The Goodness of Jamie Oliver

Now a decade beyond his days as The Naked Chef, Jamie Oliver is still at it, at as ambitious a pace as ever.

He has been criticized for all of his branding, his restaurants, his seemingly gimmicky product lines. I'd have lost respect for him if much of the work he's done didn't seem motivated by a genuine desire to help people eat better. And by "better," I don't mean lavish meals or making exact measurements or finding the exactly-right gadget-- I mean helping people learn about food and to build a real relationship with food beyond intake.

I don't just like Jamie Oliver for his catch phrases or his blond hair. I like him because he seems truly excited about food, about showing people how accessible it can be, and doesn't make too much of a fuss about cooking. While I can appreciate the exactitude with which some cooking shows demonstrate recipes, it doesn't strike a chord with me the same way at all.

He's done a lot of shows since The Naked Chef. He has a veritable empire of products, books, shows--even a magazine. His Wikipedia entry is extensive.

Yet the theme from the very first Naked Chef still resonates in everything that has come since. The title sequence of The Naked Chef has him as a rascally young twenty-something with a big mop of blond hair laying on a sofa rather indolently saying "Naked's what I call my way of cookin'... It's gotta be fresh, it's gotta be fun, it's gotta be fast, it's gotta be tasty.--It's not me, it's the food!" Each episode of practically every show of his that I've ever watched (and that's nearly all of them) is bent on making cooking seem like just that-- fast, fun, tasty.

The best way I can think to describe his way of cooking and teaching is that it is just utterly no-stick-up-yer-ass methodology. His hands get dirty. He never makes things seem complicated-- he just does them, maybe says something is a little tricky, but he never, ever makes cooking anything but accessible. At least for me.


I'm a second-generation Khmer-American girl and I can completely relate to this British white boy's style, from his generous use of butter and bacon to his gardening. I loved that he mentioned having small herb gardens in both The Naked Chef and in Oliver's Twist (though I must admit, I found OT a little bit oh-tee-tee at times with the cheer).

It was his series Jamie At Home that really did me in. It was set in his estate in his home-town of Essex, a rural area where he grew up working at his father's pub and getting into general mischief before leaving to pursue his professional cooking career, working in Italy and France and London.

The focus of Jamie At Home is not only to demonstrate recipes, but to teach people about keeping gardens and cooking with them. He has a scruffy gardener named Brian who is obviously very into his work and is very knowledgable. The two of them make growing a garden seem easy and fun, without too much fuss. Of course, not everyone has the luxury of a huge estate to grow on, but he also shows how tomatoes might be grown in an old tin can or potatoes in a grow bag.

Each episode centers around some ingredient or group of ingredients, say "Strawberries" or "Summer Brassicas" or "Winter Veg." He then goes on to show various recipes for them and to show how they are grown and harvested. I find this incredibly valuable. Having grown up with a wild jungle in my backyard, I was accustomed to seeing my parents pick herbs and produce for dinner from our garden, but so many people are utterly disconnected from where food comes from, what it looks like before it's in the grocery store, sometimes even what it looks like before it's processed or prepared.

Accessibility. That's a common term when thinking about social justice and equality. Jamie Oliver does with his food programs what organizations like Community Services Unlimited are doing directly in the community-- teaching people about growing and cooking food, encouraging a us to really connect with what we eat beyond the flavors (though he definitely gets into that, too).

Watch the way he demonstrates making fresh pasta.



He makes it sound fun, he makes it sound easy, he makes it sound like it's worth trying no matter what. When I watch Jamie Oliver teach a cooking lesson, I sincerely feel an urge to try to make things. There's no anxiety.

That's what it comes down to for me-- not only whether the cook makes me hungry, but whether he or she makes me want to cook. With Jamie Oliver, I'm not intimidated by gadgetry because he doesn't use very many gadgets, and he doesn't make it feel absolutely imperative that every little step is executed perfectly. With Jamie At Home, he brings the creative and casual energy he has in the kitchen to the garden as well. He gets his hands dirty. He seems genuinely excited about whatever he is cooking or growing.

As much as he has been mocked for his enthusiasm (i.e., the number of times he's said "pukka" and "byoo-i-ful" over the years), it really is contagious. Furthermore, not only do I honestly believe that he is trying to make a difference in the way that we think about food, I also like his methods. I don't read him as preachy. I'm drawn in.

Toni Cade Bambara, author and social activist, said: The role of the revolutionary artist is to make revolution irresistible. As campy as his shows or his merchandise might be and as weary as I am of empire-building, I admire Jamie Oliver because he seems to really be making an impact on our relationship with food.

It's not just his pretty blond hair.