"reality show" news and stories

Starting this Friday, October 3rd, Food Network will be holding tryouts for the next season of The Next Food Network Star. They'll be auditioning people in the flesh over the next four weeks in Washington, D.C., New York, Los Angeles, Charleston, S.C., Portland, OR and Philadelphia. For those of you who don't live in one of the cities they'll be visiting, you can also apply on online by filling out the application form and uploading a short video, stating why you want to be TNFNS.

Complete details about the casting calls is after the jump.

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What on Earth would make Rocco DiSpirito want to do another TV reality show?  Didn't he learn his lesson from doing that utter disaster of a reality show, The Restaurant, where he was made to look petty and conniving? From all accounts that I've heard (I've never eaten in any of his restaurants), DiSpirito is a great chef, so why is he getting so far away from that and doing another reality show? Granted, this one sounds a little less cheesy and fake than the NBC show (seems to be centered more about a person's special relationship with food in their lives), but this just seems to be the wrong direction to  go in.

Of course, I'm one to talk. If a TV show called me up and asked me to be on a TV show where they covered me in cream cheese and tied me to a chair in the living room of the latest Real World house for a lot of money, I'd be there in a second.

I obviously misunderstood the commercials that Bravo was running to promote the "two hour Las Vegas finale" for the show, Top Chef. You see, I assumed that the two hours would be run consecutively. I was wrong. This week only featured the first half of the finale and was based around one very long challenge.

When the chefs arrived in Las Vegas, the found themselves staying in the ultra-posh Skylofts at the MGM Grand, where guests get flowers and their initials monogrammed onto their pillows. As they caught up with each other, we learned that Dave's restaurant had been sold, Tiffani has must been working as usual and Harold is trying to open his own place in New York City. The chefs had some wine and were right to worry about the challenge the next day because the quickfire challenge this week was actually an elimination challenge.

 

For the third installment of their hit series, Top Chef, Bravo wanted to take the competition up a notch by bringing in some very discerning judges: a group of forty 10-year olds. The theme of the whole episode seemed to be to make unappealing food appealing, both visually and taste-wise, to a group of picky eaters, hence the name of the episode: Nasty Delights.

The quickfire challenge, which awards immunity from elimination, at the beginning of the show dealt with octopus. Given a whole octopus, the chefs had 60-minutes to make it look and taste good - a difficult feat on any day, but compounded by the fact that some people had never really dealt with the ingredient before.  Braising seemed to be the cooking method of choice and the guest judge, Laurent Manrique of San Francisco's Aqua restaurant, had a difficult time judging. In fact, there were four dishes that he liked, but Tiffani's traditionally prepared octopus dish, brimming with Mediterranean flavors, was what won her the challenge.

MSNBC has officially uncovered the secrets that make Iron Chef America work - and unlike the Amateur Gourmet, they don't seem to have been required to sign a nondisclosure agreement. The "secret" ingredient is chosen from a list of five possible ingredients that are given to the chefs prior to the filming of the show. While they don't generally know the actual one that will be used, the time they are given to plan certainly does not make it a surprise. To get the effect of a surprise, some scenes - including the reveal of the ingredient - are subject to multiple takes. The actually cooking time is still strictly held to 60 minutes, even though some ingredients may be simmering or nearly ready to use when the clock starts.

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