An Observation

So, I watch a lot of cooking shows. Especially various cooking competitions, like Chopped, Iron Chef, The Next Iron Chef, 24 Hour Restaurant War, Chef Hunter, Top Chef, Top Chef Masters, Top Chef Just Desserts, and Top Chef We're Just Fucking with You Now. And one of the things I've noticed (I am such a good noticer of things!) is that a lot of the male chefs—who outnumber the female chefs by probably at least 2-1 across all these shows, especially when you include all the chef judges—tell really cool stories about how they were inspired to be culinary artists by their mothers and/or grandmothers.

So many awesome stories about mama's signature greens and nonna's homemade gnocchi!

And then many of these same male chefs with the terrific stories about their female influences turn around and treat their female colleagues with sneering contempt, without a trace of irony.

Evidently, women are meant to cook exclusively for free to inspire men, who then go cook professionally for lots of money.

If they're talented they're lucky their grannies passed on the best recipes.

I guess a woman's place is in the kitchen, unless and until a man decides he wants to be there.

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