Jamie’s America
Jamie Oliver is important. I’ll admit that’s not the first word that pops into my head when he comes up in conversation but upon some recent reflection, I think that he is. He defines an era of sorts and at the turn of a decade, it seems a better time than most to cast a brief retrospective glance over his work, before diving into his latest book.
He has been at the vanguard of commercialising our nation’s increasing interest in the food we eat for the last ten years or so, and to a certain extent even spurring this interest on. Along with Ramsay, he has lead this charge with resounding success; demolishing the fourth wall in TV cooking (”ere camera-man, whatdyoufinka vis lamb? Laavly!”), simplifying in home cooking what had been made prissy and overly-complicated by the likes of Gary Rhodes, his now formidable and accessible publishing repertoire, his restaurants and his slightly baffling but very profitable tie-up with Sainsburys. Most vitally though, there have been his very public projects.
I think we can already look back on his work on school dinners, getting jobless youth to work in his restaurant 15 and most recently his home-spun initiative The Ministry of Food as typifying a dichotomy of modern times: on the one hand we know more about food, we understand more about the relationship between diet and lifestyle yet on the other obesity has become a serious health concern of modern times. While we are increasingly conscious of fair trade, freedom farming and free-range eggs, we also ‘Go-large’ and consume more instant meals than ever before. Throughout this, Jamie has captured the zeitgeist of this uncomfortable relationship by trying to give some of this knowledge to the have-nots. In this his newest book on American cuisine, he continues this pattern by following the gaze of one nation which already rests upon another; that of the Brits on the new nation of hope across the pond. In so doing, while not meddling so directly in the social side of educating the UK in the ways of food, he does show us a new side to himself.
So what does Jamie’s America offer us? In short, it’s a recipe book and travelogue based on his recent TV series. I must admit I didn’t warm to the TV series much, mostly due to his attempts to empathise inauthentically with a gang who had been dragged-up in some serious hardship on the streets of LA, but I was pleasantly surprised by the book. It is an inviting, warm and genuinely enjoyable collection of recipes punctuated with commentary about his travels (with maybe the odd posed picture of himself too many). It owes some presentational elements to the likes of Nigel Slater’s Kitchen diaries a few years ago with its daylight lit reportage-style photography (done in this case by David Loftus) with a similar ‘wax-paper from the larder’ style of reproduction. Its mixture of recipes strikes a nice balance between tributes to those who he met along the way and ones which he has added his own distinctive accent too.
His enthusiasm and interest for ‘real’ American food can be quite entertaining and even inspiring - whether that’s to make your own BBQ rub or a Fresh Broccoli salad.
The book can feel a little over-produced at points; photography, collage, montage, punchy copy-writing, pithy little tales and lots of self-reference. It may be cookbook-making by numbers, but it is done well and it has lots for the casual reader to dip in and out for. The good news is that whatever your style of cookery, area of interst or personal taste, there’s plenty for everyone. He visits six culinarily distinct areas of the USA from NYC to the Navajo reserves of Arizona resulting in a bright and colourful spread that ranges from a Chilli Con Carne made with coffee to Beer-Butt Chicken (which is exactly as it sounds) via Breakfast Tortillas, with a few more subtle re-tellings of traditional American dishes like Pumpkin Pie.
The Navajo section of the book is for me the most interesting as its the closest thing he finds to indigenous, as opposed to European-settler influenced cookery. He clearly has a passion for discovering ‘authentic’ food, and does so impressively here, albeit with his inimitable interpretations, additions and ‘twists’; Chicken mole with chocolate, Peach Cobbler, and Hot Churros (small dipping donuts). It’s a great book for anglicising some classic American recipes like Pumpkin pie where Jamie roasts the pumpkin to keep in the flavour (rather than boil them) and reduces the added sugar content to levels we might feel less guilty about.
The point of any cookery book should be to get the author’s take on food, for their methods, approach to life and personality to shine through and ideally to infect the reader with a little of that passion too. I’m glad to say Jamie does that here - for me at least. Not since his early books have I felt the need to attack one of his recipes but I’ll be giving the quirky, frugal and efficient-looking Beer-Butt Chicken a bash come summer BBQ time and Chocolate Bread Pudding with Beer Sauce as soon as I get the chance.
It feels like after a number of years as something of a food missionary in this country, Jamie has gone back to what he enjoys most by bringing us an entertaining, interesting and fun book showcasing a diverse selection of food from the country which continues to hold fascination for us. It’s easy reading and importantly is likely to help you out of a tight spot when you’re bored of knocking up another roast chicken or spag-bol for your friends and family. So long as you do it without the assistance of a Jamie Oliver patented Flavour Shaker, you can even do it with your head held high.
Pukka!
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