I know this scene is treated as a gem of Columbo. I like it too of course. But on the other hand it always stucks me. Too many unlogical things there.
- the presenter acting totaly foolish (who would watch the program like that??)
- I am really not the master chef, but ingridients like "eggs, salt, pepper, butter and lemon juice" don't sound like very sophisticated meal :P
- Columbo saying "eee", "eee", not that much funny. Take a look from his point of view - he knew that audience is laughing so he did it on purpose. So for me it looks fake
- Columbo puts salt in a wrong way, take a look what he does with paper coeuple of seconds later
- and Dexter pours his sauce on Columbo - what kind of cooking program is that?
I don't understand why this scene is so high rated by Clumbo fans. It is very unnatural

It looks like the kind of cooking show that people watch for the host's personality as much as anything else (even though plenty of people wouldn't find Dexter's personality that entertaining).

Often, Columbo characters were very loosely based on cultural figures of the day. At the time of that episode, there was a very popular "celebrity chef" (before the term even existed) named Graham Kerr. He had a program called "The Galloping Gourmet." Here's a sampling, which I think you'll agree, has some similarities to that scene from this episode.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31lxWYwHJ_s

My favorite celebrity chef was the New Orleans Cajun cook who would say things like: "Makes it a little more betterer there". I could watch that guy all day:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eK4umRMJlrs