Chef/Writer Spencer

Canned corn better than fresh? Shudder... Canned corn? Really? I'm not going to crack on you about your personal preferences--because certainly I've got quite a few less than austere bents--but canned corn? Packed in that icky corn milk stuff? Somethings are better left unsaid....

I hope you're kiddin' pal.

Chicken McSponges, American Cheese, Potato Powder, Butter-O, I can't Believe It's Not Butter, Dr. Brown's Cel-Ray soda, those ill-conceived taco creations from Taco Bell that incorperate a soft shell and a hard one spackled together with bland bean puree, stuffed crust pizza, red hot dogs (I know I'm fighting a losing battle there), canned marinara, canned bearnaise (bio-hazard, just add moron)...I could go on....

The tasting menu was $135. The dinner and vegetarian menus were each $115. Joseph P.S. I'd love to read your review, Chef/Writer Spencer. (May I call you Spencer?) If you have an email addy I can email it to you...Yes, Spencer is good...

Just out of curiosity....Are they still charging 135 for the nine course..or have they raised it again...

Sounds like the experience I had a couple months ago...but the rabbit wasn't up to Keller's par. I wrote 17 pages about the experience in fact....Keller came out to my table at 110am and we went back into the kitchen for pictures...Good to hear you had a great time too...

Haven't you seen the end of Old Yeller? Never saw it...tell me....

Why kick a dead horse..

The unfortunate thing about perpetuating a channel on food is the barriers it presents with respect to keeping viewers interested. Shows run their course and slip in the Neilson rating--requiring the need to fill those vacancies with viewer friendly replacements. This point has been ground to dirt on this website--myself donating more than a few posts of relentless dissastifaction. It boils down to, like I've said, a group of suit and ties sitting around a long table trying to put their fingers on the pulse of the nation. Sad as it sounds, the state of our nation is in flux--vapid is the modus operendi of the day. Look at music and war. Back in the sixties the war really inspired some great music: CSNY, DOORS, JEFFERSON AIRPLANE etc. Now we've got to endure hick mullets strumming six strings to poorly written tunes about falling towers and flags. The Food Network is just obliging (and capatilizing like pigs) on the square nature of the vast majority of Americans. They put television on air that will reflect the status quo...Guys like us are fringe elements--that receive very little if any voice in the whole...But we are a necessary element of the new frontier. Just hold on...They're will be room for us eventually....

Wow Dave, tell us how you really feel. I'm going to resign my post as head curmudgeon and hand the crown over to you. I agree with you but don't get yourself banned now. Fat Guy is unrelenting in his enforcement of the eGullet code of ethics... I loved Rosengarten's show too--the one sans Rudy's ex-wife. He could trash bad food trends like a champ. Now he's editing film on public television or something equally as banal and demeaning. Just goes to show you can't speak up without repercussion...

I couldn't help myself.....

Sportswear eh...? I can imagine him in speedos.... covered in cocoa butter.... Ghuuurossssss....Hey eGullet deities....can I call upon you to strike that last post by our new friend Trish.

Some silly name like Sissy Biggers? yeah. she was sure perky. but she's sure no paige davis. spencer, who would want to be jacqui?!? her job was to be abused and ignored by booby flay. i couldn't watch the show as i felt so bad for her. Some people long to be people that suck--it's that simple. Maybe Sissy longs to have her nose pushed in doo doo.

Jacques was a lot better looking when he wasn't trying to squeeze into sportwear that's two sizes too small. He's put on a few pounds since the days of Le Cirque...Great chocolatier though..

Some silly name like Sissy Biggers? Right. A Jackie Malouf wannabe. She's probably doing weather right now...

It WAS fun to watch these pretty boy chefs freaking out trying to beat the clock though. On more than one occasion I guffawed at the piss poor treatment the underlings received. "NOOOO. Don't put that soy sauce in the Gran Marnier Parfait you monkey." It was like a Wayne's World basement version of Iron Chef. Never saw a dish that would turn my head however...What was that chicks name that hosted?

I think the Food Network actually was ahead of the game here. They used to have Ready Set Cook. Another cooking equivalent to American Idol is the much more classy Masterchef competition (obviously not on Food Network). Yeah, but that goofy ass Ainsley Harriot ruined it. Need someone with an edge....

The Tornado Dating Game...I like the ring of it.

That's an IDEA. Who would comprise the judging panel? I can almost stomach that idea. As long as it wasn't T and A time....

Even cynical old me is all for new shows. I'd love to see a show like Great Chefs/Great Cities with a contemporary feel. I mean come on, most of the chefs they showcased on GC/GC were moderately talented copper pot show-offs with very little to interest modern cooks. I do remember seeing Roger Verge and my old chef Jose Gutierrez but most of those chefs were has beens who thought the squeeze bottle/tuile for height/bullshit terrine architectural trend was the shiznit. I don't want to see some nobody from St. Croix preparing Mahi-Mahi with Mango Salsa for Christ sakes. I want to see Keller working through a stuffed pig's head, or Adria pumping smoked air into a canister. Can't they do at least ONE show for chefs. It is the FOOD NETWORK after all. Maybe this Reality with Rocco stunt will pay off. But it sounds like a homogenized ploy to N'SYNC the food world. Ok, liken it to this....The Weather Channel is a channel about weather right? How would you shlockers feel if they started buying into the whole pop culture thing and created shows centered around the genetalia of their anchors? How about the Weather Dating Game? Stupid right?

it ain't all roastin' chickens there tough guy.

A #1 American Fawlty Towers fan here. Too f......bad public television finds it demographically unfeasible to air it. These are the same doofuses that refuse to air CHEF! too. I liked Nola...Hate Emeril...

I'd love to get a Food Network exec in a Q and A on eGullet.

This just in: the avatar of the Food Network is a doughnut being skewered with a celery stick.

Ummm...10 thousand food industry workers, a bazillion kumomoto twenty somethings, with disposable income..it's not hard to figure out why they're going that direction... there will never be a channel devoted to food industry workers, Spencer, and I am suprised you are naive enough to think so. That was never the target market for FN...its not deep enough. It's like taking hte sports channel, and saying it wil only cater to fly fishing..where's the demographics and market in that? I realize that my dear, much to my chagrin.