What is this this thing with cookery programmes on television?

I know they have been around for a very long time, with the likes of Fanny Craddock and her permanently pissed husband, through to modern abominations like Gordon Ramsey and that slimy little cunt Jamie Oliver.

I don’t understand it.

I enjoy a drop of cooking and have been known to serve up some pretty tasty dishes in my time.  Sometimes I use a recipe and sometimes I just take pot luck and make things up as I go along.  No one has ever complained.  Not even the dog.

To me, the most important item in a meal is the taste.  Get that right and you are nearly there.

Of course smell is pretty important too – there is no point of serving up a lovely plate of delicacies if it smells like the local sewage farm.

The least important is presentation.  Granted a dish can look pretty appetising if it’s all nicely presented but if it tastes foul then presentation is pointless.  In fact presentation has gone a tad over the top in recent years – you order yourself something nice sounding from the menu and they proceed to bring out a massive great plate, or chunk of wood, or something, with a tiny portion plopped in the middle with a “drizzle” of something making an artistic statement in the blank space around your meal.  Personally I would prefer a bit more meal and a little less artistry.

So there we have our ingredients for a nice meal – taste, smell and appearance, in that order.  But in case no one has noticed, taste and smell aren’t exactly an option on television.  So what is the point of the whole fucking exercise?  It’s akin to showing snooker on a black and white television, or listening to a mime artist on the radio.  What is the fucking point if you can’t smell or taste the food?

I know these programmes are extremely popular and I’m not casting nasturtiums at the viewers.

I just don’t understand.  That’s all.