Jamie's Spanking the Rosemary & Emeril's Closing In

Jamie Oliver's lecturing on diet and doing recipes for promoting his "Food Revolution" TeeVee series .  Just saw him on ABC's "Good Morning America" while flipping through channels.  There he was, touting the wonders of $8 skirt steak (doused in olive oil and fried for two), and generic salad (with greens, "crunch," "optional cheese," and the like), and of course, an oil-based dressing.  Oh, and let's make a horseradish sour cream dressing for the steak!  I switched channels.  Waste of my time.

How ironic that in his efforts to help children (and Americans) eat better, he's promoting a high-fat (and expensive) cooking style.  Instead of Americans rushing towards heart disease, obesity, Type II Diabetes, and Altzheimer's disease, he can help them walk fast towards same.  Is this progress?

Think of it:  $8 for that dead cow flesh to serve two people.  For $8 I could purchase 4 lbs of tofu (enough for some 8 to 12 servings).  For $8 I could buy 4 lbs. of brown rice or millet and 4 lbs. of beans or lentils and make 12 to 16 servings.  He's like this rich kid who believe that the answer to health is only fresh food (dead animals, eggs, processed oil, and fermented bovine secretions qualifying as food) and, as he gleefully points out, serving size.

Although it's almost amusing to see him (and his host) make innuendoes about "spanking" the huge hunk of rosemary to release the fragrant oils (which, unless you grow your own, would probably cost around another $8), the real in flagrante delicto is that his nutritional awareness to helping prevent dietary related degenerative diseases can be likened to to a garden hose putting out a house fire.  Just slows it down and doesn't solve the real problem, no matter how expensive or fresh the hose.

Here's some of the recipes being plugged at ABC ("Fast and Healthy Meals You want to Serve Your Family") from Jaime:

Grilled Skirt Steak with Horseradish Sauce
Jamie Oliver's Parmesan Chicken Breasts with Crispy Posh Ham   (from the "Food Revolution" cookbook... don't forget to add olive oil!)

My favorite cook, Emeril (previous posts 1, 2), is having a "Breakfast in Bed for Mother's Day Contest" on the same receipes webpage.  Check out this typical biologically abusive Emeril recipe for the event.

Buttermilk-Scallion Biscuits with Eggs and Griddled Ham

Some of the nutritional highlights:  2 cups self-rising flour, 6 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes, 3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons buttermilk, 1/3 cup grated sharp cheddar, 8 large eggs, 2 tablespoons whole milk, 2 tablespoons unsalted butter [thank god it's unsalted!!], 8 2-ounce slices honey baked ham, and 4 teaspoons butter.

That's a lot of fat (and saturated fat), but Mom deserves it, right?  Look's like Jaime's got some tough competition.

Comments

[Peter]

Hi Mark,

Jamie may be teaching young people to cook and prepare food which is a great skill but that in no way equates with a healthier diet. In particularly my gripe is that just about all chefs now subscribe to olive oil being a health food.

When 'star' chefs prepare foods they frequently say 'just a little olive oil' but end up using 'liberal' quantities of the stuff. Do they ever do the sums and calculate how quickly the calories add up? Would they be surprised and horrified by the calories in the dishes they prepare just from the olive oil alone?

Over the last decade very few people have questioned this myth of olive oil being healthy and of course vested interests have promoted this line. I can hear the chefs shouting back that olive oil adds so much flavour. Surely though if chefs were a little more imaginative and more concerned with health they could make foods just as delicious without resorting to the liberal amounts of oils they all too frequently use. Unfortunately I don't see it happening any time soon.

I had to smile at the $8 skirt steak you mentioned. Yesterday I went to my local F&V shop and for $8 I ended up with 14kg of produce, namely these were seconds but only because of the occasional blemish.

[vgpedlr]

I wish that Oliver's distinctly unhealthy cooking style did not get tied into "health", particularly with the "fattest city". Unfortunately, I can sympathize with many people who will fall for it, because I did myself for several years. I decreed all packaged, processed, or "fast" food as unhealthy, and anything made from "scratch" as infinitely better, regardless of fat, meat, dairy, or salt content. Sadly, I had a lot of fun making gourmet meals that were truly unhealthy. After doing a nutritional analysis, I can't imagine his meals are any healthier than what he's replacing. I wonder if there is a way that we can challenge Oliver to somehow justify his creations?

[Don't know... he's school in the unhealthy European traditions, mostly... Mark]