Food Network chef smackdown: Bourdain v.s Deen
There’s a hissy fit going on in celebrity chef TV land that makes the occasional sparring between wine bloggers seem like a love-in. Seems that Anthony Bourdain gave an interview to TV Guide, in which he called Paula Deen “The worst, most dangerous person [in] America,” accused her of having “unholy connections with evil corporations” and, as if that’s not enough, added the ultimate putdown for a chef: “her food is f—ing bad for you.”
Then Anthony told us what he really thinks about the Food Network’s Guy Fieri. “I look at Guy Fieri and I just think, ‘Jesus, I’m glad that’s not me.’” But wait, there’s more! Anthony on Rachel Ray: “Does she even cook anymore? I don’t know why she bothers.” And, last but not least, the Bourdman on Sandra Lee, also a Food Network star (whose boyfriend happens to be Andrew Cuomo, the Governator of New York). “Don’t mess with her…I hate her works on this planet…”.
Meow!
It didn’t take long for Frank Bruni to get his two cents in. The New York Times’ restaurant critic slammed Anthony for his “gratuitous schoolyard-crass putdown[s]” and accused him of “moralizing and snobbery,” because he [Anthony] is a “self-appointed sophisticate” who thinks the Food Network cooks are “rubes.”
The whole thing is funny. For once, I’m glad I’m not involved. Been there, done that. But it does raise important issues, since obesity is a huge [no pun intended] problem in the U.S. Anthony is essentially saying the Food Network is the television version of a greasyspoon diner whose cooks show an already fat nation how to get even fatter. Whereas he, Anthony, is more of an Alice Waters kind of guy–eat healthy and green. There’s certainly truth to that. The main problem, of course, with Anthony’s elitism (if we can call it that) is that it costs more–a lot more–to eat along an Alice Waters’ line than to eat Paula Deen’s bacon cheeseburgers between two donuts. That was the essence of Frank Bruni’s criticism of Anthony–that Anthony was insensitive to poor people. (Incidentally, Anthony kinda-sorta apologized to poor Paula yesterday in this radio interview. Also yesterday, Paula Deen, who seems like a real nice southern lady to me, finally fired back at Anthony. He “needs to get a life,” she told the New York Post’s Page Six.)
Well, there is a split between the Whole Foods crowd and the Penny Saver shoppers when it comes to food, and we have the same kind of split here in the wine industry. It’s only to be expected, because we have that split in America with any consumable good. If you’re a Paula Deen person, you drive a Chevy or a Ford pickup. If you’re an Anthony Bourdain person, you drive a BMW, or maybe a Prius. Rachel Ray’s people drink Two Buck Chuck; Anthony’s look to Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon. That’s just the way it is–but at least we in the wine biz don’t get down in the mud like Anthony did. We’re much too civilized for that!
