Can someone get Jamie Oliver on the phone for Roy Choi, please? The Los Angeles based chef famous for his Korean tacos and role in the rise of food trucks recently wrote a blog post in which he talked about going vegetarian, thinking about quitting cooking (!), and wanting to help kids. Oh, and getting British chef/world saver Jamie Oliver on his side.
On becoming a vegetarian: "I will no longer eat meat for my own consumption. Animals be talking to me. They told me..stop. Stop, Roy. Please." So, Roy has stopped.
On helping people: "I talk to animals and kids. I feed adults. Time to switch. Talk to adults. Feed animals and kids." Which, great. But is quitting cooking really necessary? Oliver has restaurants and saves the world and, you know, it seems to be working out pretty well for him. Anyway, Jamie, give the guy a call.
· Who [Riding Shotgun LA via Eater LA]
· All Jamie Oliver Coverage on Eater [-E-]
· All Roy Choi Coverage on Eater [-E-]
[Photo: Riding Shotgun LA]
[Photo: ABC]
Jamie Oliver, it seems, is not all talk: the British world-saving chef has started to make real change in the US, first by getting LA schools to ditch flavored milk and now by influencing McDonald's to stop using beef treated with ammonia hydroxide. Or, as he calls it, "pink slime."
When it comes to chefs swearing, Jamie Oliver is all like, "Bollocks, you naff arsehole prats!" No, not really, what he actually told the Radio Times was: "I don't like chefs that go round shouting and swearing." Well, that's boring. Wonder who he's talking about? Certainly not a certain shouty, sweary British chef called Gordon Ramsay that Oliver has publicly criticized in the past?
Moving beyond dressing up as a giant tomato and filling school buses with sand, Jamie Oliver has kicked his campaign to save the world up a notch with a letter asking United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon to take up the topic of childhood obesity with the global body at a high-level meeting this week. And, as any good celebrity advocacy letter to an international organization would, Oliver's is filled with statistical citations, emotional appeal and self-referentiality.
So why should UN delegates care what a celebrity chef thinks? Oliver has the answer: "You may not know me, but I have spent many years now working in schools and communities and talking to governments in the US, Britain and Australia, campaigning against the epidemic of obesity which is threatening the lives of our children and has a good chance of bringing our economies to a standstill through bad health within twenty years." Here's the letter:
Despite its noble goals and season one Emmy and because of its low ratings Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution has been yanked from ABC's schedule for the time bring. The show, in which Jamie Oliver encourages Americans to change our god-awful eating practices, will reportedly return June 3, back in the 9 p.m. Friday time slot it occupied for its first season.
This doesn't bode well for a show that was pulling modest ratings earlier this year when this season's first few episodes aired on Tuesdays. Jamie Oliver will need some really amazing costumes to boost ratings back on Friday nights, which is prime time for TV viewers to be out stuffing their faces with giant portions of trans fats.
Not to worry, though: Oliver's former Tuesday night slot will be filled by another hour of Dancing With the Stars.
· 'Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution' moving to Friday: Do you still watch? [Zap2It]
· All Jamie Oliver Coverage on Eater [-E-]
· All Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution Coverage on Eater [-E-]
[Photo: ABC]
Last night on Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution, world-saving chef Jamie Oliver continued in his quest to promote healthy eating in schools in Los Angeles. Which meant getting a bunch of people to dress up as fruit and vegetables and hand out free, healthy lunches to kids on their way to school. (Jamie Oliver sure loves to wear costumes.)
"They were worried about us creating drama and conflict with reality TV," said Oliver. "The LAUSD made me dress like this." When one of the parents asked him for a hug, Oliver told her, "Of course, but don't squash me. Unless you like ketchup."
After last week's season premiere of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution, things looked pretty bleak for world-saving chef Jamie Oliver — what with being completely locked out from filming in the Los Angeles schools and everything — but now his PR firm brings news that he's "set to meet with" the new LAUSD Superintendent John Deasy.
Apparently the show and his recent television appearances (see Charlie Rose, The Daily Show, and Letterman) have caused the LAUSD to think twice and a thaw is now in the air. Next week he's heading back to Los Angeles to shoot the final two episodes of the series, and he'll at least get a meeting "with the hope of being able to work with LA's schools." He'll also be getting a tour of the school district's Central Kitchen. Progress!
Here's the press release:
Jamie Oliver has a new show in England called Jamie's Dream School in which 20 teenagers who've dropped out of regular school spend some time being taught by famous thinkers. So, what does Oliver think is wrong with kids today? They're lazy!
Said the celebrity chef: "I've never experienced such a wet generation. I'm embarrassed to look at British kids. You get their mummies phoning up and saying: "He's too tired, you're working him too hard" – even the butch ones." He goes on to say that people should be able to work seven 18-hour days in a row and that by the age of 13, he was working 15-hour days in his dad's pub. Unsurprisingly, some folks think this attitude is "frankly mediaeval."
· Can Jamie Oliver Revolutionise the Nation's Schools? [Observer]
· Oliver's Backing of 18-Hour Days For Chefs Is Modern Day Slavery [Chef Sandwich]
· All Jamie Oliver Coverage on Eater [-E-]
[Photo: Channel 4]
The Los Angeles Unified School District is putting its foot down: Jamie Oliver will not be filming Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution in any Los Angeles school, even if it's one of the MLA Partners schools he had in which he had previously been allowed to film.
[Photo: A. Scattergood / LA Weekly]
More tough times on the Los Angeles set of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution: British chef Jamie Oliver was disappointed by the meager turnout to a publicity stunt he staged in which he dumped a bunch of sand on a school bus to represent the amount of sugar kids consume. It seems only "20 people and one journalist" was a considerably smaller audience than he had in mind. Said Oliver, "L.A. is not on my side. They've got their fingers in their ears -- la, la, la -- they're not having it...I don't want to winge about turnout... but maybe L.A. was a big mistake." Sorry, Jamie.
· Jamie Oliver Fills A School Bus With 57 Tons Of "Sugar" In Carson [LA Weekly]
· All Jamie Oliver Coverage on Eater [-E-]
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