René Redzepi’s ‘Omnivore’ Is Culinary Smooth Jazz … And That’s Just Fine

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a chef in possession of celebrity must be in want of a globetrotting TV show. René Redzepi is the latest culinary legend to join Bourdain, Chang, Nosrat , etc. in the kitchen-to-TV pipeline. Redzepi’s restaurant is Noma, in Copenhagen, a destination for high end foodies. As a chef, Redzepi has been one of the leading figures in the molecular gastronomy movement, an approach to food that leans on expensive gadgets to produce unusual dishes, such as this celeriac and truffle shwarma . Noma has existed in a variety of iterations, and Redzepi has periodically moved the restaurant to other locations in other countries, with varying degrees of success, and has closed, reimagined, and reopened the restaurant several times.

If you find yourself in Copenhagen with about $800 burning a hole in your pocket, you still can’t eat at Noma, because it is a legendarily tough reservation. You can, however, stream Omnivore on Apple TV+ . Each episode focuses on a single ingredient, with chile, tuna, salt, banana, pig, rice, coffee, and corn featured in season one. The strength – and weakness – of Omnivore’s approach is that it’s very pleasant to watch, and does not demand much from the viewer. For chile, say, we visit a paprika farm in Serbia, Avery Island, Louisiana, where the McElhaney family makes Tabasco sauce, and Thai peppers across Thailand. This approach makes for very pleasant viewing – like many high-end food shows, much of the appeal lies in the vicarious traveling you get to do. There are moments where you wish that Redzepi would ask harder questions than the ones he does ask.

Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Omnivore’ On Apple TV+, A Docuseries About Ingredients That Form The Basis Of Meals All Over The Planet

Omnivore is much less character driven than offerings from predecessors like Bourdain and Chang . Given the obsessive nature of Redzepi’s approach to food, dialing down the chef in the mix is probably for the best. What remains is very pretty to look at, with a narrative that is very easy to tune out. In 8 iterations, in several locations per episode, the argument of each episode boils down to “aren’t ingredients great?”

Childish Gambino Beefs With Shane Gillis In Spicy ‘Hot Ones’ Episode: “I’m Coming For You”

It is worth noting the relentless focus on the work and passion that goes into producing all of the ingredients Redzepi considers. Scooping fleur de sel by hand is backbreaking work, and as someone who will splash out for fancy salt, it’s good to be reminded that it is not simply a higher price that differentiates fleur de sel from the stuff in the saltshaker, but also a labor of love. As it happens, labor has been a touchy subject for Redzepi. Like many high-profile restaurants, Noma relies on the stage system, where aspiring chefs work for free in exchange for the experience, and, well, being able to say that they staged at Noma. Of course, not everyone can afford to work for free and live in Copenhagen, so the stage system serves as another barrier to making restaurant kitchens more diverse. These guidelines from Noma give some sense of what the stagier has to do. This system has been part of how fine dining restaurants all over the world work, but the system has come under increasing scrutiny, and due to the high profile of Noma, Redzepi has been at the crosshairs of this criticism.

In the context of Redzepi’s high profile labor issues, it’s surprising that there is a scene that feels like it was lifted right out of The Menu , where chef Redzepi invites his entire brigade to join him in eating a ghost pepper from his garden , whole. It is an invitation, but in context, it feels like an offer Redzepi’s people cannot refuse.

CLICK HERE TO GET EMAILS FROM DECIDER

Redzepi’s kitchen is calmer than the one in The Bear , but the scenes in Noma, intended to tie things together from that episode, are, with The Bear and The Menu in mind, stressful to watch, at least for me. There are a lot of delights, however. The title sequence is food fantasia that defies description. At its best, Omnivore feels like if Les Blank had a bunch of frequent flyer miles and a translator. In particular, the rituals surrounding Anton, the special black-footed pig that is blessed by a priest in the town of La Alberca, Spain, as part of the Marrano de San Anton , every year on the 13th of June is a whole vibe. Anton’s siblings’ hind legs become Jamon Iberico, at about $1,600 per ham. There is a scene that runs about 4 minutes that is just two handsome La Alberican bakers, David and Fernando Sanchez, using some local chorizo to make a really fancy Spanish pepperoni roll. I watched it with the same expression that our pup Dinah makes when I am assembling a regular American pepperoni roll.

Redzepi is not trying to start a revolution in the way we eat, but that’s ok. Just now, with one thing and another, oases of calm are hard to find. You could do worse than to turn the audio down, turn on some Khruangbin, and fire up an episode or two of Omnivore on one of these warm summer evenings.

Jonathan Beecher Field was born in New England, educated in the Midwest, and teaches in the South. He Tweets professionally as @ThatJBF , and unprofessionally as @TheGurglingCod . He also writes for Avidly and Common-Place when the mood strikes.

For more entertainment news and streaming recommendations, visit decider.com