"TylerFlorence" news and stories

Last year Slashfood launched the The 10 Hottest Men in the Food Industry and boy, did we hear about it! From commenters all over, everyone had an opinion. This year, we opened up the polls to our readers and let you decide who would make our final top 10 list.

Narrowing down 30 names to 10, after the jump, see who made the list again, and find out who, surprisingly, is our (possibly not-so-hot) hottest man of 2011.

Premiering on the Food Network this Sunday, August 15 is The Great Food Truck Race -- a six episode series that pits seven food trucks against one another, vying for a $50,000 prize. As the food truck trend continues to grow in urban areas across the country, these mobile units will have to travel to locations outside their comfort zone and try to win over a whole new client base, before rolling out to the next stop.

Slashfood spoke with the show's host Tyler Florence (Tyler's Ultimate) about the concept behind The Great Food Truck Race and the economics and cultural impact of food truck culture.

For Food Network star Tyler Florence, good things have been coming in threes this year: In addition to launching a third gourmet food shop, he's ambitiously opening not one but three California restaurants, including San Francisco's Wayfare Tavern, Mill Valley's El Paseo and a Napa rotisserie shop, all the while juggling three kids, a new television show and his involvement with Wishbone salad dressings, delivering healthy salad recipes through a series of online cooking demonstration videos.

But Florence, 39, isn't daunted by the challenge, he admitted Tuesday night at a Wishbone-sponsored "Salad Night Live" event in NYC. "We started planting seeds there [for the restaurants] years ago and they're all coming up at the same time. Plus, buying in bulk to get a better price is a financial incentive. We're capable."

Capable indeed. With an impressive culinary background that stems from his start in professional kitchens at age 15, to a flourishing line of successful cookbooks and organic baby food, to his rise to fame as a Food Network chef and host, Florence is as at home in front of the camera -- having recently hosted the Travel Channel's upcoming Food Wars series -- as in his private kitchen. He reminisces back to his culinary start, when the Food Network "had two cameras and that was the whole network... And it was really bad, but I loved every minute of it!"

Will everyone who's ever eaten artichokes for the first time and mistakenly shoved the whole fibrous, impossible-to-chew leaf in their mouth, and then tried to figure out how to get rid of it without gagging, please raise your hands? Or am I alone in this Lucy-like episode of Famous Food Faux Pas? Why, all those years ago, didn't I have Tyler Florence to show me the way with his delicate roasted baby artichokes?

Yes, folks, artichoke season has come around again. Blogger Pabo76 (who also provides great takes on Korean food) layers the choke with sun-dried tomatoes, fresh mozzarella and some roasted red peppers on crusty bread (for another hoagie combo see our recipe). Or you can get back to artichoke basics (and give your kids a lesson in the ultimate slow food, leaf by leaf) with this recipe for the spiky green veg.

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If this doesn't give you the urge to go into the kitchen and fry something right now, we can't imagine what would. You can almost feel your teeth breaking through that delicate golden crust, taste how those grains of salt work in perfect balance with the tender potato inside. Everything we bite into should be this dreamy.

Try making your own homemade fries following method in Tyler Florence's fish and chips recipe.

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