"deen" news and stories

The Food Network loves Paula Deen and they are about to do what they always do with their favorite stars -Rachael Ray, Emeril, Bobby Flay, Alton Brown - and give her a new show. Paula's Cooking Party is an hour-long prime time show staring Paula, a kitchen and a live studio audience. The network describes it as a "non-stop rollercoaster of food, fun, stories, recipes and surprises" and it will have far less emphasis on straight cooking instruction, which her current show is based around. Well, that and butter, anyway.

Deen, 59, just recently became a grandmother, so it is something of a surprise that the network is opting to promote her when they have been trying to attract a younger audience. Granted, Paula's show and her specials have attracted the some of the largest tv audiences on the network, but is "Paula unplugged" going to attract viewers? And when one of the early episodes featured Paula "trying on a young audience member's stilettos, telling jokes and staging a live crab race," will it keep viewers accustomed to seeing her cook satisfied?

The show premiers September 29th, so we'll just have to wait until then to find out.

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In an interview with Pop Candy this week, Paula revealed a few secrets about her life as a celebrity chef, now that she is the most watched personality on the Food Network. For example, with two restaurants to run in addition to her busy TV, book-writing, magazine-editing schedule, she and her family rarely eat at home, preferring to eat at one of her restaurants. She says she spends approximately $100,000 on food for both restaurants, one of which seats over 300 diners at a time. That is not stopping her from cooking Christmas dinner, though. Her table will be spread with a standing rib roast, green bean bundles, shrimp-stuffed twice-baked potatoes, salad and “everything that goes along with [those]”. The best meal she ate this year was not one of her own, but a romantic dinner with her husband in Paris’ George V at the Four Seasons.  Paula also has a new line of cookware in the works for 2006, along with a new biographical book.