My mom and I used to watch his show, The Galloping Gourmet, all the time. It was from him I first learned the word “roux”, and then he showed how to make one. I made my first one myself that very day!
I recently learned that he lives in a town in Washington where we plan to retire. He and his wife lived in a nice self-designed home in the hills looking out toward Puget Sound, but his wife recently died and he has now moved to a retirement community close to the water. He still looks quite young and I’m sure is still cooking.
Yes I remember that show. He seemed to be a good guy and was fun to watch. Can’t say I remember much about his dishes. I think he was big around the same time Julia Child was.
I remember The Galloping Gourmet as a title, but I was too young at the time to really watch or appreciate it.
I’m more familiar with him from his comeback in the early 90s, which was just called something like The Graham Kerr Show. That later show focused more on healthier, lower-fat recipes. As I understand it, his wife had suffered a stroke around that time, which got him into trying to cook healthier. I remember that he would often compare his new recipe to the version of the same dish he had done on The Galloping Gourmet, to point out how much less fat and calories the new version had.
Haven’t thought about him in years. Sorry to hear that his wife has passed away, but I hope that he is doing well in his retirement.
Watched it all the time when I was little. I remember thinking cooking while drinking wine looked like the funnest thing ever. I liked him much more than Julia Child. Not that I didn’t like Julia, she just didn’t seem to have as much fun as The Galloping Gourmet.
Galloping Gourmet was as much comedy as cooking. He’s often hold up items in a suggestive way like a pair of coconuts or melons and make a Double entendre comment, but yes I remember it and it was fairly entertaining.
It’s interesting that he renounced The Galloping Gourmet and tried to get it taken off the air in syndication after having a serious life change in the mid-70’s. He became a born again Christian and objected to the drinking, racy commentary, and the food on the show (which he believed contributed to obesity).
When preparing some fried chicken in front of the studio audience: ‘Remember, ladies, to dredge your breasts (in flour) !’ I remember that, cracked them right up!
Sad how turning fundy-Christian makes you lose your sense of humor.
I used to come home for lunch from business school and watch The Galloping Gourmet, he was a hoot.
Watched his show all the time as a kid. One episode that stands out in my memory was when he got scalded by some hot steam or something. There was a quick break and he came back on looking a little shaken but none the worse for wear.
That’s my understanding of his work in the '90s, as well. My wife loved the show he had on PBS at that time, and she bought several of his cookbooks. And, while I was a little kids when The Galloping Gourmet was first on, I remember him from that, as well.
I got to meet him about 20 years ago – at the time, I was working at Quaker Oats, and helping to staff our booth in the trade fair at the AARP national convention. Kerr made some guest appearances at our booth, giving cooking demonstations with his low-fat recipes.
After one of the appearances, I had the chance to talk with him for 20 minutes or so, as I helped him clean up the demonstration area. I was really impressed by how down-to-earth and genuine he was, and how he wanted me to tell him about my own family and experiences.
Yeah, when you’re a kid, you’re home during the day, there’s nothing else to do, there’s 2 channels on TV and you end up watching cooking shows.
I liked the show, though. Kerr was likable. The double entendres, “it’s time for a short slurp” and gallantly grabbing the prettiest woman in the audience for the final tasting was rat packy enough for the era and felt right in a way it wouldn’t now.
That must have been after his conversion, when all the fun went out of the show. Before that, it was drinking wine, making ribald jokes, and delicious food. One of his favorite standby lines, was “Now, take a leek…” and the audience would titter. He would look all innocent and say “What?” while holding up an actual leek. I think he preferred using leeks to other types of onions because it gave him a chance to use this joke, which did get tired after a while.
After the conversion, any wine used in cooking was de-alcoholised. Fairly or otherwise, I blamed his wife for the conversion.
The Galloping Gourmet was hilarious. He put wine in EVERYTHING. And he measured it by “ounces.” He’d pour wine into whatever he was making, and count “One, two, three…” for however many ounces the recipe called for.
Several episodes would be filmed in a day, and he’d be more than half-lit by the time the day ended.
One memorable episode is when he set his dishtowel on fire. When the fire proved more complex than he could immediately handle, he went back to cooking while the flames burned higher and higher. He made some statement like “A good cook does not become distracted. Just ignore what is going on around you, and concentrate on the task at hand.” In the meantime, the studio audience is screaming with laughter.
He and his wife both began to drink heavily, until they were in a car accident which totaled their vehicle. It was a single vehicle accident, and the two of them were not badly hurt. That was their “Come to Jesus” moment, when the drinking stopped and they got religion.
~VOW
There was a short-lived TV program in the early 1970s called Arnie, about a blue collar guy who had gotten a promotion, and (I guess) his adjustment to going to white collar.
Anyway. . . Charles Nelson-Reilly played Randy Robinson, the “Giddyap Gourmet.” According to CNR some years later, Kerr was. . . not amused.
I remember my dad telling me about The Galloping Gourmet when I was in junior high (late '60s). He watched it out of Chicago and thought it was quite funny.
I liked it immediately, and it really turned me on to cooking. The dishes I remember best are goulash (more Austrian than Hungarian) and Chicken Kiev.
I also loved the humor in the show. The joke I remember best is the little boy who was asked if he knew why babies have their umbilical cords tied off after they’re born: “Well, I suppose if they didn’t, they’d go BLURUZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ-FTPFFF [and fly around the room like a balloon]!”
IIRC, the series was taped in Toronto, which I didn’t know until after I’d moved here. There are some episodes and clips of the show on YouTube.
I’d heard about his wife having a stroke, but it seems to me she died more than just recently. I’m sure he’s a kinder, gentler person now, but I really miss his irreverence (which I think came from his time in Australia).
I shall think of him and Treena next time I smash a clove of garlic with my kitchen knife!
On one occasion, the audience laughed as he did this. He looked up in one of his “What?” moments and said “That is *exactly *six ounces! If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you.”
He took out a measuring cup and poured more wine just as he had a moment before. Damned if it wasn’t exactly six ounces!
