Like so many others at the moment, I have eagerly been tuning in to watch the new Masterchef Professionals series. As I sit and watch, bemusing the skill and flaws of the contestants and commenting on how I would do things differently, I often wonder if we are taking the magic out of food. Is the over analysis of our dining experience ruining the simple pleasures that we can take from food? To make a simplistic comparison, magicians are wonderful to watch, but once you realise how they have done their tricks you can no longer truly enjoy them.
So exactly what are these shows doing to our industry? I'm sure that we have all discussed the exposure that the shows are giving to dining and possibly the influx of new staff who now decide that cooking is their life long ambition. Now more than ever we also have to deal with the "informed diner" many of whom want to know exactly what cooking processes are involved in their dish and exactly where the products were sourced from. But knowledge is power and comes with responsibility and so many people who watch these shows and are starting to immerse themselves in the gourmet consumer world are critiquing and disecting our dishes and dining experience without fully understanding all the intricacies of running a successful kitchen.
Often they lack the understanding that the foods that they are buying have to be costed and have to be financially and laboriously viable to be able to put them on the menu. If they want food with such flair and locally sourced, organic, free range ingredients and impressive plating, the cost has to match that and the restaurant also has to have sufficient customers to continue producing that food. Too often we hear people bemoan the fact that there are no decent restaurants or places to eat around, but then we see great eateries go under or change their niche due to lack of customers.
I feel that this all links back to the one central issue, the media are doing a great job of glorifing our industry and what we do but they fail to look at the viability side of it. The food we are shown is often self indulgent and not subjected to the constraints of time, customers, ingredient costs and staff ability. This is understandable because after all, who wants to sit and watch a chef cost out his sous vide of scotch with truffled celeriac puree and lobster roulade. Surely the media also has an obligation to acknowledge all the behind the scenes work that goes into making a successful eaterie and not just promote the idea that if you do good food you will be successful.
We also have to acknowledge the great things that these shows have done for the industry. Without these shows, so many of us wouldn't have access to some great ingredients or be able to put some of the more interesting dishes on our menus. These shows drive innovation and normalise untraditional ingredients, methods and food, which allows us to diversify and experiment more on our menus. Suppliers are beginning to stock more exotic ingredients at more competitive prices and we get the benefit.
The final gift that these shows give is a gift for our ego, we have truly been turned into the rockstars of the worker world, and rightly so! We work hard, give up so much and put all our emotions and personal lives aside to give the customer a memorable experience. We don't get to say that we save lives or keep the community safe or that we are nurturing the education of the next generation, but a piece of ourselves goes out on each of those plates, a piece of our pride and our self worth. We give these things willingly and it is nice to be acknowledged for that.
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