Over on the Food Network they have a problem, sure I like that they have a competition show to decide who works best on camera and this year was even better since the public decided who would win. The problem that they are facing is that they are still marketing the old faces and at least once the winner’s show was never picked up for broadcast. Sure they now have The Cooking Channel, but of all the winners of (Next) Food Network Star only Guy Fieri (Ferry) seems to have made a large impact on the network and from all I’ve seen and heard about him Guy Ferry is the worst. I was surprised to see Lenny win this season, as from the pilots they showed last Sunday I really didn’t like any of them. Hopefully Lenny’s actually show will be better and he can make a space for himself on a network that is already overflowing with huge personalities, or have some of the bigger names (Bobby Flay/Rachael Ray) leave the network and make room for new talent to come in and take their place.
The biggest problem that Food Network needs to fix is getting away from all the reality/competition/travelogue shows and get back to shows about cooking. Sure during the daytime hours that is the bread and butter of the network then after 6 they switch to the other programing. Don’t get me wrong I like Restaurant Impossible as much as the next person but do we need to have basically the same show but dealing with staffing issues as well, then another episode of Restaurant Impossible. Also do we need to have both Chopped and Chopped Canada aired on separate nights and the ad nausem reruns of Diners, Drive-in and Dives as the only time that I can really watch Food Network is in the evenings and it ends up being one of these shows.
Over on the Cooking Channel in the evening they still are airing some show about cooking with reruns of Good Eats and one of the better shows on the Cooking Channel My Grandmother’s Ravioli. On My Grandmother’s Ravioli Mo Rocca visits with some grandparent where he learns a little about their culture and how to make some recipes. It would be nice if there were some show like Good Eats that were being aired on the Food Network today as Good Eats was a show that introduced me to many concepts about cooking and it was entertaining to watch.
Deep in the well 