I mentioned it in another video, but here's the Salon article I was referring to:

http://www.salon.com/2014/08/08/how_one_man_destroyed_the_food _network_guy_fieri_has_made_culinary_tv_into_a_viewers_hell/

I don't know, IZ, that article makes him sound kinda awesome.

I mean, that writer sounds like one of those frumpy ladies who get their glasses blown off by the SHEER ROCKIN' POWER of MOTLEY CRUE. Loosen up a lil', Ms Haightderfun!

I've never seen Guy Fieri outside of that one Aflac commercial, and I can totally empathize with the idea of wishing TV weren't so dumbed down. But for fucks sake they're cooking shows, not science documentaries; if you're turning to cooking shows to give you your daily shot of snobbery and class-aspiration ("Oooo, a kitchen in the HAMPTONS! How very Old Money!"), then maybe a fat ska-dude with stupid hair is exactly the sort of celebrity chef you need?

Julia's entire oeuvre was one of slowly building upon methods one after another until the viewer had a rudimentary understanding of the subject at hand, that being French cuisine. This episode shows exactly what she does best. She starts with the basic food, fried potatoes, and then goes to an intermediary form, potato chips, and then finishes off with a visual showboat piece, the souffle potatoes in the potato nest. This was itself part of the greater arc of the series, where she started each season with a basic method (the mother sauces, how to roast, etc.) and would slowly build on top of it with each episode. Julia was on the side of the home cook. She wanted them to master the basics and then move upwards.

Compare this to her British counterpart, Fanny Cradock, who oozed classism from the very outset. She did things to impress it upon the average British housewife that she was inferior to the French. Her shows are horrific escapades in shock and awe cuisine, the sort of thing that makes widdle Guy Fieri piss his pants.