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My family eats Chinese take-out once a week and it usually results in at least one plastic won ton soup container. I save them all and now have enough to start my own restaurant, but I use them for taking my lunch to work, which I do every day, and for freezing stuff. I'd like to say good bye to plastic baggies, however. I will get out my ol' Singer soon.

I use wax paper bags from whole foods which decompose quickly instead of plastic bags. You can find great lunch bags at Home Goods a division of TJ Maxx. I got a great little insulated bag there for my work lunches!

Isn't Bob Tuschman the one who killed BRAVO?

Other than a slight disagreement about Giada (her food is quite good); and Ina Garten's new show (I thought it would be mostly rehashing - but it's not) I must agree with what Jackie has to say. It's yet another brilliant representation of where TVFN went wrong and why it will continue to be disregarded by its original core audience - serious cooks.

Here's the rub - it's tougher to win back or regain respect than to earn it in the first place. It's going to be a tough road for TVFN, assuming they give a shit what people who actually cook think of what they've done to the once-beloved network.

For a short time I was a “Food Network Panel” member. After I felt the whole premise of the so-called panel was a farce, I started jotting down [thus, the 2008 date] all the little irks within not only the FN, but also with the FN website. The following is that letter, which I forwarded to Matthew Greenberg. I had been intending to send it to Bob Tuschman…..[fortunately, I edited this copy more accurately] & have followed through with sending it now after Matts inspirational article.
Friday, March 07, 2008
Dear Mr. Tuschman,
I am an avid Food Network viewer………having watched since your inception. I have your station on whether I am actively watching & even as background when not. My husband will frequently view with me as well if I am actively watching. My favorite person is Ina Garten, & I have every one of her books, even though I can get her recipes free @ your site. In fact, I liked her show so much that we used to program it so we can view it @ dinner every night. I also like Alton, Giada, Tyler, & used to watch “How to Boil Water” with the French chef who was assisted by Jack. I watched Martha Stewart when she used to be on, as well. I used to watch Paula @ times for her “down home” type recipes. I no longer watch her since she got married - she seems to have gone off the deep end.
I guess you can see I do have some complaints about your content.
• Please……..no more boobs!!!!! I’m talking Giada & Sandra Lee. I know Giada was pregnant. However I’m sure that for both of these “chefs”, it has little to do with pregnancy [although in itself, that would be a pretty skanky reason to be flaunting cleavage anyway]! Every time I tune into Giada, I am forced to look @ cleavage! Come on, this is a cooking show, not “Girls Gone Wild”. It really detracts from the program, & makes me wonder if it’s just a ploy to attract more male viewers perhaps? Sandra Lee in particular has an episode where she is in the park I believe, sporting this goofy little Bo Peep get up complete with pigtails, & I’m waiting for her “store boughts” to fall out like…….. muffins in a well greased tin. Doesn’t anybody critique the shows before they go on? No one chose to comment on her going on air with that Halloween get up? Totally tasteless. Now today I tune in & there’s Rachel with her little boobs half out [competition maybe]………..what gives?

• Speaking of Sandra, I have to admit the minute she comes on, I change the channel. I do like some of her ideas but cannot bear to lis-ten……… to……………. her……….hes-i-ta-tive………..way……….of……….speak-ing!!!!!!!!!!!! It’s obvious she cannot do two things [cooking & talking] at a time……….doesn’t anybody let her know how absolutely aggravating her diction is? Her show does go off when I hear that voice – it truly is aggravating.
• Paula used to be worth watching, however, she has, like I said, gone off the deep end. Her recipes used to be down home basic with a nice Southern flair. She even allowed us to chuckle @ times. Now, it seems her old fashioned charm has been replaced by her obvious change to compete with the real chefs. Southern country has made way for false eyelashes and excessive finger bling. I definitely can’t watch her “party” show………she’s licked one too many audience participants faces for me. What’s with these people………..they don’t make enough money……….they end up doing “party shows”, “at home shows”, and so called “back to basic” shows? They resort to nepotism, selling books &magazines, along with cookware, and packaged foods?
• Now, alas, my favorite……….Ina. I love her home, the way she & Jeffrey seem like a couple of love struck teenagers. I have all of her six books. However, she is not without aggravations as well. It isn’t hard to see that she is an island unto herself------she has different rules from the rest of the FN stars, somewhat of a “Queen complex”. Her cookbooks are more expensive, & don’t seem to participate in the holiday shows [unless you edit her show into the group]. The new “Back to Basics” is nothing more than taking the same old recipes & changing lemon juice to orange juice, or “really good vanilla” to Frambois”……….definitely not rocket science! Somewhat of a rip off. Please, no more of the “really good vanillas”, “don’t have too much fun without me’s”, “how good is that’s”, the ok, ok, ok, ok’s, & the ha, ha, ha, ha, ha’s [we counted, & it’s always 5 ha ha’s]! We really don’t need the repetitious reminders of what she’s making, i.e. “and that’s the biscuits ready to go in the oven, to go with the berries, to go with the whipped cream, to go with the sauce, that goes with dessert, that will be so good”. The biscuits are going into the oven & that is all we really need to know.
• One more thing about all these supposed college educated, “professionally trained” chefs…….please address the subject of correct pronunciation of two frequently used words: Mascarpone cheese is spelled, Mas-car-pone, not mar-sca-pone……..please, Michael Chiarello, you’re Italian & don’t know how to pronounce the word correctly? I could understand Sandra Lee not being familiar with proper pronunciation, but Tyler, Paula, & Guy also say Marscapone?
• To Guy & Paula: Paprika is 3 syllables, not 4 so therefore, it is pronounced Pap-ri-ka, not Pap-ar-ik-a! It has nothing to do with being Southern [Guy isn’t from the South] – rather, it’s about education. Also it’s Es-presso, not Ex-presso! Please have Alton or Giada do some pronunciation consultations with these five! Honestly, they have their own shows, but speak Ebonics……where can I sign up?
• Speaking of Guy…….like him a lot, but why is it “Fieti” now instead of Fieri? I am Italian, & know that his name would be pronounced with a T rather than R in Italy. However, we are not in Italy, & to change his name @ this point seems a little pretentious. I’m assuming he was tired of being called a fairy?
As far as the Food Network website:
• While I like the new set up, Please, you went to all that trouble to introduce us to all the staff on the web site! Instead, you should spend a little more time having the recipe editors actually do some editing. How many times I have read/written reviews & found, along with others, that many recipes are inaccurate! If one is unable to actually watch the show when the recipe was used, they would be lost---------the TV version is frequently very different from the FN site recipe. If you actually read the recipe reviews you would see that many people have expressed the same complaint as I am. Don’t your editors watch the programs they are editing or read the reviews?
• In addition, you have censured a few of my recipe comments [ I never do negative or directing comments]……yet allow others [ usually “anonymous”] to write both negative, and personal remarks……I always wonder how these idiots get away with it. Sometimes they even cause the ratings to go lower on a recipe review as well. One of the best features of the recipes online is that most people accurately rate the recipes & it helps all of us get a better idea of how it will turn out. When you allow the idiots to make phony comments, they ruin it for all of us serious cooks.
Finally Bob, I will let both you and Natalie know that I WAS a Food Network Panel member and felt pretty proud of that………..not anymore. You falsified the premise of that offshoot. You allowed us to believe you actually listened or cared about our feedback. If that were true, we would see our old favorite show hosts with some desperately needed new material. Instead, we see this constant barrage of new people with show content we could care less about. They never really have anything new to offer.
As the program director, in my opinion, your job should be to take something good & make it the best it can be instead of just adding more junk to make more money.
These are my remarks. Do what you want with them.

Addendum: 5-30-09
I totally agree with Matthew Greenberg’s recent comments @ True/Slant.com…………and I guess a lot of others do as well. Just check the link @ SeriousEats.com: Memo to Food Network: Your programming is going rancid

I like to transport vinaigrette in a tiny little jam jar that I saved from a buffet breakfast. Keeps the leaves from getting soggy and doesnt leak like most of my tupperware tends to!

thanks for the helpful links. i really want a couple of those 100% stainless steel containers. my cold sandwiches will stay nice and chilly.

Matt, you are soooooooooooo on the money! Great, great, great!

Wow! Just goes to show you that you are less alone in your thoughts than you might think! I used to have FN on whenever I was home. I always loved to cook and asked for recipes form friends, etc when I enjoyed the food. The FN spurred me on to invest heavily in great cookware and to finally organize my recipe collection. I used to have a problem with printing recipes from FN. I used to print a hundred a day and spent hours searching topics on their site. I loved it. Then...they changed the line-up and put Barefoot Contessa on at 1:30 in the afternoon (who is home at that hour?) and I just stopped watching. All of these new trashy "stars" just don't have it. Rachael makes my ears hurt and her cutesy words and recipes (stoup) make me vomit. Even Ina Garten made a heavy dig at Sandra Lee's tablescapes! Sandra's new "kick" is saving money when cooking. She acrually recommended making something from scratch to save 2 CENTS PER PERTION!!! Is she nuts??? That show is the tackiest garbage on the spectrum. While watching one day at my sister's house my 15 year old nephew asked "who the h-ll is that idiot" when Guy Fieri came on. I guess they have gotten away form serious food content and reaching skills to please the "suits" at the network. It's funny though that almost all of the comments here were overwhelmingly negative. So many things these days have lost their appeal (even the streets of New York) with all of the developers winning. Who are they consulting??? What numbers are they crunching? Like everything else these days, things are designed for quick consumption and quick profits with little regard for quality or legacy. Are we being "served"??? I think not.
These "personalities" might get an initial viewership, but it's the food, the techniques learned and the quality of the recipes that will sustain the growth. Clearly, Tushman is listening to the numbers crunchers and not following his original "vision". We all lose. Put Sandra on in the old Sally Jesse Raphael slot...3 am!!! Yuck!!!

I read Matt's letter and all of the comments on this thread, and have come to a conclusion. I am the target audience for the Food Network. I work full time, have a family addicted to fast food and casual dining, and only cook on occasion. Please don't kill me!

I love watching people make something out of nothing. I love seeing how they take seemingly unrelated ingredients and make fabulous food. I like the back-stories. I like traveling with Guy all over the country to little places that aren't on the map - and have made a point to find them when I am on the road.

Sure the Ace of Cakes doesn't teach me how to bake, but since whatever I do is coming from a box with a red spoon on the cover, who cares! It is the fun and fantastic things they do with the cake that entertains me. Rachel is extremely informative but sometimes I have to mute all that enthusiasm. I know Ina Garten is a fantastic chef, her show puts me to sleep.

TNFNS is dreck, but it is like watching NASCAR - a wreck is gonna happen, and don't you want to see what happens when it does?

Please don't kick me too hard for this. Serious Eats offers me a perspective I obviously lack, but sometimes you guys take it all too seriously. FN is entertainment about food. They never said it was going to be all serious all the time. They need to find a good balance. The reason that the prime time programming is full of air is because people like it that way. I am not spending my two hours in the evening watching Ina Garten or even Emeril/Mario. I don't want to think that hard and pay that close attention. I'll buy their cookbook instead.

Please watch Anne Burrell. She is without a doubt the best thing on FN now. She has talent and passion for her food. I too watch many of hours per week of FN and hers is the show I want to watch the most.

Bob, if you are listening, she makes food approachable and real. I think it was brilliant to get her out of the commercial kitchen and have her cook in a home kitchen. I have made many of the dishes (including dinner tonight). They are really really good.

Anne, if you are listening, the growl is so sexy. You can tell that you love to cook. It oozes from your pores. Please go a little easy on the salt. You are scaring me. My blood pressure goes up just watching the show. I don't know if I would eat in your restaurant with the way you roll with the salt, but it is something I can fix when I cook your food.

My main gripe with the FN is the lack of intermediate to advanced cooking demos. Like many others, I've basically mastered most of the techniques in most of the shows and would like to learn some more.>>>

My suggestion would be: go to your local public library and look for VHS/DVD of these people. You might be surprised. Of course, if your local library has only Rach and no Lidia or Mario you might wonder...OTOH take what the hell you can get.