Weekend Getaways is an unusual show on the Food Network where Food Network star Giada De Laurentiis descends on some unsuspecting city to sample its food and other delights for a long weekend. The only complaint that arises is that one gets the impression that two and a half days (Giada De Laurentiis usually gets into town in the early afternoon) are too short to sample any respectable town properly.
For example, can anyone do London in less than a week? Mind, Giada De Laurentiis gave it a good try, touching on high tea, English country cuisine, Indian tandoori (London has some of the best Indian food west of Mumbai), and (naturally) Italian. But if I were doing the show it would be entitled Mark’s Week Long Adventure.
In any event, Weekend Getaways is an enjoyable half hour if, for nothing else, the sight of Giada De Laurentiis cooing with delight over a dish of something or another. Giada De Laurentiis exudes a combination of old world charm (she was born in Rome) and American domesticity that would make June Cleaver proud on her cooking show, Everyday Italian. On Weekend Getaways she adds a cup or two of enthusiasm that makes one instantly want to get a reservation at wherever she’s eating, whether it’s a hole in the wall dive or a five star restaurant.
In between visits to sample culinary delights, Giada De Laurentiis deigns to visit a couple of sights. In London it was St. Paul’s Cathedral. In New Orleans it was the Voodoo Museum.
Giada De Laurentiis is part of an old Roman cinema family. Her grandfather, Dino, is a famous producer and has been involved in films ranging from the 1977 King Kong to Conan the Barbarian. Her aunt Raffaella, who has appeared on Giada’s cooking show, was the producer of the 1984 version of Dune.
Giada De Laurentiis, who at first never meant to get into the family business as it were, became a television star through the back way. She studied cooking at Cordon Bleu in Paris and afterwards worked as a chef in various restaurants in Los Angeles. She was asked to do a show on the Food Network after doing a piece for Food and Wine in 2001.
Everyday Italian, unlike many cooing shows, is taped in an actual kitchen in a home that is rented for the show. The idea is that Giada De Laurentiis is preparing meals that anyone could prepare in their own kitchen. This writer’s observation is that is certainly true (he learned how to make Panini sandwiches by watching the show) but sometimes the ingredients may be beyond most middle class budgets. Gouda cheese, for example, is wonderful, but expensive to grate up and put into a fettuccini.
Finally, if Giada De Laurentiis every wants to do a Weekend Getaway in Houston, my town, I have a few suggestions. Start out with barbeque over at Goode Company. Then dinner at Ninfas or perhaps a good hole in the wall TexMex place called Chapultepec. Then for the next day, down to Clear Lake for the best Italian food in the southwest at Frenchies, followed by a stop at Space Center Houston. Hamburgers and beer at the Outpost, an astronaut hangout. For Sunday, a boat outing on the water followed by seafood at one of the many places by the water near Kemah.
If she likes, Ms. Whittington and I can certainly pencil in one or more of the meals in the way of showing hospitality.
