Cookery travelogues can be a bit on the self indulgent side can’t they? They say “Look at me! I’ve been paid to go to somewhere you’ll never visit and eat loads of mental food… GASP… this insane looking thing has only been fried and my mind is completely blown. I feel like I’m on drugs. F U people of Rotherham.” Mercifully, Rick Stein’s Far Eastern Odyssey (BBC Two, Thursday, 16 July, 8pm) didn’t suffer from that too much. Rather, it was like been taken away for a weekend by an old gay man spoiling you with posh grub.

Related: Rick Stein’s Memoirs of a Seafood Chef | Rick Stein’s Who Do You Think You Are?

Of course, Rick Stein isn’t a gay old man. He’s just a quite-old man. Having seen him away from the cookery show, it’s always quite surprising to find that he’s a blokey bloke. On camera with a potential meal on the end of a line, he’s old-school camp. You can imagine him in a silk dressing gown looking lovingly and sighing at his young gardener. The reality is that he’d be more likely to punch him in the mouth. He’s a firey chef after all.

Anyway, away from my daydream, Stein went around Cambodia and looked at the food they cook out there. Naturally, that was very interesting and slightly infuriating. Interesting as it’s always good to see food that is assembled in ways totally different from our bready British stuff. Irritating because no-one has invented Smell-O-Vision yet.

Stein watched young men making bread, which was dazzling in itself, as their nimble hands slapped and rolled the dough around with such precision that it made me feel slightly drunk. He picked up fruit that looked like alien hearts from a ’60s b-movie and widened his eyes at each ancient cooking method and machine.

However, what Stein also did was give us all a quick history lesson. Through his interpreters, Stein asked about Khmer Rouge and the sustained bombing attacks and the fall-out. As he asked real people, as opposed to political experts who assume you know certain things, I found these sections very palatable and fascinating. I’m thick you see. I need TV chefs to talk political history to me.

And it worked. As a show, it was gentle and interesting. It didn’t change my life or rewire my brain, but it was very pleasant and distracting like walking on a beach on a nice day. Cuddly television.