Jamie Oliver & American podcasts
In January this year, whilst lying in the Aotearoa New Zealand sun on my mother deck, sipping a beer I listened to the Sporkful podcast with Jamie Oliver.
It is a succinct 35 mins – which, I think is a good length for a podcast. It picks up on certain aspects of his career but aims to cover his whole life story, in particular the fact he is the best-selling nonfiction author in the UK of all time, and the irony of him being dyslexic and not reading a whole book till the age of 38. I understand the desire in a short interview but trying to give an overarching sense of a man and his whole career - this means there is a lot of myth building.
Jamie is like a politician, he goes in with good intentions, does great stuff. Then gets caught up in his own Kool-Aid and loses touch with the real people, and the full discussion. Which is, ironic, or rather amusing, because of what he says about politicians – “these are people that are career politicians. They require and want to be going up the scale, getting more power. And, once you get into the realms of that, I am constantly largely disappointed” Mr Oliver talks about inequality, and correctly addresses class and access but then refuses to engage with the complexity of class, and his work centres himself
It – he – is a great story; he has done a lot. I love his books and so many cite him as an inspiration. This includes a lot of men, who have felt marginalised from the schooling system and found his work and books in their teens, at a time when the future is looming, and they can’t see themselves in it. He opens up a possibility for many. I wish that conversation would happen, the relationship with masculinity and Jamie Oliver!
We wouldn't have the breath of cooking or cooking show without his influence on the food world. But he isn't god. There needs to be room for other voices, which is what he doesn't allow for, ultimately.
He talks about class (although does he ever say class?) and maybe I am being unfair, and his interview cut a few things short which might be editing. But the references to class are so shallow they don’t really mean anything. For example, he says ‘single parent families’ but there is no expansion about what that means in terms of access or class. Does it mean a lack of support networks, struggling to be financially secure etc. so it comes across as moralistic, which I don’t think Oliver means to be. Not all single parent families are struggling, not all struggling families are single parent… etc etc.
He does address concepts (if not the language) of class and access to food and education (food systems). But you can’t talk about class without talking about race, and this is absolutely skirted, which, given his history of appropriating, feels messy and unfair. People who are working class, or quite simply poor, are likely to be immigrants, and immigrants are racialised. But there is no space for the conversation of race, because of the centring of ‘Jamie the personality’. Which is why he keeps fucking up! From his fiction book that appropriates and erases Aboriginals, to his no-jerk-present jerk recipes. He hasn’t interrogated the relationship with race and therefore culture, which is hugely important when discussing foods… and/or access to foods, and particularly healthy foods. Healthy food must have cultural relevance.
I want to champion Jamie. I want to believe in him. But he just keeps being a dick.
Or maybe I am being unfair, is it Jamie’s responsibility to delve to contextualise, expand, push for nuance? I mean, yes. He is being put up as the expert. But equally, it is the interviewer to do so as well. I see an interviewer as an editor, adding notes in the margin of ‘expand?’ and ‘meaning?’ and the most important ‘who is the ‘they’ you’re referring to?’ These are not ‘gotcha’ moments, they are simply aiming to not simplify the conversation and hopefully getting the interviewee to push themselves and be active participants in the conversation – push the conversation further etc. Here Jamie Oliver is passive, just proclaiming the good he he has done, and so not growing from the experiences or his active work. He gets to fall back on laurels, by not being questioned.
Sporkful is an American podcast and states that it is “not for foodies, it’s for eaters”. Firstly, by being American I think this means there isn’t a cultural context of what and who Jamie Oliver is. There is the global media identity, and work seen at a distance. He gets to feel shiny in a way that the British people don’t feel – I think, if you’re critical or a super fan of Oliver, there is still a sense of reality and human-ness about him. I think it’s part of the British sense of anti-celebrity.
“Not for foodies…” I don’t know what this means, but I assume there is a slight snobbery here around the idea that ‘foodies’ are people who do food for aesthetic like it’s a hobby or a past time. Whereas an eater gets in and dirty with the subject – consuming the topic of discussion has a messiness about it. Which makes it even more important for them to not just offer platitudes. Come on, ask the big questions! Interrogate the topic! You can still fanboy whilst getting into the juicy bits of the chat! This is what eating is all about.
I think - and I say this as a podcaster and someone who loves the genre, wants to do more and has been interviewed on a few - that this can all be a issue with podcasts and live interviewing. It is easy to get caught up in the moment of the guest.
Scribehound
Like all good gentrification, there are very cool people there but largely it is middle class white people doing the same thing they could be doing literally anywhere. Doesn’t make them bad. Just same-y. And of course, pushes people who had been there (doing this work) out, even more to the margins. Except for the few that can (are invited to) stay.
Scribehound has writers that I love, are my absolute favourite!!! Inject their words directly into my brain etc etc… But so many of the writers are people who are already regular contributors – if not regular columnists! – at other publications, so if I really wanted to read them, I would read them there (although those writers are mostly people I don’t read anyway). I am very ok with publications not being for me, I very ok with writers – even the ones I like or love – not always writing for me. But what is interesting to interrogate about this platform is it’s form and style.
As someone who has been part of independent food and drink media, who has a style of writing that is ‘niche’, that wants to tell stories of diaspora, migrants, history… (and I have been doing this for years, just this week I found an interview I did on YouTube of Mandy Yin 10 years ago!) I am very aware that with Scribehound, my style of writing is now mainstream. I wrote for so many years for US publication because there was no space here, or for independents like At The Table, Pit, and Eater – which is not indy but in the UK it was not mainstream… Plus I set up Cheese magazine, Sourced – which publishes work that has depth and is relative to the writer, regardless of background, and that actively works with diverse subjects and contributors.
Vittles came out of this space too, and with it has given space and appropriate financial support for the work, for five years!! Vittles publishes people who are not food writers, who are not writers, as well as seasoned writers, academics, researchers etc etc… and so they get to these rich pieces of work where you realise that only that person could tell that story, in that way, and the work feels special! This is real curation. This is thinking about the project as a whole, the publication as a whole. As a reader you feel part of it.
I subscribed to Scribehound because I wanted to read a couple of pieces and it was £1 a month if you signed up early! I bloody love reading, why not! And I dived in and read a lot. It was all good – of course! They are all skilled writers! – I enjoyed it. But it didn’t feel special, or a project or publication. What is the aim, guide, theme, purpose? What is overall narrative of the publication? Is it just reinventing substack? In which case, why have editors?
The people I fangirl; I will buy their books and searching them out when they write elsewhere.
Scribehound – gentrification of media space, the hackney of the food world.
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