Chefs love quality ingredients, so it's odd they couldn't get better celebrities for Heston's Fairytale Feast (Tuesday 9pm, Channel 4) especially with Waitrose's wunderkind in top form.
This dizzying head-trip into Regency-era decadence probed even further into the dark recesses of Blumenthal's twisted psyche. It was the most gluttonous age in history, he said, when the Prince Regent himself ballooned to 17 stone. Nowadays that wouldn't make you a standby on Celebrity Fat Club.
Though you sense Heston's heart wasn't really in the constant quips about cock's testicles, you had to admire his ambition. Any recipe with the line "now the burning and decapitation are over" is a winner.
Reconstructed boar heads and Cinderella pumpkins were impressive enough. But they paled beside breathtaking golden eggs and a ludicrously clever gingerbread house.
His labyrinthine creations were surely wasted on D-listers such as Jenni Someone-or-other and Caroline Whatshername. Ultimately you wanted more on how Heston gets his ideas and fewer reaction shots from slack-jawed no-marks.
Still, it'll be fun seeing what Delia does with the chicken testes on next week's Waitrose ad.
It's presumably deliberate that Jamie Does... (Wednesday 9pm, Channel 4) calls to mind Debbie Does Dallas, the seminal 70s feelgood flick about a plucky young cheerleader's mission to have sex with an entire American football team.
Oliver applied that same free-spirited philosophy to the opening salvo of his new series, which saw his phlegm-fuelled moped roll up in Marrakesh for the usual stuff about snake charmers and street cooking.
He's ostensibly the antithesis of Heston scampering round the serpentine backstreets like he's in Raiders of the Lost Ark, artlessly battering pomegranates with a spoon and nearly falling into an under-floor oven big enough to roast whole flocks of sheep.
His everyman routine has now lasted a decade and is every bit as polished as Heston's glowering skull. But you can still feel the joy as he slaps spices into a gutted bream.
While Heston's every move is a declaration of his genius, Jamie has nothing left to prove these days.
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This dizzying head-trip into Regency-era decadence probed even further into the dark recesses of Blumenthal's twisted psyche. It was the most gluttonous age in history, he said, when the Prince Regent himself ballooned to 17 stone. Nowadays that wouldn't make you a standby on Celebrity Fat Club.
Though you sense Heston's heart wasn't really in the constant quips about cock's testicles, you had to admire his ambition. Any recipe with the line "now the burning and decapitation are over" is a winner.
Reconstructed boar heads and Cinderella pumpkins were impressive enough. But they paled beside breathtaking golden eggs and a ludicrously clever gingerbread house.
His labyrinthine creations were surely wasted on D-listers such as Jenni Someone-or-other and Caroline Whatshername. Ultimately you wanted more on how Heston gets his ideas and fewer reaction shots from slack-jawed no-marks.
Still, it'll be fun seeing what Delia does with the chicken testes on next week's Waitrose ad.
It's presumably deliberate that Jamie Does... (Wednesday 9pm, Channel 4) calls to mind Debbie Does Dallas, the seminal 70s feelgood flick about a plucky young cheerleader's mission to have sex with an entire American football team.
Oliver applied that same free-spirited philosophy to the opening salvo of his new series, which saw his phlegm-fuelled moped roll up in Marrakesh for the usual stuff about snake charmers and street cooking.
He's ostensibly the antithesis of Heston scampering round the serpentine backstreets like he's in Raiders of the Lost Ark, artlessly battering pomegranates with a spoon and nearly falling into an under-floor oven big enough to roast whole flocks of sheep.
His everyman routine has now lasted a decade and is every bit as polished as Heston's glowering skull. But you can still feel the joy as he slaps spices into a gutted bream.
While Heston's every move is a declaration of his genius, Jamie has nothing left to prove these days.
More from this column
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