Apr 20 2005
DailyRecord
WHO would have thought fiery Gordon Ramsay could be so easily forgotten? But as the new series of hit reality show Hell's Kitchen kicked off this week, there was only one name on everybody's lips - Jean-Christophe Novelli. He is one of the world's best chefs but, among the viewers who'll be voting folk off the Hell's Kitchen teams, he's either a tasty dish or too hot to handle.
With smouldering good looks and oodles of French charm, the actor-turned-chef is popular.
But his arrogant and demanding ways could well turn public opinion against him - never mind that of the novice chefs working below him.
Bookies have made rival chef Gary Rhodes favourite to win, with Samantha Ramplin the favourite contestant.
But how will Jean-Christophe fare? We asked Women's Editor LINDSAY CLYDESDALE and features writer SAMANTHA BOOTH what they think
OUI: He's divine dashing & delectable SAYS SAM BOOTH DIVINE is the only word that describes Jean Christophe Novelli.
Although dashing and delectable would do just as well.
So what if he's self-confident and slightly arrogant? Surely that's what a girl wants.
He's the kind of guy who would whisk you away to Paris in a helicopter without considering you might have plans.
But what possible invitation could compare to a night with him?
That's why women love him. He's stylish, intense, handsome and full of charm.
His passion for his art oozes out of him and, as all red-blooded females know, he'd be the same between the sheets.
Just watching the care he gives a fillet of fish or the way he tenderly deals with stems of raw asparagus is enough to raise my temperature.
Dark and brooding, he is going to have a temperament to match but what's wrong with that?
His eccentricities, such as demanding his proteges eat three kiwi a day and no carbs after 2pm, may seem the actions of an egomaniac but they're a clever way of uniting his team and watching their waistlines.
Maybe it was a little mean-spirited to flaunt his success with a tour of the happy customers.
But did you see a single female objecting when he pecked them on the cheek or hand
NON: French charm act is so overdone SAYS LINDSAY CLYDESDALE
JEAN-Christophe Novelli won the first round by a mile but neither his pretentious menu nor his Gallic charm were tingling my tastebuds.
He's a caricature of all things French, an act so overdone I'm starting to think he's from Essex. The New York Times named him the sexiest chef in the world but look at the competition.
Gordon Ramsay has a mouth like a sewer, Antony Worrall Thompson is a rotund grump and Gary Rhodes is a spiky-haired egomaniac who's stuck in the 80s.
Novelli may not be my dish of the day but he performed with more grace than Rhodes, whose tight-lipped anger suggested he'd sat on a whisk.
Instead, Novelli has intense eyes, glossy hair and film star looks, but boy does he know it.
There can be no bigger turn-off than a bloke who doesn't notice if your bum looks big because he's too busy looking at his own reflection - narcissistic Novelli is that man.
When he wasn't blowing kisses and insisting in his heavily accented English, 'Ah em veree veree pah-shonat' he was running his hands through his locks and sticking his fingers in the food. Bleeurgh.
Even his cookery book Your Place Or Mine implies his supposed attractiveness to salivating housewives.
Unfortunately, Novelli also appears prone to moments as an airhead, laughing at jokes no one gets. True, dim can be endearing but that's a quality I look for in a dog not a man.
As a friend of Novelli noted: 'What Jean-Christophe puts on a plate becomes an extension of him as a man.'
The time when Novelli's cooking - and manliness - are up for the chop can't come soon enough
:oops:
