UK embraces ‘gastroporn’ but stays shy in kitchen

AFP/London

jamie

Recipe books are bestsellers, cooking shows dominate TV and celebrity chefs abound in Britain — all signs of a major shift in culinary habits in recent years, even if many still struggle in the kitchen.
The trend, which some have dubbed "gastroporn”, is growing fast and is epitomised by the success of the latest book by popular television chef Jamie Oliver, which sold more than 1mn copies in just three months.
At the end of December, Jamie’s 30-Minute Meals — accompanied by a TV series broadcast this month — became the biggest selling work of non-fiction since industry monitor Nielsen Bookscan began keeping records in 1998.
Oliver is only one among a clutch of celebrity chefs who saturate the airwaves with their demonstrations of delicious recipes, as the nation once renowned for its awful food is glued to the telly, rapt.
Experts question, however, whether the enthusiasm for cook books and television programmes translates into action at home.
"There’s never been so much interest in cooking and we’ve never talked so much about food,” said Martin Caraher, professor in the department of food policy at City University London.
"But we call it ‘gastroporn’. People look at the cooks but don’t necessarily put them into practice.”
The queen of gastroporn is the food writer and TV star Nigella Lawson — the wife of art collector Charles Saatchi — whose innuendos, sly smiles at the camera and provocative way of licking a spoon have won her many fans.
Despite such encouragement, and hit reality TV shows such as  Come Dine With Me where a group of ordinary people compete to throw the best dinner party, Caraher believes British people are actually cooking less and less.
"The whole culture here is based on the notion of convenience around food. Even our cooking at home seems, for a lot of people, to reflect that convenience of opening packets and not cooking from scratch,” he said.
But with households tightening their belts amid a squeeze in public spending, food blogger Marie Rayner hopes more people will turn to home cooking—and use the celebrity-inspired recipe books gathering dust on the shelf.
"These people show us that we can have a really nice meal at home with not a lot of effort and sometimes not a lot of expense either,” she said.
Her experiences are supported by the Michelin guide, which this year confirmed the top three-star ratings for four British restaurants, two of them run by chefs who have become television celebrities.
The Fat Duck, and Gordon Ramsay, the star of Hell’s Kitchen whose eponymous restaurant also kept its three stars, have made hit shows alongside Lawson and Oliver that have been widely exported abroad.