Heston Blumenthal's Balls

Cooking is all over the TV in a variety of manners. Some focus entirely on nutritional benefit and are health-slanted, some provide basic entertainment value by having a lunatic in charge swear incessantly in the faces of the other chefs, and some fill their remit by suggestively cooking so that half the country's carbohydrate-stuffed males watching are placed in a wishful, bloated trance, almost expecting The Delicious Miss Dahl to crawl through the screen and suck them off.

Then there's Heston Blumenthal.



Watching Heston's Feasts, I quickly became confused. I mean, it's not hard to understand - Blumenthal picks a period of history and usually a piece of literature or event around that time, examines the diet of the people/one particular person, and tries to emulate that "for the 21st century" as he relentlessly states. He then presents a 3/4 course meal for a group of celebrities to consume and discover the secrets of the quite well constructed and designed meals.

The problem with all of this is that, despite all other cooking programmes which have amazingly gotten past the barrier of non-existent smellivision/tastivision, Blumenthal's programme can't. His ingredients are so outlandish, that I have no frame of reference for what he's cooking, apart from a vague description from Blumenthal that camel is "a bit tough" (as you'd expect anyway), or from his attention-starved "celebrities" that everything tastes "absolutely delicious". Well of course they're going to ooh and aah and gulp down whatever demented shite put infront of them - they need the exposure, and let's face it, watching them eat whale's pan-fried smegma or whatever, is essentially a more civil Bushtucker Trial.

I suppose what the viewer at home is expected to take from the programme is entertainment value of the end product and how it looks, considering the ingredients involved. However, that fell on its hole in one episode where a recipe consisted of seal's blubber or some such and he substituted it for duck's liver...so what's the point at all? None of the meals are practical to recreate at home and listening to the hateful, ball-licking guests swooning over the meal as if each course represented the second coming of one part of the holy trinity.

What's really unnerving/irritating is that due to Heston's presenting style, it's almost as if he knows how underwhelmed I am, instead opting to look slightly to the right, away from the camera. As if he's talking to his "real" audience just over my shoulder, ones not populated by nay-sayers and stick-in-the-muds. I'm being ignored by Heston because he hates me, and would rather make singing soufflés and exploding loafs for the likes of Caroline Ferraday and Jenny Falconer. That bald fiend. By the end of the programme you're left feeling cheated and confused. There goes an hour of your time, on a load of balls, not just any balls, but Heston The Cock's Balls.

Bon Appetit.