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.

Anything + Pasta + Broccoli = Satisfying Meal

(Apologies for my amateurish, horribly blurry photography)

The title of this post reflects my general philosophy about leftovers.

First, I should explain that I am shameless about eating leftovers. Completely. I think I get this willingness to turn odds and ends into edible (and generally tasty) meals from my mother, who is a sorceress when it comes to inventing ways to avoid wasting food.

I have no problem making large batches of pasta to eat over the course of a few meals. I find that shells or macaroni are easier to cook, store, and re-serve than long pastas like spaghetti or fettuccine. The small pastas are also easier to incorporate with sauce and to scoop up in small portions. (This is important to me because I like to use small dessert-size utensils to eat my meals; this is probably because, contrary to what some might say, I have a relatively small mouth.

Also, pasta is very forgiving: as long as you treat it half-way decently, it doesn't much care whether you use a cream sauce, a tomato sauce, or just some butter and olive oil and simple adornments. The key is to cook the pasta to the proper level of doneness-- when it will be mixed with a luscious sauce, it should be cooked slightly less than a pasta that will simply be tossed with a little oil and a few ingredients.