Martha Stewart draws a stark contrast between her kitchen skills and those of Rachael Ray and surprisingly, Ray completely agrees.
Speaking with ABC's "Nightline" in an interview to air Thursday night, Stewart says what Ray does isn't good enough for her.
"To me she professed that she cannot bake," Stewart says of Ray. "She just did a new cookbook which is just a re-edit of a lot of her old recipes, and that's not good enough for me. I really want to write a book that is a unique and lasting thing -- something that will fulfill a need in someone's library. So she's different, she's more of an entertainer than she is -- with a bubbly personality -- than she is a teacher like me. That's not what she's professing to be."
When asked about Stewart's comments, Ray says "It's true. It's 100 percent true," but adds the criticism doesn't upset her.
"Why would it make me mad?" Ray says. "When it comes to producing a beautiful, perfect, high quality meal, I'd rather eat Martha's than mine too."
Who do you like better? Martha or Rachael? Spill it in the comments.
The gap between tamales and the Thanksgiving table is continuing to narrow as an increasing number of Mexican-Americans are stuffing their holiday masa with pumpkin and sweet potatoes.
Tamales have been a festive food ever since the Aztecs and other early Meso-Americans served them in conjunction with their religious rituals, says Claudia Alarcon, an Austin-based writer who's kicking off the University of Texas' Foodways of Mexico speaker series this week with a talk on tamale history. While tamales aren't associated with winter holidays south of the border, Alarcon says "I'm pretty sure in every U.S. state where Mexican-Americans live, they have tamales for the holidays."
Cookie exchanges are so passé in southern Louisiana, where swap-minded cooks are now trading cupcakes, cheesecakes, pralines and single slices of pound cake.
The potato is enjoying newfound popularity at tailgate parties, thanks to its terrific versatility and low cost. (But if you have cash to spare, the editors suggest pairing grilled potato kebabs with Zinfandel.)
What's next for the final five contestants? Photo: Bravo
Come back, Natalie! O, Nigella, where art thou? After a couple of heavy-hitting, sweeps-month episodes, last night's "Top Chef" was, well, a little subdued.
With the albatross that was Robin finally gone, and five not-quite-equal cheftestants left, the mysteries left in the season are few. Will Jen get her mojo back? Will the brothers Voltaggio go at each other's throats, like we've been hoping they would all season? Will snarky Toby Young disappear for good, already?
Instead of high tension, we got slow-burn dread and buttoned-down critiques, not to mention portentous montages of the chefs getting dressed, sleeping, or, in the case of Kevin, hanging rosary beads around his neck.
Red-lentil soup inspired my love of the brothy dish, both for its natural flavor and for its unparalleled comforting qualities -- in fact, so much so that my house has become known among friends as the "Soup Kitchen," and friends will randomly text while in the neighborhood to ask what's cooking.
I discovered red-lentil soup rather late in life, during my college years, at Sultan's Market, a small but fiercely beloved Mediterranean spot in Chicago's Wicker Park. Braving the bristly winter weather with a bowl of the soup to-go made my walk home doable, whatever obstacles the weather was throwing my way (and these usually included numbingly harsh winds).
And coming home to a spicy bowl of this stuff warmed was inevitably a body- and soul-warming experience. Although I'm fond of preserving the natural flavor of the red lentil by cooking it up in a soup with sparing ingredients (namely broth, garlic, onion and a touch of cumin), you can't go wrong with hardly any variety of the ultimate soothing concoction. Blogger Whitney in Chicago makes hers with red pepper flakes and chipotle, ups the heartiness factor with the addition of rice, and artfully tops it all off with slivered almond and zesty Feta. You should try her recipe -- I wholeheartedly back her in dubbing it a surefire "cure for darkness."
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Yes, we covered up Bella with a burger. Photo: Rachel Been, AOL.
OMG!!! The latest installment of the "Twilight" saga, "New Moon," is nigh upon us! Will you be celebrating with fast food?
The folks at Burger King think so. They're marketing a special BK Burger Shots six-pack for all you werewolves and, ahem, blood-sucking vampires out there. The mini burgers come with a special "Gift of Holiday Value" -- coupons for "Twilight" merch masquerading as collector's cards. Think of them as a vampire Valpak of savings.
While the holiday season is all about tradition, here's one to break: serving wine with dinner. Craft beer's varied styles and flavors mean you can match any festive meal to the perfect brew. Here's our hop-filled primer on Thanksgiving entertaining.
As guests snack on crunchy crudités and crackers and cheese, crack a pleasantly hopped pale ale such as the release from San Diego's Stone. The brewery's version contains a malty, reserved bitterness that complements the hors d'oeuvres without overwhelming them. If Stone's unavailable, Stoudt's American Pale Ale is a great biscuity, citrusy selection. (The appetizer can apply to every holiday.)
Is Ronald McDonald a beloved corporate mascot or a sinister huckster who gets kids hooked on junk food?
Corporate Accountability International, a watchdog organization based in Boston, claims that through television commercials and by appearing at schools, libraries, hospitals and McDonald's restaurants, Ronald is marketing directly to impressionable children. The result they say contributes to diet-related diseases like obesity and Type 2 diabetes.
As part of a larger initiative to fight fast-food marketing aimed at kids, the organization has started the "Where's Ronald" initiative, a Ronald McDonald scavenger hunt in which activists track down the clown by photographing or videotaping him at public appearances.
"We need your help to expose the near ubiquity of the clown and the ways it is used to hook our kids on food that makes them sick," CAI says. The grand prize? A gift certificate to a "sustainable, healthy restaurant near the winning participant's home."
That's the question many lovers of frozen Eggo waffles are wondering following nationwide shortages of the popular breakfast food.
Kellogg's, which manufactures Eggo, blames the short supply on flooding that hit an Atlanta processing facility in September, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.
Make sure the Thanksgiving preparations don't turn into an episode of "Hell's Kitchen" by following Mark Bittman's guide of 101 things to prepare in advance.
"If it ain't broke, don't fix it" -- Melissa Clark challenges her family's traditional chestnut stuffing by cooking up three new stuffing possibilities to see if they can compete.
The Pour Blog admits "books about wine are no substitute for drinking wine." But these six book suggestions about wine can help readers better appreciate what they're drinking.
Legendary French chef Pierre Gagnaire is the latest three Michelin-starred to infiltrate the Vegas strip with his first restaurant endeavor in the U.S.
What's a fair without food? Residents of Broward County, Fla., are about to find out.
As the Broward County Fair doesn't have a fairgrounds of its own, it found itself homeless this year after its previous host, the Fort Lauderdale Stadium, closed for renovations. Scrambling for a solution, the fair relocated to a shopping mall.
"We'd rather have something than nothing at all," said the volunteer who answered the fair office's phone.
The Pompano Citi Centre has plenty of space for competitions and exhibits -- the spelling bee is scheduled for a room over LensCrafters, and student gardeners will display their plants at Lowe's -- but there's no room for rides or food vendors. According to the volunteer, who identified herself as Denise, the only food at the fair will be the canned beans, pound cakes and other edibles submitted for judging.
There are few dishes more American than macaroni and cheese. Forget that we credit the Italians for pasta and the French for "the good cheese" -- it's here in the United States where we bring the two together together in glorious, comforting harmony.
Rumor has it that Thomas Jefferson introduced the dish to the United States. And though a boxed version was made wildly popular by Kraft over many decades, home and professional chefs have taken back the comfort food, and now make gourmet versions like this one from blogger Ezra Pound Cake.
This take on classic macaroni and cheese, adapted from a recipe in "The Gift of Southern Cooking," is made with grated onion, sour cream, half-and-half, heavy cream, Worcestershire sauce, dry mustard, eggs and cayenne pepper, as well as noodles and cheddar cheese. Fattening and flavorful -- just the way American comfort food should be.
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Apparently, someone at Bravo decided they needed their very own Gordon Ramsay. And he needed to be, you know, sexy.
We know this, because on the series premiere of "Chef Academy," we were reminded about 20 times within the first 15 minutes of French chef-extraordinaire Jean Christophe Novelli's tall, dark and smarmy good looks. First by his right-out-of-central-casting flamboyant personal assistant, then by the contestants, then by the reference to a New York Times' survey naming him "The World's Sexiest Chef."
Personally, we think he looks like a cross between "Charles in Charge"-era Scott Baio and an aging Jon Lovitz, but beauty is in the eye of the network, apparently. What struck us most in this inaugural hour was "Chef Academy"'s weird mix of elements. Cooking-competition program, ridiculous-amateur freakshow and yuppie lifestyle catalog all converged to give Monday night's premiere one of those "Is this thing going to last?" vibes that it couldn't quite shake. To quote one of the student-contestants, "This isn't 'Top Chef'!" Don't we know it.
First there was the Halloween pumpkin shortage and now this.
Nestlé, the parent company of Libby's Pumpkin, said Tuesday that it might not have enough canned pumpkin for the Thanksgiving holiday.
"Our calculations indicate that we may deplete our inventory of canned Libby's pumpkin as we approach the Thanksgiving holiday," Paul Bakus, vice president for Nestlé's baking division, told the New York Times.
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