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Is it just me or are the Hairy Bikers always on TV? I switch off if they are on. Soooooo irritating!!
What TV chefs do you find extremely irritating and why?

I don't like them either.  I am also not very keen on The Two Fat Ladies.

There are just too many cooking programmes so I've stopped watching them all. Is it just me or are there an awful lot of repeats of old  - really old - programmes (not just about cooking) these days?

So, yes - fed up with Hairy Bikers et al. I find that turning the TV off and reading a book most evenings is what I do.

Tricia

I guess for me ANY cooking programme is about a fine balance of being a good presenter of the food and being an entertainer,cooks are not entertainers they are skilled chefs that have been lucky enough to have been thrown into the limelight.

We......the great unwashed......absorb the information for our cooking fix(should we need one) and the rest of jo public can then spend our time ripping their presentation skills apart.

We all have our likes and dislikes in how the programmes are perceived by the watching public,the middle class fanny and johny starchy persona that bored me senseless as a kid has been replaced by down to earth lads in Dave and SI,so good for them I say,there your long haired rockers of the food world and bring a freshness to food entertainment that has been missing for decades.

So me.........naaaaaa.......I like em '!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Gazza

I do not watch any cooks on the telly. I find the programmes showing you how to mess up good food using their ideas so annoying. We have got on for years cooking and eating decent meals without having to decorate the plate with three carrots a forkful of meat and the mark of Zorro.

Cooks= servants, usually from below stairs. Next thing you know these jumped up upstarts will be telling schools, hospitals, etc how to cook and telling you not to buy cheap chickens.  Pie, peas and a dollop of mash, how can you improve on that.

I find Nigella really irritating to watch and although I love many of her recipes Delia gets right up my nose! Not keen on the guy on beeb one either, can't remember his name for the moment.

Quote from: ACE on March 14, 2014, 07:13:24
...  Pie, peas and a dollop of mash, how can you improve on that.

Ummm ... TWO dollops of mash?

Quote from: Melbourne12 on March 14, 2014, 11:36:03

Quote from: ACE on March 14, 2014, 07:13:24
...  Pie, peas and a dollop of mash, how can you improve on that.

Ummm ... TWO dollops of mash?

....and a thingy of BUTTER

edit to add....THINGY!?...that wasn't my typing...

I like Mary Berry and Paul Hollywood.  Mostly I just turn the TV off, agree too much cooking, but do know people that love all cooking programmes.

Quote from: goodlife on March 14, 2014, 11:47:00

Quote from: Melbourne12 on March 14, 2014, 11:36:03

Quote from: ACE on March 14, 2014, 07:13:24
...  Pie, peas and a dollop of mash, how can you improve on that.

Ummm ... TWO dollops of mash?

....and a thingy of BUTTER

edit to add....THINGY!?...that wasn't my typing...

Yes, you have found out the same as I did a few years ago when I first joined this forum, that a k.n.o.b of butter always gets turned into a "thingy" of butter.   

I normally like watching the cookery programmes but not been over keen on the Hairy Bikers Aisan Adventure.
Nigella is the most irritating but I do like James Martin, down to earth and not too chefy.  Mary Berry for her cakes.
It's interesting how the TV chefs come in and out of fashion, you hardly hear anything of Anthony WT and Ainsley Harriot now but they were all the rage a couple of years ago.

Jamie Oliver gets right up my nose.  He's such a sanctimonious tw@t.

However, I LOVE Gordon Ramsay.  He tells it like it is, doesn't mince his words and I like his YouTube videos.  I was never able to produce nice, fluffy rice until I followed his recipe.  Now I get perfect rice every time - we eat a lot of rice as I'm not very keen on potatoes.

On my wish list - to have a meal at his restaurant in Chelsea.

Most of them get on my tits but have to admit I do like the hairy bikers and of course Nigella, wooaah, very easy on the eye.   

Why good food has to be ruined by adding all the spices etc. I do not know, I grow good veg and want to taste the veg not additions.

why does it need 2 hairy bikers to make a meal as a sort of ant and dec double whammy?
My faves are Rick Stein and Hugh fearnley whits - turn off most of the others.
I once saw ready steady cook being filmed live - this put me off cooking programmes.

Different spices, herbs and cooking techniques give different flavours and, used well, enhance flavours and textures.    I love watching cookery programmes as long as they don't assume I'm dumb and teach me something new, same as watching gardening programmes which increase my knowledge.  Just wish we had some on TV instead of wall to wall antiques formats and "Reality" TV.

They just announced the death of the second 'Fat Lady'.  Just thought I'd mention them.  Thought their programmes were interesting, because they cooked the sort of things that I never would - old fashioned, rustic and sometimes quite 'posh'! 

I like Delia for reliable basic recipes that work for me every time, not so much her 'advanced' stuff.  Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall is more my telly cook.   Mainly because he uses real ingredients including garden  and foraged ingredients.  He spends care sourcing ingredients and the link between living animal and slaughter for food is definitely not glossed over.  A lot of his show is about getting and even producing the ingredients.  But whereas I actually follow Delia's recipes to the letter, I watch Hugh for entertainment and get inspired to cook something completely different. 

I must admit that the Hairy Bikers have recipes that I found quite good, some published here.  Their baked tortilla 'salad bowl' is pretty and novel and their curries are good.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/chilli_salad_bowls_22404
But I don't watch them unless I catch a programme by chance.