I'm not home to cook most of the time, and my wife, who is not that skilled in the kitchen, is always trying to find easy tasty foods. She is a big fan of nigella. We have the nigella express cookbook and I have to say I find it to be a great book. Lots of big flavors and tasty dishes. Conversions aside, anyone who encourages folks to cook good flavorful food, rather than bland "healthy food" is ok by me. lots of butter, lots of bacon, and not just standard fare. she cooks and eats real food, and she is effin hot. funny too. again, any woman who creeps down stairs to eat left over pork cracklins (in a busty night dress) is fine by me.
also, john t edge is a contributor to NPR in his field, southern food.
who cares if she is a limey. or if she is cooking american fare. cocoa cola cake is good. snickerdoodles are good, pork chops taste good.
rick tramanto serves bread and butter pudding in chicago, do you think the folks in kent are upset with him?
Nigella had me when she cooked a real ham and pulled off the crisp skin and ate it hot from the oven. That is so evocative of my long ago childhood that the image and the tastes that it called up from my memory are a favorite TV momemt.
That was a real ham and not what we have here now.
I love how she enjoys cooking and while I didn't hear her radio interview, I'm not sure why the upset.
I have to agree with all the folks here who don't understand your aversion to Nigella on NPR. Her cookbook and whether or not her recipes "fail" aside (and I would add that a lot of recipes from cookbooks fail for many reasons), it seems as though you are using some form of patriotism and maybe some gender bias? to shore up your argument, which is never a good reason to criticize someone in my opinion. What should count instead are her qualifications and her appeal to the general public and I think without a doubt that Nigella is one of the most appealing food personalities on t.v. Not only is she a home cook in every sense of the word, cooking real food for real people, but she is a REAL woman! She's curvy and pretty but not in a traditional sense, she's gluttonous, she's not afraid to cook and eat what tastes good, despite the calories and low-brow nature of it and this is something our insipid and vacuous female American t.v. personalities are sorely lacking (I'm thinking of Giada and the blond whose name I can't remember). It's funny how we hold the women to a different standard than the males on food programs. Why are the men always 'serious professional chefs' and the women amateur, good-looking dabblers from whom we expect nothing but tips on how to throw a party? But that's a topic for another discussion, though somehow I think your aversion to Nigella is closely related.
"Why are the men always 'serious professional chefs' and the women amateur, good-looking dabblers from whom we expect nothing but tips on how to throw a party?"
The irony, of course, is that there'd be no Food Network without Julia Child. We can argue about how much credit to give the Food Network for Paula Deen.
oh, and I wanted to comment on this sentence:
"The rich vein of humor that is British cooking works because of England's unfailing ability to turn wonderful ingredients, sourced nearby and raised more naturally, into a much less appealing result."
Anyone who writes that today is seriously behind the times in what is going on in the food world internationally. London has some of the best food in the world, and it's not all Indian or Chinese. British food has been undergoing a renaissance in the last decade or more because of chefs like Fergus Henderson, Heston Blumenthal and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingshall of River Cottage fame, who have succeeded in making British food as interesting and exciting as any food around. Not to mention, these guys-- and the Brits in general -- have been doing seasonal, local and organic for longer than anyone and with some of the best results.
A look at any of the major food magazines lately will attest to this. British food is all the rage now. Makes me want to get on the next plane to London!
In all fairness, British food does not equal what you find in London. I agree, the food I've eaten in London is some of the best I've had in my entire life. But you get outside the city and...whoa. It really is a shame what Brits do to perfectly good food. Much like it's a shame what my mother does to a perfectly good stalk of broccoli. It's like comparing American food to that you can get in NYC. I think NYC makes no claim on chicken fingers and ranch dressing.*
As for cookbooks, I prefer books that made the authors celebrities, not books written by those who are already famous and got a book deal. I love my Bittmans.
*Ten bucks says that the TGI Friday's in Times Square is full of Brits. :)
Actually, I wasn't just referring to the food in London. River Cottage is in Dorset, Blumenthal's restaurant is in Berkshire and while London *is* regarded as one of the world's food capitals, the rest of England, particularly in the countryside, is where the renaissance is occurring. Again, these remarks about "terrible British food" are really not appropriate anymore. It really is and has been changing.
I don't think Domestic Goddess is the best cookbook at all, but I wouldn't trash it because it offers recipes that may not all be British in origin. If we were to go down that line, Mario Batali certainly shouldn't be writing cookbooks and residing over an Italian food empire. Nigella's books are just like her-- simple, straightforward comfort food recipes and uncluttered with the pompous pontificating about food found in so many others.
"But you get outside the city and...whoa. It really is a shame what Brits do to perfectly good food." After three years of living and working and eating and cooking in Cambridge, I can only say amen to that. We got fresh mushrooms, gorgeous naturally raised meat, fennel, berries. But you could count on two hands the number of acceptable-to-good restaurants in Cambridge, a town of 100,000. If you add "affordable" it dropped to one hand. On the other hand, the best Chinese food I ever had was in London.
"British food has been undergoing a renaissance in the last decade or more because of chefs like Fergus Henderson, Heston Blumenthal and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingshall of River Cottage fame, who have succeeded in making British food as interesting and exciting as any food around."
In my admittedly limited, distant experience with British food, that's not a renaissance, it's a virgin birth.
Mr. Pink, some of us read local papers to find out about local doings, local being relative to one's current or targeted location at the time of reading.
As for British food in general, if you haven't found a good meal in England in the last five-eight years that was well-made at a reasonable price with droolingly local and organic ingredients, especially at the (sadly) disappearing local pubs, then the fault is your own. What I would give to see Lamb Henry on the special board at any establishment here! And to know it was locally raised grass-fed sheep to boot is just rubbing salt in the wound.
"Mr. Pink, some of us read local papers to find out about local doings, local being relative to one's current or targeted location at the time of reading."
True. And some of us like knowing what's going on in the world outside. I don't see why a local paper can't do both. Especially online, where "one's current or targeted location" is hardly a fixed point. I got a kick out of the Bites reader posting from Miami to ask if anyone here had lunch recommendations there. That kind of thing happens more and more.
