Buzzin TV

While cookery programmes are nothing new to television, the current onslaught of celebrity chefs and even Joe Public cooking for three strangers on Come Dine With Me, has me reminiscing for the old days when TV chefs were few and far between and each recipe was absorbed by the viewer as a special treat to try out on the family.

In the good old days of Graham Kerr, Keith Floyd and Rick Stein, when a fine wine selection was a pre-requisite to concocting a tasty meal, we had time to try out the recipes that took our fancy with at least a week until the next programme.

These guys were the pioneers for the likes of the Jamie Oliver’s of this world who came along offering some friendly patter while introducing simplicity to the menu.

Simplicity isn’t something that Heston Blumenthal brings to the TV, particularly on Channel 4’s Heston’s Feasts 2. Having only recently caught up with the series I was amazed at the lengths this ‘little chef’ goes to to recreate the tastes of the seventies, his own childhood era.

Obviously blissfully unaware of the celebrity chefs on TV at that time, Heston admits that he did not grow up eating lobster and caviar, in fact as a child he loved the ‘taste’ of powdered snacks like Cup a Soup and Pot Noodles.

And so he sets out to re invent those snacks for a more discerning palate, admitting that he is more excited about the ritual of making the noodles than the actual flavour.

Blumenthal manages to concoct noodles using seaweed and gelatine and makes this into noodles by putting it through a Play Doh toy machine from the 70’s era. The mixture is put into the toy and squeezed out in thin strips that make up the noodles.

Finished off with his own chicken and mushroom mix, the product is served up to his celebrity guests. I have to say I have enjoyed this series mainly for the inventiveness of the celebrity chef, who has not only re invented Pot Noodles but also re-creations of seventies and eighties iconic treats such as the Zoom ice lolly and of course Soda Stream drinks.