quote:

Originally posted by Pwingsx

jjrfoodie,

You said ‘meh.’ Curious. Do you read either Something Positive or hang out on Egullet?

Just wonderin’….. [8D]

I paruse egullet on ocassion, but have to say i use the "meh" expression more as "forum speak" then anything else, as I am active in about 8 varied forums daily and a’la the instant message shorthand lingo, I just picked it up and found that in works to descibe a feeling in a very quick way.

Urban dictionary lists 167 defintions for the term. Go figgur’!

Now back to our regularly scheduled "Good Eats" discussion….

jjjrfoodie

quote:

Originally posted by Oneiron339

quote:

Originally posted by Diner-Lover

We don’t have cable TV but have seen Good Eats when we’ve been in a motel during our travels and enjoy Alton Brown a lot. I have a friend who works on his program and she loves working with him. I’d watch him all the time if we had cable!

Diner – please contact me. I need to speak to your friend, we have been trying to get ahold of Alton Brown for a benefit ball in ATL and so far unable to do so.

I took this off the http://www.altonbrown.com site…
From the Press Room Page…
Media Contact
Amy Voll, First Name Media
[email protected]

Taken from the Food Network site:
Alton Brown

Alton Brown’s flair in the kitchen developed early with guidance from his mother and grandmother, a budding culinary talent he skillfully used later "as a way to get dates" in college. Switching gears as an adult, Alton spent a decade working as a cinematographer and video director, but realized that he spent all his time between shoots watching cooking shows which he found to be dull and uninformative. Convinced that he could do better, Alton left the film business and moved to Vermont to train at the New England Culinary Institute in Montpelier, Vt. Soon after, Alton tapped all of his training to create Good Eats, a smart and entertaining food show that blends wit with wisdom, history with pop culture and science with common cooking sense. Alton not only writes and produces the shows but also stars in each offbeat episode on Food Network.

Alton Brown’s first book, I’m Just Here for the Food (Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 2002) won the James Beard Foundation Award for Best Cookbook in the Reference category, was one of the bestselling cookbooks of 2002 and has sold over 300,000 copies to date. It was also chosen by Amazon.com as one of the top 50 books of 2002 by both editors and readers.

Alton Brown’s Gear for Your Kitchen, his long-awaited homage to tools and gadgetry, was published by STC in September 2003 and was nominated for both a James Beard Award for Best Cookbook in the Tools & Techniques category and an IACP Cookbook Award in the Food Reference/Technical category. Gear is an essential guide to all the "hardware" you need in the kitchen. Packed with practical advice and tips, this book takes a look at what’s needed and what isn’t, what works and what doesn’t.

Alton’s third book, on baking, I’m Just Here for More Food, hit bookstores in November 2004 and has since gone on to become a New York Times bestseller.

Alton’s newest series, Feasting On Asphalt , features Alton with only his motorcycle, a few buddies and the clothes on his back, taking a nostalgic trip across the country to rediscover the disappearing people, places and stories of great American road food. Feasting On Asphalt merges a little Easy Rider with good eats and great tales from our road food’s past and present, while preserving the map for its future.

For more information on Alton Brown, visit http://www.altonbrown.com.

People either love or hate Alton Brown. My wife cannot even stay in the same room if AB in on to tube. My oldest daughter and I watch him together.

quote:

Originally posted by Diner-Lover

We don’t have cable TV but have seen Good Eats when we’ve been in a motel during our travels and enjoy Alton Brown a lot. I have a friend who works on his program and she loves working with him. I’d watch him all the time if we had cable!

Diner – please contact me. I need to speak to your friend, we have been trying to get ahold of Alton Brown for a benefit ball in ATL and so far unable to do so.

jjrfoodie,

You said ‘meh.’ Curious. Do you read either Something Positive or hang out on Egullet?

Just wonderin’….. [8D]

quote:

Originally posted by bbqjimbob

He has been trained in the culinary arts. After that, he left the culinary world, and was a producer/ director in film, and decided that he preferred culinary arts over film arts. Since, he has combined the two to produce the show that many, myself and my wife included, have grown to love- Good Eats. The show combines his knowledge of cooking and movie production, and both are very obvious in "Good Eats".

Actually, my understanding is that it worked the other way around: he was making a living as a commercial director (he also was the DP on some R.E.M. videos back in the day) in Atlanta, then he decided to go to culinary school so that he would have the background to create his own cooking show. He went to NECI in Burlington in the late ’90s, just before the show started.

His onscreen mentor, Shirley Corriher, is undoubtedly a big part of the science of the show: her book COOKWISE is a classic of food science, up there with McGee.

Cooking, in it’s pure form, is nothing but chemistry.
Add heat , cold, (or in some cases just acid in the form of a lemon) and it transforms both basic and complex properties of ingredients into something else.

If you care to cook on any creative level, you should be versed in the basics of ingredients and their properties. It allows anyone to understand what can be mixed, added, or eliminated (both flavor wise and chemical wise) in ANY dish thus controlling the outcome. I love Alton’s shows and approach for this very reason. Scientific, yes, but also necessary. And it takes a big brain to understand it all.

Anything else is a non-repeatable culinary crapshoot usually . Using recipes means someone has done the homework.

Great part about any of that type of info is I can march right out to my kitchen and put it to good use. I’m still trying to find a use for some of the UNIX classes I took long ago…
[:p][:p][:p][:p]

Meh.
jjjrfoodie

"May I add a suitable phrase that my dear, old grandmother taught me as a young lad when we caravanned on the Gobi plains by camel. ‘If you can’t say anything nice, you’ll walk behind the camels until you do.’"

I’m glad to hear that someone who works with Alton Brown likes him. As a former media guy that says a lot. He has always appeared to me as the unusual on-air talent who knows production from the trenches and probably is less prone to prima donna fits.

Gordon W and others make excellent points. TV production is mostly about research, and then educating your audience within the parameters of the medium. Good production usually means collecting a lot of material and becoming an instant expert on a topic, and then gleaning it all down to the few facts, authorities, personalities, visual elements, etc. that tell the most engaging and informative story in a brief time frame.

Programs like "Good Eats" are frequently frustrating to those who know, or want to know, the "whole" story, but it’s in the nature of formatted TV. I think Alton Brown does a good job.

BTW – If you like the scientific "whys" of cooking you should check out America’s Test Kitchen, from Cooks Illustrated magazine, on public television stations. Like the magazine they explain why they add ingredients at certain times, why they use certain cooking techniques, and what is likely to happen if it’s done another way.

Alton Brown is a fun and informative show. I learn something every time I watch.

I TiVo the show and can’t seem to bring myself to erase any episode.

The good part of having it on tape is that I can re-watch the show … there is so much there that it is worthwhile re-watching.

We don’t have cable TV but have seen Good Eats when we’ve been in a motel during our travels and enjoy Alton Brown a lot. I have a friend who works on his program and she loves working with him. I’d watch him all the time if we had cable!

He has been trained in the culinary arts. After that, he left the culinary world, and was a producer/ director in film, and decided that he preferred culinary arts over film arts. Since, he has combined the two to produce the show that many, myself and my wife included, have grown to love- Good Eats. The show combines his knowledge of cooking and movie production, and both are very obvious in "Good Eats".

I think he’s great, learning why things work has made me a better cook.

nah..the Mayor is one of a kind[;)]