Which Australian TV cooking program is co-presented by Maggie Beer and Simon Bryant?

Answer 1

The Cook and the Chef on ABC

Take one inspired cook with a national and international reputation for mouth-watering home cooked creations. Add one chef who creates five star restaurant masterpieces on a daily basis. Mix the magnificent setting of the Barossa Valley in South Australia with the abundance of local seasonal produce and garnish with plenty of good humour.

The Cook and The Chef is a new half hour weekly series hosted by Maggie Beer and Simon Bryant, screening on ABC TV in early 2006.

Based in South Australia's Barossa Valley, Maggie Beer has taken the region's food to the world and won acclaim everywhere. Maggie's cooking celebrates what is growing around her and she revels in the food each season of the year produces.

In The Cook and The Chef Maggie Beer introduces Executive Chef Simon Bryant to her home region and the people who supply her with the produce she has used to create her culinary reputation. Simon shares her joy of good produce and also shares with viewers the secrets of cooking restaurant meals.

Each week, in each season of the year, The Cook and The Chef visit local producers whose crops are ready for the table and then take the produce back to Maggie's kitchen. Maggie and Simon transform the fresh ingredients into dishes that everyone can cook, along the way providing helpful tips on how food is best bought and prepared.

Review of the show: (http://www.theage.com.au/news/tv-reviews/the-cook-and-the-chef/2006/07/18/1153166372632.html)

Cooking shows can be divided into two types: the precise military-esque measurements of a Delia Smith or a Gabriel Gate, or the more free-flowing "bit of this and a pinch of that" school, with a distinctly free-form approach to recipe construction. The Cook and the Chef is firmly in the latter category, exponents Maggie Beer and Simon Bryant frequently giggling over the confusion their lateral approach to measurements will have on the home viewer (and regular exhortations to refer to the website for more accurate recipes).

Maggie Beer is the "cook" of the equation, although this pleading of non-professional status seems a little unfair considering she's the writer of several excellent cookbooks and the producer of a successful range of gourmet bits and pieces, along with presiding over her own little foodie empire in the Barossa Valley. For such a self-made woman, it seems odd and a little disappointing to buy into the cliche that men are chefs but women are only cooks. Simon Bryant, meanwhile, executive chef at the Hilton hotel chain, brings the milk-curdling accent of the British bovver boy to his half of the deal. He's quite the counterpoint to Maggie's fruity charms: half her size, plenty of leather and chains. Their chemistry doesn't exactly spark off the screen but there's an undeniable respect and shared love of food.

Answer 2

The Cook and the Chef is the only thing I keep finding. Don't know if that's what you're looking for or not