Thursday, 26th
THE WORLD’S MOST EXPENSIVE FOOD, C4, 9pm
Britain has more billionaires than ever before and they’re demanding to be fed. If you thought Waitrose was where the rich shopped then this documentary will open your eyes because “supermarket” is a dirty word which will not be spoken in a billionaire’s presence; instead, they have a host of private companies and individuals who exist to “satisfy the whims and excesses of the world’s most demanding clients.”
And do these rich people eat with delicacy and decorum? Hardly. As one chef carefully arranges plush fruit on a plate, he remarks: “These will just be gone! It’s like feeding strawberries to pigs.”
And if you’re having a party and would like a bit of help with catering do you order in a few boxes of doughnuts from Greggs, a cling-filmed sandwich platter from the local café, or maybe some artisan cupcakes from that yummy mummy Facebook keeps pushing at you? No, you turn to Bubble, the experts in “molecular gastronomy”, who provide little plates of luminous streaks, odd little piles seared with a blowtorch, and something resembling a tiny bundle of twine. Do you eat this stuff or phone Rentokil?
So this is how the rich live – and eat. I still say caviar looks like a sludgy cup of wet cement. Give me a plain old shepherd’s pie and a bit of Madeira cake any day.
ALEX POLIZZI’S ITALIAN ISLANDS, C5, 8pm
Ms. Polizzi is a rather ubiquitous presence on TV just now, but then so is Italy. How I’d welcome a travel programme where a sparky unknown visits Azerbaijan or rural China, but I suppose that’s why we have travel literature: to give us something edgier than yet another tour of sunny Sardinia.
But, to Polizzi’s credit, she veers away from the typical fare to give us tales of deadly bandits in the Sardinian countryside and learns how to weave sea silk.
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