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Review
‘Floyd introduced an element of chaos, even danger to proceedings … The book is packed with tales of larger-than-life antics and wacky experiences. There are brilliant descriptions of coming of age in the 60s and 70s, subsisting on things like tripe, onions and tinned pilchard salad and encountering such exotic fare as Lurpack butter and spaghetti bolognase for the first time.’ Observer
‘The omnipresence of telly chefs was first foreshadowed and arguably made possible, by Keith Floyd. The author of this memoir, David Pritchard, was the television-maker who plucked him from his Bristol bistro and put him on telly. Floyd’s unbuttoned style made him an instant hit.’ Daily Mail
‘Heartening – as well as very funny – to read of the lick and stick pioneering days of late 70s and 80s food programme-making. David Pritchard is a dryly companionable narrator of those trailblazing years. His captivating memoir proves that – without his sense of culinary adventure, his artfulness of the apparent insatiability of his appetite – a generation of rich, starry television cooks might never have made it quite so far, or so fast.’ Daily Telegraph
Chosen as a Telegraph ‘Book of the Year’ by Kate Colquhoun
Product Description
The true story of a bumbling and undistinguished television producer who discovered Keith Floyd – and inadvertently changed the landscape of cookery programmes forever to give rise to the phenomenon of the ‘celebrity chef’.
As the producer behind the phenomenally successful Keith Floyd and Rick Stein BBC cookery programmes, David Pritchard had unique view of what went on behind the scenes of the programmes that inspired the event of modern television chefs as we know them today.
But back then, when David first met Floyd in his Bristol bistro, he was one of a kind. Charismatic, with a slight erratic edge, always happy to have a slurp of wine or two, and not afraid to say exactly what he thought on air, Floyd was a revelation, a chef that television had not seen the like of before. David shares the overwhelming excitement that went into making the early Floyd series - from sitting down to a silver service dinner aboard a tiny fishing trawler heading out of the Plymouth Sound, to attempting abortive hot-air balloon adventures over Alsace.
Twenty-five years ago, no one could have foreseen the incredible popularity commanded by food programmes on television today. Now we have a whole army of chefs representing virtually every single personality trait from sexy to aggressive, to young and experimental. But it was Floyd that started it all.
Tangled up amid the tales of the bust-ups, the botched camera shots and the exquisite regional food are reminisces about David's life growing up in ration-starved, post-war Britain. Also containing snapshots of life behind the scenes of sixties television-making and spanning the era from when avocados were virtually unheard of to a time when the term 'foodie' has gained an almost cult-like status, this is an outstanding memoir from the producer who single-handedly changed the face of food as we know it today.
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Customer Reviews
It is. It's a very funny book charting the rise and rise of TV chefs as the new rock and roll stars starting when Keith Floyd came to our screens and started doing cookery programmes for men.
There is no doubt Pritchard created the springboard for the TV formats and celebrity chefs of today, and the book is a laugh a page about how he created those early Floyd and Stein shows. Taking cookery out of the kitchen onto location and beyond the appeal of just housewife TV to an audience who wanted to relax with a glass of wine and not worry about the exact measurements of the ingredients- but just cook!
Pritchard relates how the shows were planned, filmed and received in the era before compliance, Health and Safety, bureaucracy and audience ratings. Stories of only one camera being used, tiny regional TV budgets, the volatile relationship between Floyd and Pritchard from start to finish (including a recent reconciliation), and the latter's reminiscences of the shocking British foods of the 60's and 70's, and how European food was, and still is, his inspiration.
So why 4 stars? Because it's a light, funny and engrossing read, but the book jacket ...it's just so awful!
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