THE GURGLING COD

Harry, you're a writer, are we that type?

Over to 101 Cookbooks,  there is a lively thread going about cooking for beginners. The advice is reasonable, (soups, pastas as opposed to Giacometti sculptures re-created in phyllo, with each limb stuffed with a different forcemeat), but  flabbergasting.  A  remarkable number of commenters suggest beginning by watching one or another program on Food Network, or other TV show. I am a book guy, vocationally and avocationally, but this seems like a pretty dramatic epistemic shift. Are there really people who learn to cook from TV? Not get inspired to do a dish they saw Pepin do, but learn to cook?

Together Again

According to Page Six, "the leading candidate to co-host the fourth hour of the "Today" show in September with Tiki Barber is gorgeous Giada DeLaurentiis, the Roman-born chef from the Food Network ." I, for one, hail the coming Golden Age of Today Show slash fiction.