Jamie's Ministry of Food is a four-part series that aired from 30 September to 21 October 2008.
Jamie's back with a new bee in his bonnet. After campaigning for better school meals for the nation's children, he's set to tackle what we're eating at home. And it's not pretty. "I've been to Soweto and seen kids in AIDS orphanages eat better than this," says a shocked and saddened Jamie. He's starting his campaign in Rotherham, a city of fast food junkies and set to become the fattest region in Britain. His mission, to teach mums the basics for healthy home cooking, get them to teach their friends and get the menfolk cooking too. Will Jamie's catering crusade take off or are his dreams just pie in the sky?
It's episode 2 in Jamie's quest to get the people of Rotherham cooking. To speed up the project, Jamie heads to Rotherham United football club in search of hungry men. It's the last match of the season, a sunny bank holiday and there are 5000 vocal locals here to cheer on their team. Jamie's hoping this will be the perfect place to find some new recruits but as he heads out to address the braying crowds his confidence begins to fail. "You fat bastard, you fat bastard," chants the crowd - proving not everyone's familiar with the phrase involving a pot, a kettle and a few choice words. Oh well Jamie, when all else fails, give 'em free grub. But an hour and 180 steak sarnies later only 98 men have signed up. "Unless it involves a chip pan he's no chance," is one man's thoughtful prediction. "We like us chips in Rotherham."
It's episode 3 in Jamie's quest to get Rotherham cooking but after weeks of campaigning the recipe crusader is still not sure if the public are getting the message. He needs to know if his recipes are being passed on. Time to do a Cheggers and knock on some doors. "It'll probably freak the hell out of people," he admits as he saunters up his first garden path. Probably best not to try and flog them a cookbook. The good news is everyone's pleased to see him. The bad news is nobody's heard of his Ministry of Food. Jamie was hoping that by this stage 10 per cent of the city would have heard about the campaign. So far this morning he hasn't found anyone.
Jamie is five months into his experiment to get Rotherham cooking and by now tens of thousands of cooks should have passed on his simple recipes to family and friends. But they haven't. If Jamie's going to convince councils across the country to fork out for their own Ministry of Food, he's got a lot of work to do. "Pass it on has worked, to a degree, well. But I don't think we've achieved enough in Rotherham to go to other places and say look," he muses. Jamie needs to drum up interest and fast. It's time to pound the streets. Again.
Jamie Oliver
2009
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