Making the cut

WE ARE obsessed.

I am recalling long nights out with normally gregarious friends instead glued to phones for updates on Masterchef, the most popular of the endless foodie-fare on the box. I am thinking of many male acquaintances who have morphed into Saturday Stovetop Warriors. I am thinking of younger friends, teens and pre-teens, who now ‘plate up’ and ‘stack’ their bangers and mash.

Great barricades of hefty, culinary tomes dominate bookshops while, despite pinched wallets, wild-eyed gourmands still roam farmers’ markets, grilling stall-holders on the provenance of parsnips and the terroir of turnips. We may be lying in an economic gutter but we remain fixated on the stars. Michelin stars, to be precise.