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What TV’s Onetime ‘High Priest of Hedonism’ Is Up to Now

Jan 10, 2017  •  Post A Comment

A man who was a fixture on television back in the 1970s, but hasn’t been heard from much for decades now, is the focus of a profile this week in The New York Times. The man is Graham Kerr, the British cooking personality who became a star of U.S. television as “The Galloping Gourmet.”

Kerr was one of the best-known TV chefs of his era, rivaled only by Julia Child during the still early days of the TV food genre.

“He was hunky and British and funny, and in that heyday of the sexual revolution, he could titillate audiences with a one-liner about circumcision while peeling a cucumber,” The Times notes. “The media christened him ‘the high priest of hedonism.’”

Kerr made a habit of sprinting into the audience during his “Galloping Gourmet” days with a glass of wine, then leaping over chairs on his way back — without spilling the wine. The Times notes that plastic wrap across the top of the glass kept the stunt from going awry.

“Today, at 82, Mr. Kerr is more measured. His leaping days are over, but he still speed walks every morning from his house [in Mount Vernon, Wash.], an hour north of Seattle, where he lives with his daughter Tessa and her husband,” The Times reports. “He still cooks, too, but will not make himself a hamburger because he believes that two ounces is plenty of meat for a meal and, he said, ‘You can’t make a decent two-ounce hamburger.’”

The profile tracks Kerr’s twisted path to moderation and sizes up his role in shaping what has become a thriving TV food niche. We encourage readers to click on the link above to The New York Times to read the full article.

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