Cooking Up an Unappetizing Show

Sexist: Three male hosts watch three women cook

Last night I was reminded by how bad -- no atrocious -- the programs are on TVB when I watched an episode of Cooking Beauties.

Three male hosts and a guest judge observe three female celebrities prepare the same dishes for them to sample and decide who is the winner.

Cantopop singer Joey Wong has trouble handling a live fish

The women wear sleeveless tops so they have to wear "sleeves" that go up to their elbows in case they get their arms dirty or splattered with hot oil. And the dishes they are making aren't easy -- presumably there's someone behind the scenes instructing them on what to do.

However, not all the female contestants know how to cook -- some of them have very bad knife skills and they almost chop off their fingers, or they have no idea how to cut up meat, let alone fish.

Back in June when the show started, the Communications Authority received over 800 complaints from viewers about how the three contestants handled a tiger grouper.

In order to kill them, one fish was thrown into hot water, another thrown on the floor. This is meant to elicit laughs from the audience, but many viewers at home were not amused.

A statement from Happy Animal Lab and Hong Kong Veg Society condemned the "unnecessary pain to animals". It also criticized the amount of food wasted, as many of the dishes were inedible (again for laughs) and had to be thrown out.

The contestants wear "sleeves" and the men watch them cook

"When fish and crustacean are thrown on the floor or a heating saucepan alive, as they cannot make any sound, the audience would not realize their pain. Because of their silence, the audience ignore their suffering. Their silence also results in their sacrifice in a farce," the statement read.

"If the animals are replaced by a pig, a chicken or a cow, will the audience still find this interesting?"

All good points.

But my main beef is that the show is sexist -- why is it that the women have to cook for the men who will judge them? And why just expose these women's short-comings when it comes to their culinary skills? Why not make both men and women compete? And have the judging panel include both men and women?

Some of the female competitors were so bad in executing their dishes that some of the judges gave them negative points, again for laughs. How is that amusing?

These "interns" wear form-fitting chef jackets and short skirts

Another part of the show are about a dozen "interns" dressed in form-fitting chef jackets and short skirts. Sometimes they are called on to compete against each other in a 10-minute cooking test. Real female chefs don't wear short skirts and aim to look pretty in the kitchen. They are there to do their job and do it well.

Cooking Beauties is a horrific show on so many levels. The fact that it still isn't cancelled just shows how tone deaf TVB executives are and it send the wrong message about women, men, and cooking.

Actor Nicholas Tse who has a cooking show and is a judge is looking more credible even though he isn't a bona fide chef either...