COMPANY

Company: Latest Releases

March 1, 2010

PILOT PRODUCTIONS - LATEST RELEASES:

Bobby Chinn Cooks Asia:
Hot
Salads
Soups
Desserts
Vegetarian

Globe Trekker:
Barcelona City Guide
Holy Lands 1: Jerusalem & West Bank
Holy Lands 2: Israel
Madrid City Guide
Turkey 2

Globe Guides
Artistic Traveller: Classicism
Artistic Traveller: Modernism
Gay Traveller: Gay Pride
Gay Traveller
Haunted
Relics of the Dead
Great Palaces

Planet Food:
Barcelona

AVAILABLE NOW: World Café Middle East - Istanbul

Roving Chef Bobby Chinn serves up another Middle Eastern delight as he ventures to Istanbul, one of Turkey’s most exciting cities with a rich and varied culinary history influenced by East and West alike.

Bobby’s first port of call is a stall selling cooked sheep's head. True to form, he eats it all, including the eyes and brain! He also meets Hande who runs a local culinary school where he learns how to cook two popular Turkish summer starters, a cold yogurt soup and a wheat and parslane salad.

Journeying on, Bobby visits an area called Anavut Couy to check out the amazing old Ottoman architecture as well as three more uniquely Turkish meat dishes; döner kebabs, shish kebabs and koftas. He discovers the history of the Ottoman culture from expert guide Alp whilst taking in the 600 year old, Topkapi Palace. From here he visits famous local chef, Verdat Basheran who demonstrates an ancient technique of presenting a fish which has boned itself, all before catching a boat to the Princes Islands to participate in a local cooking contest.

In the final part of the show Bobby visits one of the oldest confectioners in Istanbul where he samples the delights of Turkish Delight before visiting the various Turkish coffee stands and the Spice Bazaar. Finally he makes a visit to the district of Nevizade and the tapas style mezze restaurants which have been serving these taster plates of food since the tradition was brought back from Persia by Sulieman the Magnificent in the mid 1500s.

AVAILABLE NOW: World Café Middle East: Damascus & Aleppo

Bobby Chinn returns with a new instalment from the World Cafe Middle East series direct from Syria and explores a colourful mixture of traditional Arabic food and exotic dishes born out ofthe country’s position along the historic silk and spice routes between East and West.

Beginning in the ancient commercial centre of Aleppo, Bobby hooks up with a local chef and learns how to make two classic Middle Eastern starters the Aleppan way: Muhammara and Baba Ghanoush. Taking in a visit to a pomegranate farm along the way, Bobby learns to cook the city's signature dish, cherry kebab before boarding a train to Damascus.

Teaming up with a local restaurant manager, Bobby visits the "Lazy Bones" market selling prepared packages of just about every vegetable known to mankind before attempting to cook a popular main course of courgettes stuffed with minced lamb. After a visit to the oldest and most famous ice cream maker in the Middle East, Bobby strikes out on his own for his final cooking demonstration and shows us how to make a sweet cake (Harissa) but not before sampling a kebab made with camel hump meat and finishing the journey with a traditional Hammam steam bath and massage.

AVAILABLE NOW: Planet Food: Israel & The Palestinian Territories

Bordering Lebanon in the north, Egypt in the south and Syria and Jordan to the West, Israel has a surprisingly diverse and rich food tradition which has been shaped by Jewish refugees arriving from all over the world. Our hosts Angela May and Bobby Chinn explore the rich culture of cuisine and discovers that there's more to Israel and Palestine than Falafel.

Journeying from the ancient city of Jaffa on the Mediterranean coast, Angela discovers how Israeli food is influenced by the Jews from the Diaspora, immigrants coming from Germany, Poland, Russia and its surrounding countries, and Jews from Spain and the Middle East which have all combined to create the rich texture of what is Israeli cuisine today.

Angela also travels to Jerusalem and in the Jewish quarter, she learns how to make the most famous Jewish dish in the world, the Jewish Penicillin: Chicken Soup. Travelling northwards along the Mediterranean coast to Acco, Angela learns to cook the traditional Sephardic dish of Moroccan Fish with top chef Uri Buri. Back in Jerusalem Angela visits the old Mehane Yehuda Market and meets a Yemenite Jew who creates tasty juices from local produce to provide natural cures, all before venturing to the Judean Hills to visit the world's only strictly kosher chef school to learn how to cook Stuffed Eggplants, a traditional dish eaten on the Festival of Succot, the harvest festival.

Meanwhile, in the occupied territories of the West Bank, Bobby Chinn discovers a thriving Palestinian food tradition despite many years of strife. Bobby visits the cities of Ramallah, Bethlehem, Jericho and Jerusalem and takes day trips to the West Bank date farms and olive groves.

COMING NEXT MONTH: Metropolis Syria

Julian Davidson travels to Syria, a country of immense antiquity, boasting cities and archaeological remains that are amongst the oldest in the world.

Many of Syria's monuments reflect the region’s tumultuous past in their combination of styles, as each of the conquerors have adapted the existing buildings to their style and with their techniques. From the Hittites to the Aramaeans, Assyrians and Arabs, Greeks, Romans, Crusaders, Turks, Mongols and French – all have left some kind of monument, resulting in some of the most spectacular architecture in the world.

COMING NEXT MONTH: Metropolis Barcelona

Architectural expert, Julian Davidson joins us again and travels to Barcelona, a city which has an ancient and chequered past. From the Carthaginians, Romans, Visigoths, the Moors and even Hercules, if local mythology is to be believed - they have all had a hand in the making of the city. Steeped in history and owing a lot of its design to Medieval as well as Modern influences, Barcelona is a living and working museum of its own history.

In this episode of Metropolis, we pay homage to the ultimate modernista Antoni Gaudí and take an up close look at his iconic deigns such as the Casa Milà, Sagrada Familia and the Casa Batlló as well as exploring lesser known designs such as Mies van der Rohe's German Pavilion - which has long-since become an icon of Modernism in architectural circles.

We also take a look at Barcelona in the 21st century, and explore how the city's skyline continues to change as it embraces a new century. With an insightful guide, aided by local experts and historians, Julian shows us that there’s more than meets the eye to Barcelona’s buildings and leaves us with an entirely new perspective on this most celebrated of cities.