I’m quite swiftly getting over MasterChef this season. I’m not a fan of reality television, but made an exception for MC, because last year it was fun. Good food, bit of drama, no rubbish elimination-teary-voting-off-your-opponents-while-blowing snot bubbles and telling them how much you love them bullshit that you see on other reality franchises.

The thing is, it’s not the sobbing contestants getting to me (they do, I’m not immune to irritation).

It’s not the conspiracy theories that the show is in fact rigged (which, I kinda think it is, and I might do another post on that. I do love a good conspiracy theory).

It’s not even the monotonous and repetitive ads for other channel 10 shows, or ads by the show’s sponsors, followed by an announcement that the show is sponsored by the company that just advertised their products ten seconds ago, which when teamed with the meaningful silences and suspense and ‘we’ll tell you something after the next ad break’ which basically allow the viewer to see 10 mins of actual cooking per hour of programming.

Hell, it’s not even George’s deconstructed salads.

It’s the fucking micro herbs. Give me a break.  For starters, they are sprouts. And while sprouts can be an interesting way to add different flavours to dishes (not really my bag, but anyway…), calling it a micro herb doesn’t make you more hep and less hippy.

Then it’s the powdered additives. Meat glue, leithicin, that weird shit that they use to make ’snow’. multidextrose powder I think? And titanium oxide.  Now, I’m pretty sure that if a contestant used custard powder they would have their ass handed to them, and yet a chef uses some of this rubbish and suddenly it’s a legit product.  It’s easy to think it must taste excellent and you’d never know it was made by a chemist and not a chef, but then thing about the amount of industry ‘experts’ on telly right now peddling chemical ridden crap to an unsuspecting public. That dude who flogs Vegeta, which is basically MSG and salt in a can. Or Julie Goodwin, last year’s winner, who was telling us that MasterFoods flavour bases and sauces are just as good as actual cooking.   Or molecular gastronomy, which last year was rubbished and this year is a must-know technique, for all those wanting their food to not look like food.

Then there’s presentation. Schmear. Save me. What I don’t want when I’m about to eat, is the vision of anyone smearing anything across the plate, just before adding the food.  And I don’t care who you are, but a schmear of mash potato is just a stupid thing to taunt someone with.  The colour and consistency is another thing. While I recognise my preference for an actual bread roll with a burger over bread ’soil’ is a personal thing, I can’t believe what the judges will flame one day and applaud the next.  Claire’s QANTAS main course was ‘boring’ looking (which it was), but on Friday night’s Master Class, George served up a frothy mushroom sauce with the colour and consistency of dog sick. And everyone ‘ooh’ed all over it (which may be a euphemism, now I think about it).  If you’re ever going to de-construct something, it should be the colour of mushrooms.

I don’t know why they don’t just have a ‘Continental Pasta and Sauce’ mystery box and be done with it. As long as it’s garnished with micro-herbs, of course.