The Storm Between Paula And Tony And Is This The SAME Tony Bourdain Who Gave It To Alice Waters For Being An Elitist?

Last week, I noticed that the dustup between Tony and Paula was getting pretty heated. It was even commented upon on the Op-Ed page* of the NY Times last week. I guess what the grand dame of heart-stoppingly good Southern cuisine and the bad boy of the professional kitchen have to say about each other must be pretty important.

To recap, Anthony Bourdain spoke ill of several Food Network hosts – Paula, Guy, Aunt Sandy and RR in an interview with TV Guide. He said, “The worst, most dangerous person to America is clearly Paula Deen. She revels in unholy connections with evil corporations and she's proud of the fact that her food is f---ing bad for you."

He doesn’t stop there:

“If I were on at seven at night and loved by millions of people at every age, I would think twice before telling an already obese nation that it's OK to eat food that is killing us. Plus, her food sucks."

We got Paula’s response on Page Six of the Daily News:

“Anthony Bourdain needs to get a life. You don’t have to like my food, or Rachael’s, Sandra’s and Guy’s. But it’s another thing to attack our character.“

Paula continues, "Not everyone can afford to pay $58 for prime rib or $650 for a bottle of wine. (BINGO, Paula!) My friends and I cook for regular families who worry about feeding their kids and paying the bills . . . It wasn’t that long ago that I was struggling to feed my family, too.”

Why is this news? Bourdain’s been making negative comments about television cooking hosts forever. Actually, I thought Tony had slowed down his Rachael-Ray-is-the-most-evil-thing-on-the-planet rants (not that I totally disagree, but only about her cooking, not her personhood). I guess he has a new season of No Reservations to promote.

The real reason this particular back and forth has caught fire now is that Paula’s response has touched a nerve. She knows what it’s like to be on the other side of affluence – having been through a divorce, agoraphobia and economic worries. She may be living on easy street now, but no one can deny it was an uphill battle filled with hard work and sacrifice.

By portraying Tony’s diatribe as an attack on the have-nots by the haves, who casually order hugely expensive restaurant meals and think nothing of buying any ingredient they fancy, no matter the price, (as long as it’s politically correct), Paula has struck a chord.

The ironic thing is that Tony took Paula’s side of this argument against Alice Waters not so long ago. It must be inconvenient for him to remember that he railed against Alice Waters’ philosophy of supporting local farmers and pushing organic, farm fresh foods as being incredibly rarified and elitist. He said this in 2007:

"We're all in the middle of a recession, like we're all going to start buying expensive organic food and running to the green market. There's something very Khmer Rouge about Alice Waters that has become unrealistic."

Tony ends with this statement – “I’m a little uncomfortable with legislating good eating habits.” HUH?!!! Why the diatribe against Paula, then?

Why is it, when arguing against Alice Waters, that Tony feels we should have the choice to eat whatever we want? But he doesn’t allow the same freedom of food expression to Paula and her fans.

Our dastardly eating habits come from so many places. Paula is not the number one cause. I’d look to too much television time and paying too much attention to video screens as pretty high on the list of what we should change. Our sedentary lifestyle is the root cause for many of our obesity issues.

If we worked in the fields or paced factory floors or even walked up and down 20 flights of stairs a day, the story would be different. But many of us work and play (and eat) in front of screens and unless we’re bicycling or elliptical-ing at the same time, WHATEVER we eat is just going to sit there…no matter what it is.

No one home to cook or teach youngsters how to cook is another problem. It IS amazing how many people do not know simple kitchen basics. Adding a cooking curriculum to schools would be one great way to foster a healthier lifestyle in every family.

The list goes on and on. Bad food available cheaply and plentifully is another reason why so many eat so poorly. Lack of fresh food in many neighborhoods is a huge problem.

I can’t criticize Paula for all of our nutritional woes. I would feel as if I were saying something bad about a beloved aunt. Plus Paula has such a cozy way of welcoming us into her kitchen.

Anthony Bourdain is as warm and cuddly as a rattlesnake, even if I’m sure his culinary likes and dislikes are a lot close to mine than Paula’s are. I also like his sense of humor, although I do find him a bit scary. But does he really not see the contradiction in criticizing Alice Waters for demanding fresh, local food (especially to kids), and, at the same time, blasting Paula for cooking feel-good food and working with a company that gives loads of (okay, not the healthiest) food away every year?

Isn’t it obvious how incongruous it is that TODAY he’s playing the Alice Waters’ role and PAULA is playing his, by crying foul, that the normal person can’t afford high falutin’ baby squashes or rainbow colors of kale, whatever that is anyway.

Frank Bruni makes a good point in comparing Tony’s harangue to what’s going on in Washington. The tenor of the Tony’s remarks (actually they’re more like rants) is the opposite of an open-hearted, kind-spirited conversation to find common ground.

On the subject of food, at least, it’s a shame that something that can bring so much joy, not to mention actual physical sustenance, is being used as a way to demonize one’s opponents.

Of course, there are gads of tough practical issues and some moral ones too. What if KFC offered to give away millions of pounds of food to poor school children? What if they offered to supply free school lunches across America? Probably the people in charge would say no. But does that mean they would prefer kids to go hungry than to eat KFC?

What if Cool Whip were offered in every shelter and soup kitchen? Obviously, to that one I would say no and hope a more healthful alternative could be found. But that’s easy for someone with a full refrigerator (before the hurricane, at least) and pantry stocked with extras to say. To folks with few alternatives, free ham or cheap hamburgers at least fills them up to fight another day.

It’s hard to disagree with Tony that people should eat better and make better choices. I’ve always agreed when Alice Waters has said the same thing. But the best way to make that happen probably does not include accusing sweet Paula of crimes against humanity and berating the food so venomously that she offers with such love and affection.

*And isn’t it interesting that The Times now has TWO food-centric writers on their Op-Ed and Opinion pages? Frank Bruni AND Mark Bittman.)

A Lighter Version Of A Classic

I loved one of the things Mark Bittman said in his last Minimalist column in the Times on Wednesday. He was talking about how the column had given him the opportunity to cook with lots of different people over the years and how he always benefited from that:

I discovered that you never cook with someone else without learning something. In every case, there’s a two-way transfer of knowledge. If they know less than you do, you grow from teaching. If more, of course, you grow from learning.

Last week, I was definitely the student. For Examiner.com, I interviewed a radio host from these parts, Dennis Malloy, who is also an avid cook. His favorite dishes are old-timey, family style Italian recipes that are always satisfying and delicious when made from scratch.

Dennis just did a cooking demonstration and he mentioned a dish that really interested me. (He didn't actually cook this dish, he just talked about it.) He called it Chicken Parmesan and I think he said he learned about it from a friend in Italy.

He coats the thinly pounded chicken breasts with flour, egg and crumb (actually he may have left out the flour) and cooks them, but that wasn’t the exciting part. The cool thing was that he said he topped the chicken with an uncooked bruschetta-type tomato mixture and THAT WAS IT!

So I asked him where the Parm was. He CALLED it Chicken Parm and so WHERE was the cheese? Oh, he said, I guess you grate a little over at the end. I liked that it was kind of an afterthought.

The great thing was the idea of a beautifully cooked chicken cutlet with just a fresh, lovely tomato topping. It’s the complete opposite of a gloppy, over-sauced, mozzarella-laden bit of chicken, which sounded so good to me.

Dennis, thank you for such a great idea. THIS is what I came up with.

My Version Of Dennis Malloy’s Version Of Chicken Parmesan (serves 2ish)

Printable recipe here.

Fresh Tomato Topping:

1 pint grape tomatoes

1 large handful of parsley, chopped

½ medium red onion, chopped finely

1 tbl. extra virgin olive oil

1 tsp. red wine vinegar

A scant 1/2 tsp. Kosher salt

For Chicken:

4 thinly pounded chicken breasts (I use 1 package of Bell and Evans "Italian style" chicken breasts)

1 cup flour

2 eggs beaten with 2 tsps. water

3 to 4 pieces whole wheat bread, made into crumbs in the food processor

3 to 4 tbls. olive oil for frying

To serve:

½ box thin spaghetti, cooked

2 tbls. olive oil, 2 cloves garlic, salt and parsley

8 pitted Kalamata olives

a bit of freshly grated Parmesan Cheese

extra chopped parsley, if desired, for garnish

For Fresh Tomato Topping, cut each grape tomato into quarters lengthwise and then each piece into thirds. (It sounds fussy, but it’s so much more attractive to have even pieces.) Place in non-reactive bowl with remaining topping ingredients. Leave at room temperature until ready to use, up to 2 hours.

If using Bell and Evans chicken, cut each chicken breast piece in half lengthwise. You should have 4 pieces. Flour, egg and crumb each piece and place on a baking sheet which has been lined with wax paper. Refrigerate, uncovered, until ready to cook.

Heat 3 tbls. olive oil in 12 inch sauté pan over medium heat. Fry chicken breasts about 3 minutes about 3 minutes on each side until browned nicely. Add additional tablespoon of oil for second side, if necessary.

For spaghetti, heat olive oil with 2 cloves of minced garlic until fragrant. Remove garlic. Add spaghetti and toss until well coated. Add salt to taste and parsley.

Place one portion of spaghetti on dinner plate. Top with one or two cooked chicken breasts and tomato topping. Place 4 olives around each plate. Sprinkle over Parmesan cheese and garnish with extra chopped parsley if desired.

Top O’ The (Italian) Colcannon To You

Because it’s St. Patrick’s Day, I think I can be excused for serving a couple of starches in one meal, especially when they’re as good as these.

The first recipe is a variation on Mark Bittman's Green Mashed Potatoes. I don’t know why he didn’t make the connection between this dish and Colcannon, but it seems obvious to me. He uses greens instead of cabbage, and bakes it with a crumb crust, instead of serving straight from the saucepan. It's got to be a second cousin, at least, to the old Irish favorite.

Italian Colcannon (serves 4-6)

4 big russet potatoes
4 garlic cloves
1 bunch broccoli rabe
4 to 5 tbls. of the best extra virgin olive oil
Kosher salt

1/2 cup fresh breadcrumbs

Peel and cut potatoes into large chunks. Add to a large sauce pan with unpeeled garlic cloves. Cover with cold water and add a large pinch of salt. Bring to the boil, lower heat and simmer until barely done about 15 to 18 minutes. Scoop out into colander. Cover with clean dishtowel to finish the cooking – Ina’s great tip.

Remove garlic cloves and put through garlic press into large bowl. Add potatoes and mash with potato masher, adding 2 tablespoons olive oil and ½ teaspoon Kosher salt.

Bring potato water back to the boil. Add bunch of broccoli rabe and cook for 5 to 6 1/2 minutes. (If you have resisters to bitter greens, cook them for the full 6½ minutes. I did.) Drain well. Chop and squeeze out moisture before adding to potatoes. Mash potatoes and rabe together roughly. Stir in more salt to taste and another tablespoon of olive oil, if you think it needs it.

Spoon into Pam-ed baking dish. Cover with ½ cup fresh breadcrumbs. Drizzle over a bit more olive oil. Bake at 400°F for 15 minutes.

In the next recipe, I combined two chicken recipes to a pretty good effect, I think. One is Melissa Clark's from last week’s NY Times (sitting right next to Bittman’s potato recipe), where she roasts a chicken on top of bread, the other is a yummy marinated chicken, written about rapturously by Nicole over at From The Inside. (Her engaging blog has A LOT going on…so be patient when it takes awhile to load.)


Marinated Roast Chicken (serves 4)
inspired by Nicole (à la Gordon Hamersley) and Melissa Clark

Marinade:
3 garlic cloves, halved and green stem removed
2 tbls. Dijon
grated zest of one lemon
½ tsp. dried rosemary
1 tbl. olive oil
½ tsp. Kosher salt
1 shallot
2 tbls. lemon juice (reserve spent lemons)

1 4 to 5 pound chicken
6 slices of stale (or not) good bread
(I used ciabatta and it was 3 hours, not 3 days, old.)
1 cup chicken or vegetable stock
olive oil

Place all the ingredients for the marinade in the food processor. Try to get it as fine as you can. Rub it all over the chicken.



Place used lemon peels inside chicken. Refrigerate for a couple hours or leave at room temperature for 30 minutes (no more) before roasting.

Place slices of bread in bottom of roasting pan. Drizzle with olive oil. Season with salt and freshly ground pepper.



Lay chicken over.



Roast at 375°F for 1¼ hours or until chicken is done. Remove chicken onto board and place upside down. Cover loosely with foil for 5 minutes before carving. (10 is better). Remove bread onto serving platter, cutting in half, if desired.

Strain juices into small saucepan and add 1 cup stock. Reduce until slightly thickened. Carve chicken, place on platter and serve sauce separately.

Note: Melissa Clark’s recipe (from a friend of hers) has the oven temperature at 425°F. I found the bread gets too brown, too fast, so I’ve lowered the temperature to 375°F.

Here’s a quick dessert, particularly if you have some frozen egg whites to use up and some fruit that needs attention.

Apple Meringue (serves 4-6)

6 apples, peeled, cored and sliced
¼ cup brown sugar
2 tbls. water
juice from ½ lemon
optional: 1 – 2 tbls. Irish whiskey
3 egg whites
6 tbls. sugar

Note: Add other fruit if you have it handy. I used only 5 apples and added ½ cup frozen peaches and a handful of fresh raspberries.

Place apples in heavy bottomed medium saucepan. Stir in brown sugar, water and lemon juice. Cook on medium heat. When steam builds up, turn down, cover and cook on low until apples have broken up and are completely soft, about 15 to 20 minutes. It should look like chunky applesauce. Stir in Irish whiskey, if using and spoon into pie plate.

Beat 3 whites until soft peaks form.

Beat in sugar gradually. Beat until firm. Spoon meringue onto top of fruit, covering every bit, right up to the edge of the dish.

Bake at 300°F for 30 minutes.

Mario and Gwyneth In Spain - Episode Two, Plus A Nifty Contest

The next portion of Mario’s trip through Spain with his friends takes them, and us, on a Pilgrimage to Galicia. In honor of this wonderful series, I'm holding an exciting contest with 2 fabulous prizes. All you have to do is to read through this post and answers three questions at the end. (I have no problem with bribing my readers.)

Spain On The Road Again is available on iTunes and I’m giving away a season pass to one reader for the entire current series. You can download all the episodes and enjoy them forever! (This prize is available only for US residents.)

Offshore readers: Same contest, different prize. One lucky winner will receive a beautiful 365 Days in Spain 2009 Picture-A-Day Calendar with text by Penelope Casas. Details at the end.

Episode 2 begins with a road trip with Mario, Mark and Claudia. GP has gone home for a few days. It’s just like your family’s road trip with a complainer in the back seat (Mark Bittman) and a peace maker in the front (Claudia).

Still in Castilla La Mancha, they arrive at the Restaurante Meson Venta de Tiembles.

Espárragos trigueros doesn’t take the edge off Mark’s appetite. They’re so hungry that the conversation lags a bit.

Pisto manchego comes out. It’s eggplant, tomatoes and air-dried deer with runny eggs on top, basically ratatouille with a different twist, they remark. Mario appreciates la cecina, the name for the cured deer. Mark points out that this dish seems to be made with an equal volume of vegetables and olive oil.

That was certainly true when I lived in Spain in the mid-eighties. Every dish was swimming in olive oil, which took a while to adjust to. It’s hard to believe, but I was not a fan of olive oil then, having been firmly rooted in a butter-based cuisine. Now my olive oil usage probably outnumbers my butter cooking by 1000 percent.

The star dish of this little meson comes out - carne a la piedra - raw pork on a plate, accompanied by a sizzling hot plate (not a hotplate, but a clay plate that’s really, really hot). The chef rubs a big square of bacon on the plate to grease it and add flavor and then places the meat on top to cook it. Interesting. Many cuisines have cook-your-own meat dishes, but few as spare and perfect as this one.

After tasting, Mario says this reminds him of the meat he used to eat in his high school years in Spain. I like the idea of this dish. It’s muy tipico.

They drive through Avila - a beautiful walled city with a magnificent Parador right in the walls. They continue on to the Ribero del Duero wine growing region for a great meal. Mario and Mark are singing. I may have to turn it this off, but the countryside is so lovely. They arrive at Bodegas Valdubón. They admire a bunch of Tempranillo grapes, the most prevalent ones from that region.

Vegetarians will probably want to stop reading here. Amidst a beautiful vineyard, Mario makes a barbecue with morcilla – a sausage made from pig, its blood and rice, cumin, salt and pepper. He’s also cooking a leg from a lechazo – milk-fed lamb, no older than 25 days old and lamb chops.

The camera work is kind of annoying, because we can’t see Mario boning and butterflying the leg of lamb that well. He says by boning it, it will cook a lot faster and butterflying it makes it cook more evenly. Claudia squeezes grapes over the meat.

They treat the lamb chops with lavender, sugar, grapes. Mario is cooking on an outside fire, stoked with dried grape vines. He places the food in a cage contraption. The lechazo y morcilla con hierbas is looking really good. Mario turns the cage over.

“Things that grow together go together”, says Mario - the lamb, the local red wine, herbs…clipped vines on the fire.

They set off for Galicia and arrive at a local hotel. Gwynnie comes back. Okay, this chitchat is not that intriguing. Breakfast is served - a Pudín de Pan (here's an example) and fine bread, eaten with olive oil. Galician flour is apparently very good quality. Gwyneth is eating stuff that you KNOW she never eats. I just don’t picture her slathering oil on bread for breakfast.

They go in 2 cars to Santiago de Compostela. The road, known as El Camino de Santiago or The Way of St. James, leads to the shrine where it’s believed that St. James is buried. Pilgrims have walked this route for 1000 years.

Mario tells Gwyneth that Galicia is a great place from a chef’s point of view, because of its amazing shellfish. Santiago or St. James was the patron saint of fisherman.

Both pairs walk some of El Camino. As Mario and Gwyneth walk, they find blackberries. They point out a mojón, a pillar that marks the distance to the shrine at Santiago. It has a relief of a shell, which is a symbol of the pilgrimage. They also see stones placed on top of the mojón, which indicates how many pilgrims have passed by.

Mark tells Claudia he’s hungry (for about the hundredth time.) He also tells her that blisters, thieves and priests were the three enemies of the pilgrims. The four had agreed that the first pair to reach their inn would cook dinner, so Mark and Claudia are taking their time.

Mario and Gwyneth arrive first and start cooking a capon in lots of wine. They also cook greens with lemon and garlic.

Another dish they work on is bacalao or salt cod, which is found all over Spain. Mario and Gwynnie cook it by slowly simmering it in olive oil. It is to be served with the grellos or turnips greens. Bacalao con grellos is also accompanied with a smoked paprika vinaigrette, a salsa de pimenton.

Meanwhile, Claudia is talking her time showing Mark the old town of Portomarin. As they stroll over a newer bridge, they can see the remains of a medieval one and some ancient houses peeking out from the Rio Miño. We don't see them arrive at their stop for the night. I guess their rendezvous dinner will be shown in the next installment.

This episode shows why Spain is so remarkable. It’s old and grand and so much history is still available to be walked through, observed and tasted. Mario has offered us a wonderful way to get a piece of that without leaving home.

Spain On the Road contest (answers accepted until Sunday, October 12th):

Answer these questions and send your response to FNMusings@gmail.com:

What is Mark’s last name?
What is a lechazo?
What is a mojón?

The US resident winner will receive (by email) a complete season pass to the video, Spain On The Road Again, on iTunes.

For my foreign friends, the winner will receive 365 Days in Spain 2009 Picture-A-Day Calendar with text by Penelope Casas.

Both winners will be randomly picked from all the correct answers – one a US resident; the other, not.

Please include your full name and email address in the body of the email and title your email – Questions on Spain…

¡Buen provecho!

Mario and Gwyneth Do Spain

Sometimes we forget that Public Television is where it all began…well, where food television began. The history of this form of educational enlightenment began in earnest with Julia Child and The French Chef and carries on today with Lidia's Italy.

Another new show, "Spain...On The Road Again", has been getting tremendous buzz, mostly because, rightly or wrongly, an Oscar winning and gorgeous actress is involved.

This visit across and all around Spain, exploring local food, is Mario Batali’s brainchild. He takes Mark Bittman with him, who gets better with each column and each book that he writes, (but he does come off a bit curmudgeonly on this show).

Mario is a great appreciator of Spain’s cuisine and culture and he is the perfect guide. But Gwyneth? I have to admit I wasn’t so sure about her participation. She’s so annoying beautiful and way too thin to be someone from whom I want culinary instruction AND, on top of THAT, she speaks fluent Spanish! How obnoxious is that?

We learned last week on Oprah (I swear I didn’t watch, I listened in the car) that Gwynnie eats what she wants, but she exercises mercilessly in a specially built building on her property with a fancy trainer, who trained her good friend Madonna. (It didn’t help that Oprah kept asking her all these gossipy details that makes us want to dislike her all the more.)

Back to Mario, he’s smart, I’m sure he figured the more buzz he got, the more people would watch and I guess that’s a good thing.

What I love about Spain is that it's still refreshingly Spain, no matter what kind of global world we live in. I lived in Madrid almost two decades ago, and amazingly, much of my old neighborhood is exactly the same. My corner farmacia still has the same 2 ladies that work there. Many of the shops and restaurants are the same; the vegetable guy and fish guy are still there. It’s quite amazing when you think how modern Spain is in many ways, but even Madrid retains a village flavor. And so it is with the cuisine.

In this first episode, Mario visits the area around Toledo in a province called La Castilla-La Mancha. (Yes, THAT La Mancha.)

Gorgeous scenes from all over Spain start the show with Willie Nelson singing “On the road again”. Mario tells us his culinary beginnings took hold in Spain, where his family had moved during his high school years. After he added his friend Gwyneth to the trip, he needed to find a companion for ”Bitty”, who is a non-Spanish speaker. He chose the knockout, multi-lingual Spanish movie star Claudia Bassols.

Should we care that these 2 gastronomic heavyweights are being accompanied by much younger gorgeous gals, who are not known primarily for their culinary accomplishments? Kind of, but I’m willing to give it a chance and, after all, I’m not a fool. I know Mario will get a lot more eyeballs viewing his show with them on than if he had taken some old coots along.

Oh, wait, maybe I do mind. Mario tells us that the ladies are also planning to get a bit of pampering - don’t they do that enough in their real life, without having to subject public television viewers to it? - on the trip, as well as visit artistic and historical sites. And, voila, we get the obligatory shots of the stunning Claudia having a massage and Gwynnie in a bathtub. Okay, I know it’s better than seeing Mario in either of those settings, but, c’mon, it’s totally gratuitous.

It IS amazing that nakedness and sex appeal inserts itself into the last place you’d expect them: a Mario Batali cooking show.

The trip begins with Mario and Mark touring the fish markets of Madrid at 4 am. The ladies are shown (a few hours later) enjoying the ambrosial chocolate con churros after just waking up. Mark and Mario watch tuna being cut up. Wow, that’s a lot of blood. Mario walks around picking up fish and admiring them. The gals have girl-chat.

Ahhh, berberechos. Mario admires them. I remember those. Mario says they’re like a cross between a scallop and a clam. I think they’re more like claws filled with snail-like “meat”. No, wait, sorry, I’m thinking of percebes. I hope he tries those at some point. Berberechos are like tiny clams.

The “couples” split up. On the road to Toledo, as they travel through Castilla-La Mancha, Mario and Gwynnie give us a bit of the history of the cathedral that took 500 years to build. Mark and Claudio start singing on their road trip.

M and G visit the Cigarrales of Toledo, named for its many cicadas (cigarras in Spanish), which is an old mansion with gardens and vineyards on the outskirts of Toledo.

They meet up with Chef Adolfo Muñoz. He shows them how to make Arroz Con Verduras Y Azafran (rice with vegetables and saffron). He infuses saffron in hot water for the rice dish. The chef uses bomba rice. Remember I told you that that was the rice that Chef Garces uses? It swells sideways, not lengthwise to absorb tons of flavor.

Gwyneth is doing the translating. She’s doing ok, but I’d rather have a chef be the translator than a movie star, but whatever… The chef adds the rice to a hot pan and stirs in the saffron water. Mario is intrigued. Spoonfuls of hot vegetable broth get stirred in. Mario says it looks like a risotto. Gwynnie tells him there’s no oil and to let it go, they’re not in Italy. Mario chimes in there’s also no sofrito. I think he gets it now. It’s SPANISH, not Italian.

Later on, a handful of finely diced carrots and then red peppers are added. They add turnips and more broth.

They start another dish called Pisto Manchego. Roasted vegetables are passed through a food mill. They add olive oil and serve the purée on grilled bread which has been drizzled with olive oil.

We see a bit on nonsense between Mark and Claudia. Back to Gwyneth and Mario, they are being shown a partridge dish. I think Gwyneth looks a bit ill, but that could be me I’m talking about. They carve the breast off the tiny bird, leaving the leg on.

Mario asks if she’ll eat a bird like this. She says she will if she knows it lived a good life and was hunted in the wild. Huh? Doesn’t it die just as much HUNTED in the wild, as any other way? I do get what she’s saying, but it does come off as a bit pretentious.

If you don’t want to eat meat or living things, then don’t. I guess a road trip with Mario makes people do all kinds of things they might not ordinarily do. Oh, she explains further. She doesn’t believe in factory farming of any kind and she won’t support it. There’s no way I can argue with that. Mario doesn’t either.

Back to the chef, who doesn’t seem to care how he got hold of the dead partridge, he dunks the tiny breast quickly in olive oil and wipes it over the grill. Then he puts the breast ON the grill. He braises the legs for 30 to 35 minutes in a stock reduction. Chef Muñoz likes to leave the partridge breast a little rare to give it the taste of the country and where the bird comes from. Gwyneth looks faint. He puts a piece back on the grill for her.

The chef plates the rare breast and the braised legs and adds many of the braising liquid ingredients RAW at the last minute, the herbs and lavender, for example. He drizzles the dish with olive oil. Gwyneth likes it. Mario has the “bird sushi” version. They finish the Arroz with olive oil and herbs. Mario says Holy Toledo, it’s good.

Mark and Claudia drive to Tembleque, 55 kilometers from Toledo and home to Manchego cheese. A really good-looking cheese maker is introduced and Claudia gets to milk the sheep. We see the cheese-making facility and how the cheese gets pressed into rounds and finished in a brine for up to a day. The wheels sit for 3, 4 or 5 months in a cave, until they are ready to eat. Claudia slices the incredibly hard cheese.

More chitchat between the two pairs in their cars... Mario and Gwyneth drive in a convertible and Gwynnie gets screamed at (in an admiring way) by passers-by. They arrive at the Iglesia de Santo Tomé in Toledo to see El Greco’s El Entierro del Conde de Orgaz. Interesting. Not a bad discussion of the painting, before Mario gets hungry again.

Mark and Claudia drive through Consuegra, land of 600 year old windmills. The previous chef’s son, Javier, shows Mark how to make Migas Con Chorizo Y Pancetta. Oil in a pan, then unpeeled whole garlic is stirred in. Javier says the best garlic is from Cuenca. He adds chopped chorizo and pancetta and cooks it until crispy. Then Claudia throws in coarse bread crumbs and cooks it “como el sol de Toledo” until it looks like the sun in Toledo. I like that. The Migas is served with a few grapes and roasted peppers. Mark likes it a lot. He compares it to fried rice. “You can’t ask much more from bread.” Don Q and Sancho Panza arrive and are given food and drink.

The four (I guess Don Quixote and SP had other plans) arrive in Toledo for a birthday dinner for Claudia cooked by Adolfo. Mario tells us later how sick he got from the raw partridge.

Gwyneth goes home and leaves the three of them to go to Avila (next episode).

What did I think of this show? Well, for the moment, I’m willing to put up with the beauty shots to get to Mario’s and Mark’s pearls of wisdom. The hour did seem a bit short on food and actual cooking, though. We don’t really need to see so much car time. We get how they’re DRIVING around Spain. The only virtue to that is to show viewers that they too can drive themselves and they don’t need a formal tour to see this magnificent country.

The itinerary on “Spain…” would be a wonderful route for any traveler. Added to the more mainstream, can’t-miss sites, it would make a trip of a lifetime.

My only caution…look up the itinerary for each episode here NOW, book it and get there before everyone else does…or you may risk a “Sideways” effect, where visiting that good-looking cheese maker is no longer possible; or that charming road with all the windmills that has barely a car on it now, is packed with hungry tourists.