-
Posts
551 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Everything posted by Dignan
-
Nobody's picking on fat people, or people with bad teeth, or weird legs, or jagged arm scars. But people on TV make choices about how they will appear on TV. When those appearances catch your eye, commenting is fair I think. The Spike/Tom/Malarky hat tragedies have elicited plenty of comments. I won't go back into the thread, but I'm sure that one guy who always wore ties in whatever season that was got comments based on it. I thought Tony looked odd in the Top Chef jacket. One of the reasons Padma is on the show in the first place is that she generally looks fabulous in anything she wears. And Gail has a unique style that I can't figure out. TV is a visual medium. What people see matters. It's plain old vanilla human nature. Edited because how did I forget the trump card? The Faux Hawk: an oft commented and inexplicable alternative hair-style choice that knows no boundaries of gender or sexual orientation. For two seasons and counting....
-
I like Bourdain. I've read all his books with the exception of the Typhoid Mary one. I've had the good fortune of dining with Bourdain. Heck, some of my best friends are Bourdain. If Tony couldn't write like he does, he'd be a bistro chef with even more beat up knees that none of us had ever heard of. Does that mean he can't be head judge on Top Chef? Hell no. I did think he looked a little uncomfortable in the chef's coat. Maybe it just didn't fit him right.
-
And another thing: Boy, it sure looked to me like Blais was going to bust out crying before they even got going at Judge's Table. They were just asking him about his dish, and his eyes were watering and it looked to me like he was having difficulty remaining composed. Anyone else sense that, or was it just me?
-
Frozen Scallops versus Peanut Butter Potatoes. I figured that would be the face-off. The Battle of the Bad Moves. (Plus we were treated again to another running gunfight: Gail versus Ill Chosen Frumpy Dress) When Tramanto actually seemed to like the potatoes, I knew that was it for Spike. I was glad to see him go, but would have been gladder to know I wouldn't have to look at that slack face and lidded eyes underneath that dirty bandana ever again. Oh well. I can't imagine Lisa will make it another week. She just gets by ever time on being the second worst.
-
At Judges Table, I bet Tom was thinking, "Just one grenade...." It was a sour sullen triptych of petulance.
-
Knock Knock! I'll be in Madison soon, and will be staying at the Fluno Center at UW. It seems to be about 5 or 6 blocks from Capital Square. Any suggestions in walking distance? I've scanned the thread, but I've never been in Madison and don't know the terrain. I won't have a car, so I'm looking for good eats in the area. Thanks a bunch.
-
Here's an episode list. The episode which airs 5/21 is called Restaurant Wars. Relax. ← Yep, I recall them saying wedding wars INSTEAD of restaurant wars, so clearly they are yanking the contestant's chains (and ours.) The HK prize is always referred to as a salary of 200K, so roughly double winning TC assuming the winner can keep themselves from being fired. BUT with strings attached, obviously. It's the elimination winners I feel sorry for; one week a trip to Italy, the next some cookware, the next survival. Not exactly fair. But, as everyone has taken a turn at pointing out, Bravo are sponsor ho's, so if one week no one is ponying up I guess the elimination winner has to be satisfied with another shot at fame and fortune. BTW, I forgot to mention earlier that I have eaten at Public and eaten at CoCo500. I thought Public was excellent but uneven, but CoCo500 was really terrific with great flavor combinations, excellent execution and a sense of humor that didn't get in the way of the food. I'm sad Jennifer went down because I know her food and I think she could have made it to the final 4, maybe the final two.... Has anyone else eaten at other of the chef's joints, other than Richard's? ← I've seen it said more than once that the elimination winners get prizes, but that they aren't always included in the end edit of the show for whatever reason.
-
Here's an episode list. The episode which airs 5/21 is called Restaurant Wars. Relax.
-
I mentioned that one in my thread reopener above! Yes, it's absolutely flippin stupid!
-
I've got the same unhealthy fascination. I also bought his three star chef cookbook. He is a totally different person on The F Word, the British Kitchen Nightmares, and Ramsay's Boiling Point. Obviously the producers of this show are pandering to typical American tv tastes. This Sunday morning he made two dishes on The F Word that were made with the pigs he raised in his back yard.. Herb and Lemon stuffed Roast Loin and Pressed Belly. He also did pan seared halibut on top of red wine glazed pancetta, shallots and mushrooms. I was literally drooling on the couch. He's much more relaxed on the British shows. I'd love to spend some time with him. Anybody who thinks the Hell's Kitchen version is really him is uninformed. ← The Hell's Kitchen Gordon is Gordon, but only part of his overall personality. He doesn't suffer fools, that's for sure, but he's not simply a raging martinet. I've not seen Boiling Point, but I've seen a good few KNs, and a couple F words. On the F words he's been 98% pleasant. On KN, he looses his patience all the time and has his freak outs, but the subjects of the rants are not innocents -- head chefs getting head chef pay who can't cook are frequent examples -- and he also devotes his energy to encouraging the impressionables he meets, and even those he thinks are lost causes if it'll get the food out. I saw the pigs too. I was concerned about the kids faced with eating them, but they sure got into it. I just ordered his bio. It's ridiculous really. But these idiots on Hell's Kitchen don't seem to evoke that part of him.
-
Aw, C'mon! As far as the critters, I live out here just outside of Grizzly country, and I promise you I would not sleep with anything vacuum packed inside my tent. But are bears really likely to be a problem for you? And the rotting vegetation may help to keep most animals away from something buried in the middle of the pile.
-
I cant take this peer pressure anymore!! Maybe I'll throw a piece of salmon or something in there...Heck, I started this stupid thread, I should be the one to try it.... I'll report back when I get some salmon...or short ribs...lamb? ← I'd probably use some meat, to avoid any false negatives that might come from more delicate and sensitive fish. And nothing expensive!
-
What are ya waiting for? Throw something in there. You don't necessarily have to eat it!
-
This show is ridiculous. What a uniformly unlikeable bunch of contestants. I've only seen parts of two episodes. I recently got the Dish Network, and now that I have BBCAmerica, I've developed an unhealthy fascination with Gordon Ramsay. I'd never really paid much attention to him before, having only superficially absorbed the press that he was an asshole who swore alot, but he's the only flippin' person on this show that appears to be from Planet Earth. And that includes the moron sickly sweet sixteen and her moron mother from last night.
-
They've had that disclaimer since the beginning, though I don't think the producers play a large role in the elimination decisions. I doubt Tom would stay around if every decision was undermined by a corporate exec. ← In another blurb from the same source, Tom says, "...I think we choose the best contestant every year, and there is no pressure from the producers or anyone else to pick a certain someone despite what everybody believes. The day they tell us we have to pick someone for any reason other than our judgement (sic) is the day I do my last show."
-
They've had that disclaimer since the beginning, though I don't think the producers play a large role in the elimination decisions. I doubt Tom would stay around if every decision was undermined by a corporate exec. ← In this description of the Marcel head shaving scandal, Tom wanted to send all the shearing contestants home, which would have given Marcel the title by default. The Producers intervened.
-
I didn't know that Jodorowsky did Estonian commercials back in the day! ← Nice reference! DEFINITELY either Jodorowsky or Coffin Joe..... I don't know if they can be considered the "worst" of all time, but I really, really hate most Olive Garden commercials. There is an especially annoying one right now where a kid is taking his grandfather out to dinner and has to tell him "Have whatever you want Grandpa! And have ALL you want!". The weird, manic tone of the commercial makes me think the next words out of his mouth are going to be "because tommorrow you're going to THE HOME!". Something about people going ape over things like shells stuffed with fake crab and smothered in sausage and cheese sauce is so wrong on so many levels...... Edited to add: And you do not, DO NOT even want to get me started on the "yogurt wenches"........."Oh, THIS YOGURT is girls-only weekend good!"...."It's walking on the beach good!"...... ← Yes! Two good ones. Those flippin' Olive Garden commercials. The couple: "We're treating ourselves tonight!" How about a lobotomy? My treat! And the yogurt one is a second cousin to the soy milk one I metioned, with the soy milk going for a drama angle while the yogurt one is all coquettish. Hate em all.
-
Dignan Lives, Brother Johnny! The whole Burger King ad campaign, in my opinion, is pretty terrible. They actually seem to have four seperate attacks: The foam rubber food people; the took away the whopper; one just featuring the food (I imagine a meeting were some ad guy says, "You know? That's so crazy, it just might work!"); and the King. I didn't list the King because, while I agree it's pretty creepy, it doesn't raise my temperature like the other ones do. Plus there was one where he was scoring a touchdown in a football game that I may have smiled at.
-
Current worst food commercials ever: That dumbass Pizza Hut switches its pasta for that in the fancy Italian restaurant -- where everyone is waxing rhapsodic on hidden camera about their pasta saying things no real person would ever say about Pizza Hut pasta. That dumbass Soy milk commercial where all the women are in the kitchen having a soy milk party, also saying things no real person would say when faced with 29 different flavors of flippin' soy milk. If you substituted heroin for the soy milk, the dialogue might make more sense. The Burger King twofer: the asses in the foam rubber burger costumes and the "we got rid of the whopper" bullshit.
-
Tom C. says this in his blog on Bravo (which I would link but all of a sudden I can't hyperlink - sorry): "A typical food stamp allotment in this country is $21 a person a week, which breaks down roughly to $1 per meal, or $4 per meal for a family of four. Suddenly that $10 doesn’t seem so bad, does it?" I don't doubt that that is a statistic you could read somewhere, but it seems like it's more along the lines of a misleading statistical fallout of a study. And if that's all you have then for cliff's sake don't go to Whole Foods. It seems very unlikely that they could pull it off, even with the scenes spliced in showing the contestants actually pulling off parts of veg to make it weigh less. I think I'll try that this weekend at my local store - I'll dismantle a head of iceberg right there at the register until it's the weight and price I want. Edit to add: Tim made the veggie point 1st! And so did LucyLou, before Tim! Geez!
-
Ethnocentric my wide butt. What a blithe way to dismiss a considered assesment of a bad dish. The winner was a stir fry. The loser was"'nt appealing", a "sloppy" "lacking" curry that was judged, in part, by an Indian woman and Oprah's self-professed curry lover. ← Perhaps the poster was referring to the raised eyebrow "hmm....really?" look that Tom gave Mark when he found that Mark was making curry. That surprised me. ← Perhaps. If a raised eyebrow could be considered a "fit." He probably raised his eyebrows at the fennel-redolant paillard and the brussel sprouts and the beets. They'd all have the potential to challenge young palates.
-
Reading Ted Allen's Bravo blog reveals that there was indeed polish sausage included in this dish. This blogger sleuths it out. It's in the Top Chef power rankings for Ep 7.
-
Ethnocentric my wide butt. What a blithe way to dismiss a considered assesment of a bad dish. The winner was a stir fry. The loser was"'nt appealing", a "sloppy" "lacking" curry that was judged, in part, by an Indian woman and Oprah's self-professed curry lover.
-
I found him agreeable as well -- until he said some chicken he was served didn't need the skin. If the skin was flabby or something, okay, but if it was a remark meant to support the false economy of calorie elimination, then he deserves a ruddy good smack on the bottom. I immediately assumed that was his meaning because, for cliff's sake, he was Oprah's chef. Of course, he looks like he's eaten his share of chicken skin. And in a some what related thought, I cringed when Lisa called her helper "Big Man." The kid, god bless him, was about as wide as he was tall.
-
Yes I did! It's probably a habit with him; tought to break. ← Someone else -- Dale, I think -- double-dipped as well. Guess I'll have to catch a rerun to check it out. ← I think Richard did -- right in front of Tom.