Signe Rousseau teaches critical literacy at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. She is a contributing author to The Business of Food: Encyclopaedia of the Food and Drink Industry; Food Cultures of the World; Icons of American Cooking; The Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America, and A Cultural History of Food, Volume 6: The Modern Age (Berg, 2011)

• PrefaceIntroduction: Do You Remember when Chefs just Cooked? Part I: Food Media - A Fantasy Industry1. The New Study of FoodChef Mario Batali, on the Subject of CookingEnter the Foodie Television: The Magic ScreenTo Your HealthLet Me Entertain You2. Foodie Books and Fantasies Communication: 'The object thus made common'A Life Less Ordinary (David, Fisher, Liebling)Drooling Over HistoryA Life More Ordinary (Food Literature)Ignorance as CommodityPart II: The Rise and Rise of Food Television3. The Celebrity (Professional) Chef: Jamie Oliver The Naked Chef@jamie_oliverJamie's KitchenThe Jamie Effect, or The Practice of Everyday Interference4. The Celebrity (Amateur) Chef: Rachael Ray Multi-Millionaire Girl-Next-DoorThe Yum-O® RevolutionFood PornDisordered Eating5. Fetishism and the Imagination: Heston Blumenthal and Nigella LawsonEveryday MythologyIn Search of PerfectionFetishism: 'The definitive mistake of the pre-enlightened mind'The Domestic Goddess Part III: How Not to Think About What to Eat6. Nutritionism, Bad Science and Spectacles of Disordered EatingMorbid FascinationsYou Are What You EatSupersize vs. SuperskinnySuper Skinny Me 7. Obesity: Whose Responsibility Is It Anyway?Fat StoriesThe Obesity PoliceFat TaxesEvidence: What of?Public GoodBibliographyIndex

The chef has became a famous face, often emblazoned on television in different guises, often a prolific author of cookbooks and increasingly a “celebrity” in his own right... This book takes a look at the development (for better or for worse) of the chef as a public celebrity... The author has carefully and cleverly mixed up many opinions, explanations and a lot of engaging information into a fairly broad, interesting read with the skill and dexterity of a master chef. Whilst this is an academically-biased book with a lot of footnotes, bibliographical references and a detailed index, it still manages to be relatively accessible to the general reader who wants a good, thought provoking read as well.