Food Porn

Nothing is more seductive than a big pan of rich Oatmeal Fudgies!

Everybody does it.

I'm just going to admit it for all of us ... sometimes I just like to stare at pictures of food.

It can be an obsession.  I don't even allow myself to go on Pinterest anymore, because I know I will spend hours just ogling photos of food and looking up recipes.

Good food is one of the passions of life, and there's no doubt that we're a pretty food-obsessed nation.  We think about food all the time, we make plans around it, we worry over food pairings, we master it, we photograph it, we Instagram it, and we post it for all to see.  Lots of folks complain about it, but the truth is ... there is something fascinatingly primal about looking at what someone else is about to eat.

White Chocolate Brownies look wickedly decadent on this exotic tea set.

And the plating is so beautiful in restaurants these days, we can all be forgiven if we just have to post one more photo of a truly magnificent dish.  (Yes, we are secretly interested.)

When I was a kid, I used to pore through Better Homes and Gardens and other home magazines, lusting after dishes I wanted to replicate and put on the table.  There were never enough hours in the day to attempt every recipe I wanted to try throughout the years.

Sure, the gardens in those magazines were lovely, the homes were grand and the interior decorating was beautiful, but the food ... ah, the glorious food!

Bubbling Blueberry Muffins are undeniably irresistible!

We certainly had our cooking shows back in the day ... the incomparable Julia Child, The Galloping Gourmet (my personal favorite), and The Frugal Gourmet.

Then the Food Network came along, and we thought we were in culinary heaven.  It is truly a marvel how fascinating it is to watch other people cook.

But what is really alarming is how easy it is to get sucked into watching one show after another, after another.  I would tell myself, "This is the last cooking show I'll watch today," but it never was.  It was so hard to turn off the tv.  As soon as the next show begins and the chef announces what they'll be cooking next, I am lost.  I am absolutely helpless.  I cannot change the channel.  Just one more show!  It's an obsession.

My favorite close-up of our
Pineapple Upside-Down Cake.

Twenty-four hours a day of cooking shows, seven days a week, really should be enough for anyone.  Nope.

PBS stepped up their game with America's Test Kitchen, The Cajun Chef, Lidia Bastionich, Martha Stewart, A Chef's Life, and The Mind of a Chef.

The Travel Channel got into the game with Anthony Bordain: No Reservations, Bizarre Food with Andrew Zimmerman, and Man vs. Food.

And we haven't even started talking about all of the cooking competition shows on all the channels, such as Iron Chef, Hell's Kitchen, Top Chef, Master Chef, etc.  We even had to import the Great British Baking Show, because we just can't get enough!

Don't believe me when I say that things are out of control?  Here's a list of only 100 TV Cooking Shows.  There are plenty more.  Take a look ... I'll bet you're familiar with or have at least heard of (if not watched) most of them.  It's cray-cray!  

It's just a fact of life.  People are always going to be obsessed with food.  Even those who watch every bite they eat and count every calorie are always thinking about food.  When the calories count, you don't want to waste a single one on bad food.

So, I'm sharing some of my food porn ... just for kicks.  Some luscious photos of our own Afternoon Tea classics.

Why?  Why not?  I could look at food all day!