Food television has gender roles.
But wait! Isn't the gender norm that women are the ones who cook? Yes, yes it is. But that's an incomplete gender norm. The stereotype regarding cooking is that it's women who are the ones who cook at home.
And there's nothing wrong with that. Let women be homemakers if that's what they want. But the problem here is only so few female chefs get to be perceived the same way as the male chefs.
Is this a bad thing? Yes, yes it is. One of the few misconceptions by the whole world is that gender roles only limit women. This is ridiculous. By saying men do not cook at home, it discourages the boys that do. It marginalizes them even because if they step foot in the kitchen and put on an apron and start cooking, many of the very ignorant would call him out on diminishing his masculinity. For women, the lack of women shown working as professional chefs could discourage them from pursuing their dream of turning their passion into work.
Of course there are women too. We have Anne Burrell, Cat Cora, and especially Cristeta Comerford who challenges everything what I had just said about female chefs. The Kallinis sisters destroys the stigma that baking, especially by women, is all cutesy and bubbly with their show DC Cupcakes.
-Anna
(click photos for source)