So pop culture has come to this: A former figure skater perhaps best known for being a goofily ironic punchline to a "South Park" song has his own show -- and it's a cooking show. Die-hard foodies, take note: "What Would Brian Boitano Make?" is not for you.
This is not to say it operates at Sandra Lee levels of non-cooking: At no point does Brian (whom we interviewed) crack open a packet of supermarket taco seasoning for some zing or create a lush tablescape out of freshly raked autumn leaves. But it is, shall we say, a little on the frothy side for anyone wanting to learn the proper way to braise a quail. (Though the guy sure knows how to strain his juices for a mango-tini.)
No, this is one of those "lifestyle" shows the Food Network is so adept at churning out -- more tailored to the host's persona and his or her niche than anything else. And to judge by the first episode, Brian's self-professed niche would be San Franciscan guys who like to entertain their single girlfriends, prepare fussy little crudités and "ride bikes on rainbows!"
Who knew someone as adorable as Zooey Deschanel could be so difficult? Truth be told, when the actress and singer showed up as a guest judge/elfin dinner hostess last night on "Top Chef Masters," we were counting the moments until she threw the inevitable curveball: "I'm a vegetarian."
When she added "no eggs or dairy" -- never uttering the word "vegan" -- and professed her intolerance for soy or wheat, we sensed the evil guiding hand of the show's producers, eager to ratchet up the tension for the five remaining celeb chefs. The only way they could've played it up more would have been to have her break plates and pull a "Mommie Dearest" at the dinner table: "I told you, no gluten ingredients EVER!"
No such luck. The star of the heavily Bravo-promoted "500 Days of Summer" was a model of apologetic demureness when she met the cooks pre-meal, although she did decline Michael Chiarello's request to sing couple of a cappella songs in exchange for his culinary handiwork.
Behind her back, the Italian cuisine maestro was the most outwardly offended by the restrictions, calling them "off-putting."
Now things get ugly. We've been waiting all season for something to break the respectful, civilized, almost comically cordial spell cast by the "Top Chef Masters" assortment of celebrity chefs, each gingerly battling the other for a claim to Bravo-endorsed superiority (not to mention a philanthropic sack full of Lexus-supplied charity cash). In Wednesday night's first round of finals, the cloud of cheery camaraderie seemed to have finally lifted.
It wasn't the chefs who removed their gloves -- or mitts, to be more appropriate -- but rather, the folks behind the scenes. From the quickfire challenge to the judges' table, the six chefs who've made it this far were subjected to a grueling, baffling psychological experiment the likes of which we haven't seen since the Skinner box.
Maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration. But right from the start, something was off-kilter. Even host Kelly Choi's usual preschool-teacher diction took on a tinge of deviousness as she announced that each chef would be asked to prepare his or her "sig-na-ture dish," making sure to linger on every syllable.
Beloved Anthony Bourdain, in his show "No Reservations", hops back on the tube tonight, with a season premiere that looks pretty darn delicious -- and fattening -- if this preview video is to be believed.
In it, Tony tucks into a 12-inch-long Chilean hot dog covered with sauerkraut, guacamole and an avert-thine-eyes-health-care-professionals incredible slop of mayo. His thoughts? "I don't know whether to eat this thing or conceal it in a brown paper bag."
Top Chef judges Toby, Padma, Tom and Gail. Photo: Bravo TV.
Chef-testants for season six of Top Chef were announced today. The showdown will take place in Las Vegas, which Tom Colicchio assures us is a "very serious food town."
The primary thing a bunch of these newbies have in common? Tattoos, big time. Click through the gallery and let us know if we're wrong. That's not to say we don't spy some serious contenders in the mix. Talent ranges from Michael Voltaggio, chef de cuisine of the buzzed-about José Andrés Bazaar in Los Angeles, to the innocuous-looking (but perhaps culinarily ferocious) Jesse Sandlin, one of the tattooed toques, who sports a flower in her hair.
Don't skip the video of our four judges, in which Gail declares, "I'm eating very well," and Padma asserts, "A few of these contestants have even taught Tom a thing or two." Hmm. We'll see.
Are you stoked about Top Chef Vegas -- or are you over it by now?
It's amazing what a couple of rabbit ears will pick up, and it pays to do a little futzing around with the remote to sample the bevy of weird and wonderful channels and sub-channels blazing through the airwaves in all their pixelated glory.
Case in point: "The Dotch Cooking Show." This little gem of Japanese pop culture may have ended in 2007, but it lives on thanks to Los Angeles' KSCI-TV channel 18.2 -- not to mention online, in countless YouTube clips and less-than-legal downloads.
America's cook-off shows seem downright sleep-inducing by comparison. As TV spectacles go, Dotch occupies a space somewhere between the loose, tipsy fun of the celebrity-studded '70s staple "The Match Game" and the free-wheeling nuttiness of "Peewee's Playhouse."
Love her or hate her, Sandra Lee can stretch a dollar.
For her latest Food Network show, the queen of "semi-homemade" cuisine is teaching her viewers "Money Saving Meals" with tips on how to make dishes like this French toast without breaking the bank.
"This show is like Suze Orman meets Julia Child," she told Slashfood Thursday in the Food Network test kitchens.
Get her three tips on how to save at the grocery store and the French toast recipe after the jump.
Tomorrow night on Top Chef, Gail Simmons has a special surprise for the Chef'testants. She's throwing her girlfriend a bridal shower and they are cooking!
Creating a menu around the old maxim:
Something old, something new Something borrowed, something blue And a silver sixpence in her shoe.
... should be no trouble for the teams (Old, New, Borrowed, and Blue ... where's Sixpence?).
The only problem is, some of them don't look too excited to be Gail Simmons' personal chefs. Isn't this supposed to be a competition, not a service?
The episode airs tomorrow night, Wednesday, December 10th, at 10/9c on Bravo with guest judge Dana Cowin, Editor-in-Chief of Food & Wine Magazine.
On more nights than I'd like to admit, Scott and I succumb to the blue flicker of the television screen while eating dining. We park ourselves on the couch with our plates and watch Jeopardy or reruns of The Daily Show. But when we go out to eat, we avoid places with TVs, knowing that we get plenty of tube viewing time in at home.
However, CBS has recently opened a restaurant where the point is to watch television while you eat. Over the weekend, they opened a 15,000-square-foot restaurant that will serve upscale pub food and will prominently feature approximately 130 high-definition televisions. Included in that number are table-side flat-screens programmed with CBS content, so that you can choose from 60 years worth of CBS programming while you dine.
The restaurant, called CBS Scene, has been opened in partnership with New England Patriots owner Robert Kraft and is located in Foxborough, MA, adjacent to Gillette Stadium. Video about the new restaurant is after the jump (it starts playing as soon as you open the page).
Healthy officials say celebrity chefs often fail to maintain basic hygiene standards, according to an article by BBC news.
Interestingly, however, the article only cites one health official, but it states that the issue was brought up at a medical conference in Edinburgh. Crimes by the celebrity chefs include not washing lettuce and using the same utensils for raw meat and cooked foods. Guilty shows include BBC's Ready Steady Cook and Celebrity MasterChef, which I've actually never seen.
I'm not sure whether the problem, if it exists, happens here in the U.S. as well, as I have never thought about the issue while watching food TV. I guess I always presume that ingredients are pre-washed, or that the washing is edited out of programs like Top Chef and Iron Chef America. Your thoughts?
It hasn't even been a week since the season finale of Top Chef, and I'm already into a new show. It's a rebound -- something new and exciting to occupy me for now, and who knows what it could turn into? A brief fling? A multi-season love affair? I feel so giddy.
So just to clarify: Last night was my first evening spent with The Next Food Network Star. I'm going to be writing recaps for the rest of the season, but my experience with the show is limited to one episode, plus all of the online content. That means that all you veteran watchers should feel free to help me out whenever possible with details from past seasons, etc. And if you haven't seen the show, start watching Sundays at 10 p.m. EST and we can learn together!
So, last week I showed you a gallery of photos of us framing out walls, putting up drywall, prepping them, and priming the paint. This week I will show you how we painted the future Penobscot Bay Distillery & Brewery at Winterport Winery. Because we have windows on the second floor of Pairings Food and Wine Culinary & Education Center looking down into the distillery, we decided to splash a little color around. The main outside wall we left a nice crisp white. This wall is where we will have all the equipment stationed and a plain and simple background will be best to showcase all the copper, stainless steel, and brick nicely.
The interior as a whole was mind-numbingly bright and white. I felt like an Oompa Loompa in Willy Wonka's factory working in the TV Room. (Especially the Gene Wilder version, which I feel caught the original book better than the Depp version.) It was scary how white and bright the room was, so we decided to splash some color around. We looked at color chips for a week or so, and then went with ones that we felt portrayed the image of various of the "Brown" spirits. Scotch, Bourbon, Rye, Cognac, Rum, etc. Then we threw a pair of accent lamps on the wall with aim-able lights to leave on at night for a soft glow of the equipment.
Yes, I know this is a commercial /industrial facility. But I'm the one who is going to have to be in there for hours and hours each day. So much so, that I am setting up a office in the distillery so I can write and do other business while the still chugs along. With distilling slow is good, but since a run can take twelve hours I need some way to keep my sanity. So an interesting and calming paint job, plus the ability to kick back and write for you guys, seems to be a working solution. Of course there was another reason we wanted to have a nice paint job for the facility... Continued after the jump. ;-)>
Though I know for sure I don't have what it takes to be a Top Chef (heck, I doubt I have what it takes to be just any chef), there might be some of you out there who have the endurance, the stamina, a thick enough skin to take words from Tom Colicchio and cold stares from Padma Lakshmi, and of course the talent.
If so, get yourself to an open call for the next season (wow, they're already on Season 5!) of Top Chef. New Orleans and San Francisco already happened, but there are calls scheduled in May for Vegas, New York, LA, Denver, and Chicago. If you can't make it to one of those cities, you can also "apply" by sending in a video.
The embeddable video from last night's Top Chef isn't quite available yet, but I thought I'd find some food video content to keep you guys busy while you wait. So here we have episode two of Hell's Kitchen (if you missed the first one, you can find it here), the American version of Gordon Ramsay's show (which bears several similarities to Top Chef) that gives him an opportunity yell and scream at aspiring chefs.
Check back tomorrow for the complete Top Chef episode.
Apparently, even if Rachael's show were actually getting cancelled (it's not), she won't go down without a fight. The TV chef is working on an animated series that stars herself as a young chef. The show is being produced by Oprah's company, Harpo Productions (naturally) and is scheduled for debut in January 2009.
Now, I'm not sure how I feel about this one, but to be quite honest, an animated version of Rachael might be easier on the eyes. Then again, it'll still be her voice.
Healthy officials say celebrity chefs often fail to maintain basic hygiene standards, according to 
Though I know for sure I don't have what it takes to be a Top Chef (heck, I doubt I have what it takes to be just any chef), there might be some of you out there who have the endurance, the stamina, a thick enough skin to take words from Tom Colicchio and cold stares from Padma Lakshmi, and of course the talent. 
How did we miss this?!?!
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