I’m pretty sure that Jamie Oliver is the first ‘celebrity chef’ my wife and I watched regularly on television.  It was 1998 and the series was The Naked Chef, his first, and was very casual, him in his home doing simple (‘naked’) recipes, and breaking the fourth wall by talking to the person behind the camera doing the filming.

As an aside, and a funny one at that, at the time  -  I was already married and Jake was in Grade 11.  Needless to say we didn’t know each other then, and it would’ve probably been creepy were we to hang out with some 16-year-old punk kid at the time and vice-versa.

Anyways, Oliver had a more manic persona at the time, but his content and focus on fresh, simple, natural ingredients resonated both in our conscience and our wallets.  The man has been a whirlwind over the years, producing many television series, books, products and restaurants without compromising his initial message or drive.

His more recent UK shows, Jamie’s School Dinners and Jamie’s Ministry Of Food, have been our favourites.  Both shows involved Oliver providing the challenge for Britons to have better standards in the food they consume, moving away from chemical-laced, processed foods to meals made from real ingredients.

The concept crossed the Atlantic recently, and the gent’s just launched Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution on ABC in the States and CTV in Canada, which also just earned him the TED 2010 Prize (watch his TED speech, a viral phenomenon, here…).

The first episode which aired this week was fantastic and way more emotional than I’d imagined.  Check the trailer:

I oh-so-heartily recommend you watch this series.  In the U.S. you can watch it on Hulu, and in Canada on CTV.ca.  You can always download a Torrent of it as well.

So.

All this leads to what this post is actually about.  I’m putting a concerted effort into cooking at home a little more often these days to save a little coin since I’m planning on being unemployed relatively soon.  This series and recent popular books (LOVE THIS!) come at a great time, though it’s always a great time, to assess what I eat and how I eat.

Jamie Oliver’s magazine is fantastic, and we’ve been dog-earing his recent Recipe Yearbook, starting to put some of the dishes into action.

Today, I made the “Japanese-Style Pancakes” which are pretty much eggs, cheddar, minced ham, fresh herbs and chives done thin-pancake style, rolled, with ketchup for dippin’.  It was quick, easy, looked nothing like the photo in the book, but they were delicious nevertheless.

We tried ‘em with La Difference 2008 Viognier-Muscat (great website) from the south of France, which tastes like this:

It’s around $15-18 around Vancouver, very fresh and vibrant.  We usually just drink it on its own, it really does transport you to the French countryside.  I thought the fresh nature and that bit of lavender would hit the fresh herbs of the pancakes quite nicely plus the citrusy acid would elevate the heavier aspects of an otherwise delicate dish.

I was totally, totally wrong.  The rich parts of the dish totally weighed down the cheerier aspects of the wine, and all you could taste was the lavender with no hints of fruit whatsoever.  It was like someone pumped liquid handsoap on our meal.

Great food, great wine, crappy combo.  My bad.

But I’d wanted to tell you all that Jamie Oliver stuff anyways.

Heh!