Setting the table
When it comes to managing holiday stress and making T-Day right, we got to spread our wings and include more than the usual suspects. Last week, Media City explored the pages of Time Inc.’s Food & Wine and Bon Appétit by Condé Nast. This week, we turn to the crossover giant Food Network and the mag namesake domestic diva herself, Martha Stewart Living. It’s the least we can do to help with only T-minus 10 days until the big day.
Proving that haste can make waste or worse, Food Network runs a three-page spread on New Orleans celebrity chef John Besh. The problem? Right after this issue hit the stands, Besh got exposed as a serial sex harasser, accused by 25 of his past and current female employees.
One woman alleges that Besh boozed her up then assaulted her in a hotel room, after which he coerced her into a “long-term, unwelcome sexual relationship.” In the Food Network profile, the nasty chef declares, “I love chaos” as he details plans to fire up four Viking ovens for his own Thanksgiving feast with 60 guests. (At this point, we’re guessing he might make do with one.)
Outside of its unwitting trip to Sleazeville, Food Network does a solid job of catering to everybody from the obsessive to the completely unprepared. Three different turkey recipes offer cooking times between two hours and 12 hours. There also are three stuffing reci- pes, plus four options for cranberry sauce and 10 side dishes, most of which can supposedly be prepared in less than one hour. Phew!
If you haven’t started planning your feast yet, Martha Stewart Living is here to confirm that you’re running late. The domestic diva maps out a to-do list that starts two weeks before the goutinducing grub-grab. Of course, if you want to skip her advice on how to dress up your front door with a homemade wheat wreath, you might still pull off a decent dinner.
Stewart starts off reasonably enough by suggesting a turkey recipe that only takes two hours to roast by breaking up the bird and cooking the breasts first and adding the legs after a bit of sautéing. She also suggests cutting out appetite-sucking hors d’oeuvres and serving up just one.
But her ideas about “reducing the stress” of hosting the holidays are laughable. Instead of asking guests to bring wine, appetizers, pies or anything that would actually reduce your costs and prep time, Stewart’s big idea is to have guests bring “fresh herbs for garnishes” and “cute containers” for taking home leftovers. And in your spare time, how about stitching pockets into your fine linen napkins so you can place a personal note to each guest and have them write down what they’re grateful for? Oh, brother. How many days till Christmas week?