What’s Cooking? The Foodie Reality Shows Are On

It must be that time of the year again for the foodie shows to begin. I wanted to provide you with a list of some of the top reality based cooking shows on TV including a few new ones starting up. I have provided you with a few of my thoughts on each as well. Get the TIVO ready!

Chopped. This show is pretty much ongoing on the Food Network. Every show has four different professional chef and cook contestants pitted against each other over three courses, an appetizer, the entrée, and a dessert. With the first two courses one contestant will be chopped in each round until the final two compete for $10,000 to the winner and the other chopped. The show is hosted by Ted Allen and has a rotating group of three professional chefs and/or restaurateurs as judges.  This show is very intense as it appears almost all contestants need the money, while others just want to boast about their usually inflated views of their culinary skills. Each course the contestants open a basket of surprise ingredients – and are they a surprise. I think even James Beard himself would have said “say what?” All in all it is fun to watch both the contestants and judges on this show.

Hell’s Kitchen.  This show airs on Fox and is on Tuesdays in most locations. It features tormentor, and some say the Devil himself, Gordon Ramsay. This has proved a very popular program for Scottish born Ramsay who is an accomplished world renowned chef and restaurateur. The show’s roots in America actually came from his British production of Kitchen Nightmares in 2004. The ultimate prize on this show is the coveted black chef’s jacket and with Ramsay pushing them at every turn, it makes a very intense and entertaining show. Ramsay divides the teams into the Blue Team and the Red Team (just a bit political you think?), with the winning teams enjoying wonderful treats and awards for their efforts, while the losers are confined to Hell doing the mundane and often ego busting jobs. It can be a bit hard to watch these poor souls that found their way (and pushed their way) into Hell, but all of them know what they were getting into, do not feel sorry for them, just sit back and enjoy the show and be happy you are not on it!

Master Chef. This is a new show premiering July 27, 2010 on Fox Network. Gordon Ramsay is at it again, but will we see a more nurturing and patient side to the Devil himself? We will see. This show takes average everyday people that love to cook and think they can cook and will put their skills and personalities to the test every week while being judged and mentored by Ramsay and the other judges for the title of Master Chef. Although he promises to be more nurturing on this show, he will also be striving for perfection and the contestants better be prepared for that.

The Next Food Network Star. Series begins tonight on the Food Network. For some reason I really like this show. The contestants can range from moms and dads with little professional cooking experience, cooking enthusiasts, those that cook in some professional capacity but are rarely what you would consider a chef, to comedians and others wanting their own show on the Food Network. By winning this, it will make them an instant celebrity, like Guy Fieri who won this title several years ago. This is always a great show and is always on our TIVO schedule. The show is hosted by Food Network star, restaurateur, and Iron Chef, Bobby Flay and will feature Giada De Laurentiis, along with many Food Network stars that are a guest on most of the shows.

Updated 6/6/10 10:00 pm. After watching the season premier of The Next Food Network Star, I said above that there are contestants that cook in some professional capacity; however, there are more contestants calling themselves ”chefs” this year than in the past. Because of this, if they are truly what one would classify as a professional chef, then I stand corrected in the part above that says “..rarely would you consider a chef” I know this is an objective opinion, but I felt I would make this update nonetheless.

Top Chef Masters. Season finale is this week on BRAVO. The show is a spin off of the highly rated Top Chefs. This is hosted by Kelly Choi. This show pits “real” top chefs against one another for bragging rights as Top Chef Master and for financial awards going to their favorite charity. I am really not sure why many of these, mainly celebrity chefs, would even want to be on this show as it can make a FEW look like egomaniacs that are hot tempered, swear like they are in Scarface (the Al Pacino one), appear at times to not know what they are doing and so forth. I am not sure how this affects their restaurants or celebrity status after these shows, but others keep coming back. Most of the chefs on this show are not like this though and are determined to win for their charity and always present a wonderful dish under extreme challenges. Chefs are artists and this show brings that out for all of us to see. Mouthwatering food comes to mind.  It also makes us very envious of the judges who can be a real pain at times for the chefs, but that is how it is supposed to be. Sometimes though, when there is a vote by the public tasting the dishes, the judges can be off the mark by more than a bite. However, presentation can often be more important to the judges than to the public, so if a chef does not personally make a presentation to the liking of a judge, this can be a determining factor as well as how the dish was actually prepared to standards.

Top Chef.  Starting up on BRAVO June 16, 2010 as Top Chef D.C. so expect to see a hopefully a well balanced group of politicos on the show. Serving again as lead judge and mentor is Tom Colicchio, who just became the Top Chef Master himself winning the esteemed James Beard Foundation Award for both Outstanding Chef and Outstanding Restaurateur this year. The show is hosted by Padma Lakshmi who also serves as a judge. This show pits the non celebrity chefs against one another for the title of Top Chef and that will certainly not hurt their careers. Some have restaurants of their own, are executive chefs, or those not quite there yet. This is also a hotbed for a lot of crying, whining, swearing, anger, lust (yes that is right), sabotage, intrigue, and tattoos – yes, tattoos I have never seen so many tattoos on people at one time in my life, at least over the past couple of seasons, so guess you can tell I am not a biker chick, but again chefs are artists so go for it! This is usually not only about great food it is also about an ongoing soap opera each season. As they all live under one roof, we see them not only perfecting their craft, but also what they are like personally which can be a good thing and a bad thing. Let’s see what we have had in this melodrama, we had brother against brother with both as the finalists on the show, there is usually some chef that throws a tantrum more than once, a chef that does not want to go on or has constant bad days, there is usually some romance that goes on, again good or bad depending on if they are married or not to others, and so on. This show is about great food, but is also one of the more entertaining of the bunch. 

The Next Iron Chef. This show is also on Food Network and is hosted by the popular Food Network star, Alton Brown who also hosts Iron Chef. This show pits professional chefs, some not well known nationally but are adored in their locale for their restaurants. The award for winning is becoming the next Iron Chef to appear on the show. Iron Chef is the American version of the original 1993 show Iron Chef Japan. The contestants on this show are all driven as this will also make them a celebrity chef and all the rewards that go along with it. To me this is one of the more intense reality cooking shows out there. The food always looks fantastic — only wish I could taste it. The competition is fierce and has its own drama, show to show, but without a lot of melodramatics and tends to be more professional and civil for most part among the contestants. This show is mainly all about the food and the quest to be on a career altering show, Iron Chef.

There are of course other reality based cooking and food shows out there, cannot mention them all, but anything that makes people love good food and/or want to experiment with different cuisines, or go out to restaurants is a good thing.

Cheers then Enjoy!