The Taste

There's a new, rather watchable, programme on Channel 4 that is a totally unique format. Nothing like it has ever been before. The judges, or mentors - we'll call them judgementors, sit with their back to the contestant (however did they think of that?) while they taste a spoonful of their carefully prepared food.  Because nobody ever buys food made by an ugly chef, it is important to judge the food without seeing the person who made it. Food changes how it tastes if you don't like the look of the cook, almost always your first impression of anything you eat in a restaurant, so this is clever. Just the taste, and how the food looks. We'll gloss over that last one; they can't see the cooks, right? Clever.

The three chef judgementors then decide whether to ask them to join their kitchen. Should more than one judgementor want to choose a person, the person themselves must decide which chef to go with.

To persuade them, each judgementor uses their wiles to persuade them. Ludo Lefebre smoulders and emphasises how very very French he is. Nigella pouts in the way that only Nigella can, and Anthony Bourdain sits back and relaxes in the knowledge that he is Anthony Bourdain. Each one displays a parody of this behaviour throughout the process until each kitchen has the requisite number of contestants. Some of them are chefs, some are home cooks so they shall presumably collectively be called chooks.  Nigella obviously champions home cooks, her audience and readers. Ludo is perpetually and stereotypically French in his incredulity that anyone who is not a professional chef can make anything more complex than toast. Anthony continues to bask in being Anthony Bourdain,  

Next week the chooks join with the judgementors in their kitchens and, judging from the trailers, do nothing more than cause the judgementors to sigh and shout a lot while making food that's barely edible.  One of them will go home in a episode finale so unheard of it's unbelievable.

Meantime, there's a rumour going round that on Saturday the BBC are doing something similar but with singing. How are they going to taste singing? Just silly.