"Ham on the Street" news and stories

I was watching Ham on the Street a few nights ago (great show - I had never watched it before but it's quite entertaining), and the episode focused on pizza. He visited pizza shops, had a taste test to see if people on the street liked his toppings of carmelized onions and gorgonzola more than pepperoni, and made some pizza on pita bread that I have to try.

But the recipe on the show that I need to try right now is the Pepperoni Pizza Soup. What a great concept, pizza, but in a bowl! At first I thought it would be just some odd approximation of pizza, but this recipe actually sounds doable:

I believe it was H.L. Mencken who said, "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public." That quote goes along way toward explaining the popularity of George Duran's idiotic Food Network show Ham on the Street. I know we here at Slashfood have no love for the man's antics, comedic or culinary.

Joanne Ostrow, TV critic for The Denver Post, is clearly a big Duran fan. I'm willing to cut her a break when she writes that the show deserves "a wider, hungrier audience" mainly because she's not a food journalist. However, I lose all faith when I read that she feels that Duran "succeeds in being hip without trying." His show is the antithesis of hip and goes beyond being unentertaining to become simply annoying. Perhaps, this is sour grapes on my part. The first time I watched, I thought, "Dang, I could do this, and much, much better."

There was one bright spot in Ostrow's review of the show though. Duran's producer, Allison Page, says that he speaks so longingly of France, that she fears he may return their one day. A note to Ham fans, it  won't be any time soon, the second season starts in July. Today's show will examine microwave foods. I can't hardly wait.

Source

I was pretty excited this week at the prospect of watching Food Network's new show, Ham on the Street. In the last year, I've become more and more disenchanted by the the Food Network's programming, new branding, and new celebrity "chef" hosts, particularly with the news that personal favorites of mine would not be returning (and I swear it has nothing to do with the fact that we share the same name).

But Ham on the Street promised to be sarcastic, a little irreverent, and I was hoping that it might be funny they way Tony Bourdain is funny to me.

It wasn't funny. Not even close. I swear I wanted to change the channel at 10:34 PM, but i made myself watch the whole thing.

George Duran used to be a comic, but he's not very funny. In fact, Duran's a wee bit dull. Is it just me? Anyone? Or maybe I was the only one watching the show last night anyway. The topic of choice, breakfast, had so much potential, and even each individual "segment" could have been done well, but it wasn't. And it wasnt even very educational. Okay, scratch that. At least I learned how to make a version of pain au chocolat. It just felt like an almost-funny comedian doing a combination of the worst parts of "Unwrapped" and "The Secret Life of..."

And at least Jim O' Connor of "The Secret Life of..." is cute.