Every great chef has a refined palate. The best chefs can distinguish one type of lettuce from another, but what molds these palates? It is very easy to believe that a chef was the kid who ate everything from glue to lobster. Then as time passed, the kid began to develop better tastes, and so he became a foodie, seeking out the best food in existence. Once the child became a chef and had been one for some time, he was transformed into a great foodie because of his developed tastes. The question arises, “What molded his developing taste buds?” Surely it was not the chicken noodle soup his mom made for him while he was still a kid. Perhaps he developed the desire for the strange and abstract dishes he concocts from watching others of higher social classes. In these higher social classes, it is easy to get weird and crazy dishes and to make this cuisine look savory, despite its taste. Therefore, it can be observed that the tastes of a great foodie, or person who is said to like fancy, delicious foods, are governed by one type of person: the man with the biggest wallet.
A foodie who is governed by the wealthy is a foodie who has given up some ingredients. What is meant by this is that the foodie will refuse to eat the food unless it costs a great deal of money, or it is so divine that it is nearly impossible to obtain. With the desire for these rare and costly cuisines, the great foodies of the world set themselves apart from the rest of the culinary world. By removing the “great” foodies from the normal community, the average Joe becomes doomed to either attempt to recreate the unique dishes he once sampled or sell everything he owns to have “superior” ingredients, recipes, and meals. Also, with the high ranking foodies set apart from the community, the pressure increases for youths of the general public to become wealthy culinary masters. The child sees the food, and the price, and realizes that to be happy he or she must get the strange food. This requires that he or she get the necessary funds to pay for it by working a second job, becoming famous or cooking for someone who will pay for the use of these unique ingredients.
The television makes it even easier for the rich to pollute the taste buds of developing foodies. There are so many of these shows: Good Eats, Hell’s Kitchen, and Iron Chef America.1 By spending millions of dollars to broadcast the developers’ opinions of food, each show changes the way foodies and the culinary inept think of food.
When someone has resources, especially those for broadcasting television programs, he or she can use those resources to produce almost anything. For food, the resources are ingredients and the product is the meal, so having the means to obtain these resources and products allows someone to gain almost anything. With nearly limitless resources, rich men can have their personal chefs prepare never before seen cuisine. The best example is Iron Chef’s host and chairman, Takeshi Kaga. He constructed a place called Kitchen Stadium inside his house to find new and interesting dishes. To succeed in this task, he hired his own top chefs and made them cook against top chefs from around the world. Kaga chooses the main ingredient and expects these two chefs to each prepare him a several course meal based on this one ingredient.2 The biggest catch is that the ingredient could be just about anything imaginable and the two cooks are competing with one another. This competition airs on television for people to watch. When evolving chefs and ordinary people see the final dishes being presented to the judges, they cannot help but think that this rich man on the television must be eating the finest cuisine in the entire world, despite the fact that the food could taste absolutely appalling.
Television star, Takeshi Kaga, is not the only person who can influence the tastes of foodies. His American counterpart, chairman Mark Dacascos, also has a say in what foodies enjoy. His show, Iron Chef America, is very similar to the original Iron Chef, and in fact is a spin-off of Iron Chef. Even so, Iron Chef America has more modern technology than the original Iron Chef. Also, Iron Chef America has much more action. Switching between several camera angles in a matter of milliseconds and adding intense music to the background it is nearly impossible to fall asleep when the program is on. These additions make the show appear as an exciting ordeal, and, by association, the food seems to be just as exhilarating. The dish still appears mesmerizing even if the ingredient chosen by the chairman is one no one has ever heard, like Opah (a species of fish found in Hawaii).3 The few people, who try to recreate the televised goodies, discover that the dishes are nauseating because they lack either the resources or the highly developed skills vital for the dish’s creation.
All the resources on Iron Chef are useless if the chef lacks the knowledge needed to properly prepare it. That is why Alton Brown’s show Good Eats influences the growing gourmet by teaching him or her how to accurately utilize ingredients. In his show, Alton Brown teaches people how to prepare diffident dishes with a given recipe.1 This may sound like an excellent idea, but it is not. Yes, teaching people how to cook is beneficial, unless they are being taught how to cook with coconuts, beer, or another infrequently used food. These are obviously not recipes used in everyday life. Although the ingredients are readily available, the dishes are sometimes too complex to cook for every meal. Thus, increasing the foodies drive to obtain a taste for these scant materials.
Hell’s Kitchen brings to light another wealthy foodie quality: the drive to ALWAYS be right. When the multiple chefs on the show come together to cook, each one fights for dominance. The reason this occurs is the chefs are all under the orders of the wealthy head chef Ramsay. He pushes them to find the best chef for his restaurant and in doing so he creates foodies who believe that they are always at the top and in control. Also, the chefs on the show are “taught” by being rewarded when they win and punished when they lose the weekly competition.4 As a result, the viewers are taught that, if they cook well for the right financer, they will be rewarded for their efforts with more than just their annual salaries.
The effect of televised people eating the finest meals made from the finest ingredients by the finest chefs is not the only factor that affects the foodie’s tastes. The stereotype of expensive objects also has a role. In society, expensive objects are held at greater value, in taste as well as price, and are considered to be of perfect quality. According to this principle, the most expensive ingredients are the ones that should always be used for delicious cuisine. This means that expensive food, no matter how despicable it is, is tasty food, and so the “best” foodie will always select the most expensive ingredients.
The worst of the wealthy foodies pay for the cakes produced in Ace of Cakes. In this show the cooks go over the top and create just about any type of cake. They do a variety of cakes from replicas of other cakes to zombies. The minimum price of these cakes is one thousand dollars.1 Meaning that the although the ingredients may be inexpensive, the final product costs so much that the average foodie then develops a desire to sell his not so unique talent for large sums of money. Therefore, the man with biggest wallet may not change the food related tastes of the foodie, but he does change the style and preferences of the foodie.
Television has played a vital role in the influence of foodies, but the rich people who dictate what is discussed or seen on these programs play an even bigger role. The rich financers of the world choose the foods and control, to some degree, what happens in the program. When a young foodie watches these shows, the child becomes engrossed by the mannerisms and strange food used by the chefs, actors, and hosts on these programs, and decides that his future will involve the money needed to buy these fascinating cuisines. However, children are not the only ones affected by these selective, money based programs. The developing chefs and gourmets of the world are also touched by what they see. These chefs watch and wonder if they too can cook with the rare ingredients, but when the chefs see the price tag, they decide that they must then charge more for their services or get a job with the rich people who can easily obtain the food. The differences between the children and chefs are significant, but what they are transformed into is the same: servants to the rich.
1. FoodNetwork.com. 2009. Television Food Network G.P. 24 October 2009.
2. “Iron Chef Chairman: Takeshi Kaga.” Fine Living. 2009. Scripps Network, LLC. 24 October 2009.
3. “Opah.” Hawaii Seafood Buyers' Guide. June 2008. The State of Hawaii. 24 October 2009. <>.
4. “Hell’s Kitchen.” 2009. FOX Broadcasting Company. 24 October 2009.
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