The Bookseller.com

1st December 2008

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Multimedia launch for Jamie’s Ministry

25.09.08 Katie Allen

Television chef Jamie Oliver is planning a three-pronged attack on recalcitrant cooks with the launch of his latest campaign, the Ministry of Food,  in print, online and on television in the same week.

The website, www.jamiesministryoffood.com, launches on 30th September, the same day as the first of four weekly episodes airs on Channel 4. Jamie’s Ministry of Food (hb, £25) is published by Penguin on 2nd October.

The campaign is aimed at teaching people to cook and to encourage them to spread their skills and Oliver’s recipes among their friends and family. It is based on the Ministry of Food which was set up during the Second World War to help people deal with rationing and prepare home-cooked meals. The book contains more than 100 step-by-step recipes formulated for those who are time-poor or new to cooking.

Some recipes will appear on the TV show, which follows Jamie’s visits over the past year to Rotherham—the town notorious for the mothers who rejected his school dinners’ campaign and pushed fast food through the school fences—to set up a Food Centre and teach people how to cook.

The website will also contain a “generous” number of recipes from the book, and, as part of the Pass It On scheme, users will be encouraged to pass on recipes to two of their friends via email.

Content from the website will be syndicated to other sites such as MSN, Bebo and YouTube, and there is an MoF store on Amazon, including recipes and videos. Penguin is also working with MySpace.

In addition, Channel 4 and 02 are collaborating on a microsite, where mobile phone users will be able to download recipes and videos.

"There’s a real need for something like Ministry of Food because we have a real problem with obesity in this country and I don’t see any radical solutions coming from anywhere else right now," Oliver said. "I think that technology can play a huge part in getting this project to spread across the nation," he added.

Jamie Oliver digitisation Katie Allen The Ministry of Food