Friends And Family At The TV Table

Michael Hedges November 5, 2018 Follow on Twitter

Of all the great defining cultural attributes, nothing tops food. We eat. We identify with food and all of those tastes and textures convey our history, values and community. Food is shared and celebrated. Food is us, distinctly. Bots don’t eat.

“Italian food has enslaved tastebuds around the globe for centuries,” noted CNN Travel (May 4), calling the cuisine, again, the best in the world. It is lively, passionate and essential to Italian culture. Italians have a very special relationship with everything connected with food. It is no surprise that Italians have celebrated food and cooking in writing for hundreds of years and that food and cooking shows are a staple of Italian television.

Passions being what they are in Italy, a cooking show on public TV channel RAI Uno caused considerable angst last week. Well-known chef Vittorio Castellani, known as Chef Kumalé, abruptly ended participation in La Prova del Cuoco (Test of the Cook), the cooking contest show based on the BBC’s Ready Steady Cook format. Chef Kumalé quit, he said on social media, because somebody at RAI told him to stop with the multi-ethnic dishes, his specialty, in favor of Italian regional cuisine.

“Avoid fusion recipes and harebrained revisitations,” he was told, quoted by daily Corriere Della Sera (October 29). "I am rather worried about the suffocating air that is breathed in this country, for this form of cultural poverty, which in a silent but substantial way is reinforcing feelings and choices that I consider very dangerous for our poor Italy. It’s not for me.”

“The chefs who participate in the broadcast,” said a RAI spokesperson, “are screened through an editorial choice that takes into account many factors including, as in all programs, the visual quality, the quality of the story and, last, the preference of the audience. There is not, however, any thematic selection or indication for the cuisine presented: Any such statement is false.”

And, being Italy, there is an understory. A new host for La Prova del Cuoco was named for the season opening in September. Out were Antonella Clerici and Anna Moroni, the show’s original co-hosts. Ms Moroni became host of another cooking show, Ricette all’italiana, seen on Mondadori’s Rete 4 channel. In is Elisa Isoardi, girlfriend of far-right deputy prime minister Matteo Salvini. Ms Isoardi had demanded the exit of Chef Kumalé, reported Huffington Post Italia (October 29). Echos of Silvio Berlusconi are ringing.

Several personnel changes, some quite significant, have come to RAI since the elevation of Mr. Salvini, also leader of the far-right, nationalist Lega political party. Populist purveyor of conspiracy theories Marcello Foa, with no broadcasting experience, was named RAI president. New directors of all television and radio news programs are political appointees.

Auditel audience estimates for La Prova del Cuoco are trending lower; 12.9% share (September-October) from 15.7% share one year on. Viewers become attached to show hosts, particularly after 18 years. A possible problem, as every TV person understands, is it is the Sunday lead-in for the quite important news program Tg1. Change the show host is, most likely, politically untenable, an abrupt cancellation disrupting to viewers. Italian media watchers expect a schedule change until the oven cools.

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