Cooked-up tension

Masterchef (BBC1) is a total waste of life — and I should know, because I’m addicted to it. It came to me suddenly and I’m still not sure how it happened. All I know is that one year I was like: ‘Masterchef. Ah, yes, it’s that foodie programme Loyd Grossman presents, which critics always call things like “Moaasterchoif” and “Mxxrgrghstrchrrxff” to show how amusing they can be about the presenter’s pronunciation.’ And the next I was: ‘Noo! Noo! No way was cloudberry coulis on calf’s brain carpaccio an ejection offence! That boy’s got talent. You should have got rid of the woman with her crappy tarte au citron…’

Actually I’ve just done another thing critics always do when writing up Masterchef: competing to see who can conjure up the most imaginatively ludicrous dish to represent the kind of imaginatively ludicrous dishes they tend to imagine get served up on Masterchef.

Regular viewers will know, however, that this is a fake observation. Yes, the competing amateur chefs do try to push the boat out with their recipes — and are penalised for not doing so: one poor chap in this new series served up a very homely steak and chips, then broke down in tears as he belatedly sensed his fatal error — but their adventurousness almost never results in the kind of road-crash dog’s breakfast dishes for which the show’s producers no doubt continually yearn.

For example, one of this year’s contenders — the one who looks like the once-vicious now-benign old lag who runs the lifer’s wing in a maximum security prison — has a thing about mackerel. Worse, of his own volition, he actually decided to serve up some of this mega-pointless greasy scum-feeding crap fish with a kind of foamed-up cold sauce made of oysters whizzed with cream.