Theatre and cooking have a real affinity. Both require excellent ingredients, a good stir to allow the flavours to blend, just the right amount of simmering, and are designed to be shared. There’s a strong element of performance in the work of many chefs, and cooking on stage is always fascinating. Over the years I’ve gorged on shows in which bread has been prepared and baked, curries conjured and soup served up with real theatrical flair.
Theatre Damfino’s show is aimed at firing up young taste buds and imaginations, offering a five-course taster menu of flatbread, beetroot puree, spiced popcorn, cheese, and honey ice-cream alongside a performance that connects the food being eaten with its origins, from the soil and the hive to the spice routes of Asia and a Cotswold flour mill. It’s a really lovely idea, particularly at a time when there is so much anxiety around obesity and what children eat, but in its current form it would probably work better in the classroom than in the theatre. A school setting would allow room for genuine interactivity and an opportunity for a less sketchy exploration of how food gets on our plates.
There’s plenty going on here – in fact rather too much at times, so the hardworking cast are rushed off their feet. But the bells and whistles don’t disguise that what the show lacks is a defining narrative backbone and gripping individual stories to bring the facts alive. It’s a pity too that while the show features a couple of cooks, the food proffered has been prepared earlier, which only reinforces the disconnect that many children experience between the food they eat and how it is sourced and prepared.
There’s novelty here, but although it feeds the stomach, it doesn’t do nearly enough to sustain the imagination.
• At Print Room at the Coronet, London, until 13 December. Box office: 020-3642 6606.
