She should be fired for this!
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She should be fired for this!
I know. I at least mix the ketchup with barbecue sauce, vinegar, and brown sugar.
OMG I GET TO POST KWANZAA CAKE?!
I LOVE YOU PEPPER.
I watch food network in the morning to catch my favorite cook, Ina Garten on Barefoot Contessa. She is ridiculously awesome, and everything she makes looks incredible. And what comes on right after her? Semi-Homemade. Its like test driving a Ferrari, then riding your bicycle home. Die Sandra Lee.
I like Ina Garten too, but she does have some, um, irritating tendencies. Like her rhetorical questions. Or her gooood vanilla. Like I'm going to bake her fucking cake with the shoddiest excuse for vanilla I can find.
This one is still my favorite. The very end is the best part.
Quote:
You can embellish any cake with anything you like.
Oh sweet Jesus, I need to find the clip for this!
You get the feeling that the ghost of her grandmother is inside her head, screaming at her constantly. I wonder if she thinks we can hear it too.Quote:
Originally posted by Feirefiz
I like Sandy. She's like one of those desperate full blown alcoholics who cling to things like table scapes and window treatments as a way to try and exert some sort of control on their Mr. Toad's Wild Ride of a life, while at the same time turning any event (Child's birthday party?!) into an excuse to make big ol' Kool Aid pitchers full of vodka cranberry. She's just so midwestern, it's comforting.
I'll bet any amount of money that her front step has a cast concrete Canada Goose on it that she dresses up with special outfits for the different holidays. Such are the ways of my people.
I'm so confused...why did she trim the cake down and put it on the disposable aluminum-foil cake pan, again? And why would you put icing on the cake pan? Wouldn't the effect be better to leave one of the layers whole, trim the other, and make a stepped-in layer cake?Quote:
Originally posted by Feirefiz
I have SO MANY QUESTIONS.
You just described every neighbor I had when I was growing up.Quote:
Originally posted by Cluricaun
Pepper, I love you dearly, as I hope you know. But I have to say I don't get the hate for your original clip.
I don't like ketchup glazes, even those that have been improved as Sticks suggests, but they're popular with a lot of people.
What I'd rather complain about with her is that it seems to me that she's gone so far overboard into the concept of 'let's use prepared/canned foods to make meals' she's adding fat, sodium, and complexity, where actual raw ingredients would be just as useful, easy to use, and flavorful. It seems to me that her show is contributing to the popular idea that you need lots and lots of time to cook from scratch, when I think that's just the opposite: It may take a bit more planning, but the time constraints are often a matter of ten to fifteen minutes more prep time, compared to an hour or so of cook time - which seems a negligible delay.
And one that pays off so well in terms of taste and healthfulness.
I am very confused as well. What was the point of that? Any of that? And how did adding half a teaspoon of raspberry extract make the canned frosting taste homemade? :confused:Quote:
Originally posted by Sarahfeena
It's not just the sad excuse for a glaze that she made. Meatloaf is not an attractive dish. If you're going to cook it on a sheet instead of in a pan, at least do some cleanup before you show it to the camera. Cooking shows aren't just about food, they're about presentation. If your recipe tastes phenomenal but looks like shit, you shouldn't use it on a show.Quote:
Originally posted by OtakuLoki
But that's just it - making meatloaf on a sheet, instead of using a loaf pan, it's inevitably going to bake in such a way to ruin any squaring off you put into it. Once the decision was made to use a baking sheet, there's no way to make meatloaf look good. And I can see why someone ostensibly trying to show off what the 'average' person can do in the kitchen would eschew such a relatively intimidating* baking tool as a loaf pan.
*intimidating for the sort of person for whom the idea of cooking at all is big step. The sort of person who thinks that cooking a good steak at home is a big deal, because that's so far beyond their experience.
ETA: I agree with you about the presentation factor, just trying to suggest that there are circumstances where that general rule might be overridden in pursuit of some specific goal.
Shh! No Questions! Grandma will hear you! She demands we ice the pan. We cannot disobey her, can we?Quote:
Originally posted by Zuul
I watched the cake one again and noticed that she apparently plans to later snack on cake bits and a cocktail made with peaches. I thought maybe it was fruit cocktail, but now I'm not so sure.
Precisely. I don't care about the ketchup glaze at all. I care about the fact that she's a lazy drunk with a cooking show and her food looks inedible (and I know from experience tastes awful).Quote:
Originally posted by Inner Stickler
Alton makes meatloaf on a sheet instead of a loaf pan, because of the grease factor. But Alton takes the time to make the meatloaf itself tasty. He also shapes it in a pan and so the meat is tightly held together, not a few loose handfuls thrown on the pan. Finally, he would never, ever, ever ever allow something like that to be on his show. And why? Because he loves food. He takes pride in his work. It's important to him that his food be tasty and attractive and nutritious.
Sandy literally doesn't give a fuck. You can tell that she couldn't even be bothered to mix the meat thoroughly because you can see the egg she uses. Now, if she wants to cook up abortions like that in her own kitchen, that's her business. God knows I've probably done worse in my time. But I don't have a cooking show on the Food Network and neither should she.
And parzival, it's never a fruit cocktail. Ever.
I have a meatloaf recipe from one of Martha Stewart's books. She recommends not using a loaf pan, but she says to place it on a rack. and place the rack in a shallow pan (like a jelly roll pan). That way, the grease drips through. Simple. Brilliant. I <3 Martha.
Fantastic idea! I'll remember that for the next time I make meatloaf.Quote:
Originally posted by Sarahfeena
I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss Sandra Lee's abilities in the kitchen. Perhaps her Grandma Lorraine passed on a secret and now Ms Lee gets to share it with the world: the aluminum foil cake pans are edible and help prevent Alzheimer's! Why else frost them?
Surely there can be no other reason for 1. not using some kind of serving plate or even a dinner plate to put the cake on; 2. Removing a not insignificant portion of the cake to make it fit onto a flimsy and useless item; and 3. frosting them as 2 different cakes, instead of a double layer cake.
Raspberry and peaches? :dubious: No thanks. And I have to agree with the OP--that meatloaf is nothing but a hot mess, literally. Third graders can make better dinners. Kraft makes better dinners!
But the Kwanzaa cake is the winner for me--never have so many odd ingredients come together to make such an unappetizing dessert. I like the candles best--they add a certain something to the presentation...
I suck at carpentry which is frustrating because it's pretty much what my job entails. Does that mean my boss teaches me ways that structurally fit the requirements but look like crap? No and I wouldn't want to learn them. If you are teaching someone who is afraid of cooking how to cook then you choose recipes that are easy and will look good. Nobody wants trainer recipes that look like shit. There's no motivation to improve your skills. And frankly, meatloaf isn't that difficult a dish to make presentable.Quote:
Originally posted by OtakuLoki
Her big mistake was using ketchup for blood and then putting her creation in the oven rather than using Strickfaden’s Tesla coil to animate it.Quote:
Originally posted by pepperlandgirl
I have to disagree. A loaf pan is highly basic, and fairly ubiquitous. I'd buy a mandolin being referred to as intimidating, but not a rectangular baking dish.Quote:
Originally posted by OtakuLoki
But the thing is, it's a food network; one should expect culinary techniques to be employed and taught. I wouldn't get annoyed at the home improvement shows for using a circular saw; I mean, I may be inexperienced and not terribly comfortable with using one, but that's the sort of thing involved in carpentry.
(Now I'm imagining Sandra Lee doing a home improvement show; it involves a lot of Play-Doh.)
I can't breathe. I'm laughing so hard. This is a fucking brilliant post.Quote:
Originally posted by Cluricaun
Such are the ways of my people. Ohhhhhhhhh.
I know I've linked this in chat so probably a lot of you have seen it. I just love the absolute, genuine, palpable joy she feels as soon as it's Cocktail Time.
Exy--that is classic! I can't decide which I like more: the porn theme or the every-morning-is-Christmas-and-I-got-everything-I-want! look when she's mixing her drink of choice...
Wow. That is amazing.
Why does that person have a "cooking show"? Holy cow. It's not a joke, is it? I mean, is it? Cutting a cake to fit on the bottom of a disposable pan? WTF? Who would eat that shit?
Everything she did was just disgusting. Canned "frosting"? For the luvva pete. Have any of you ever tasted that stuff?
As for Martha Stewart. Well, there are those who sneer at Martha, but I am not one of them. If Martha tells you how a cake ought to be made and iced (frosted, as you Americans say), then you may be sure it's the right way. She might be an anal bitch but by god, the woman knows what she's doing in the kitchen.
Eh. Not her fault. She would be cooking heating and serving the same shit without the TV cameras, so I can hardly hate her for cashing the checks someone wants to give her for doing so.
The real fault lies with Food Network. She's merely the most egregious example of the network's trend over the past decade, that of moving away from chefs with legitimate credentials and professional success regardless of photogenicity (Batali, Lagasse, Moulton) and towards cute, telegenic home chefs regardless of training or skill (Sandra, Rachael, Marcela).
It sucks. It triple sucks.
There is much in what you say. I subscribed to the Food Network because I like to watch cooking shows. But what do we get? We get chefs shouting obscenities and stupid contests and childish "how it's made" crap. Amateur bs like that Sandra Lee woman, or peculiar cake-decorating.Quote:
Originally posted by OneCentStamp
It's part of our "cable package" so we still get it, but I don't even turn it on any more.
We DVR Good Eats and Secrets of a Restaurant Chef, and that's about it. Oh, and watching Ina Garten is always fun; someday I want to be like her!Quote:
Originally posted by vison
Considering I hope and plan to be married to you at the time, please do! :DQuote:
Originally posted by artifex
Good Eats is the only show worth watching on that network. It even tells me good places to go here in town. Like Fontane's from the oyster show. About a mile from my house.
The interwebs work in mysterious ways. Just after posting above I went out and turned on the TV and the Food Network and there was a very cool young man sitting beside a little outdoor stove in Italy and he was making different kinds of soup and one of them is the soup I'm making for lunch tomorrow. Simple, but interesting, and will no doubt be delicious. I'll have to substitute dried red peppers for the fresh chili peppers, but I have the other ingredients.
And if I hadn't come in here to scope out that appalling Lee woman, I would never have seen it.
Thank you, Sandra Lee.
Fine, I'll call off the hit squad for another week. :DQuote:
Originally posted by vison
I miss Sarah Moulton. I liked her.
Me too. She was the prototypical FN chef of 8 year ago: dowdy and dry by Rachael Ray standards, but as the editor of Gourmet magazine, authoritative beyond reproach.Quote:
Originally posted by eleanorigby
With a few notable exceptions (Alton and Ina come to mind), they used to pretty much all be successful restaurateurs.
RIP Gourmet Magazine. :sad:Quote:
Originally posted by OneCentStamp
I wouldn't rule out her sleeping with one or more of the producers or execs at the Food Network, either.Quote:
Originally posted by OneCentStamp
I subscribed to Gourmet for many years but gave it up finally because it got too remote from my life. I enjoyed some of the articles, but in all the years (25?) years I subscribed I think I used maybe 3 recipes. I switched to Fine Cooking but gave that up because it's full of very boring yuppies (are there still yuppies outside Fine Cooking?) in $100,000 kitchens "plating" appetizers.
I still take Cooks' Illustrated and Cooks' Country, they're fun even though the recipes are obsessively picky.
I saw an ad for a "cooking show" titled Bitchin' Kitchen featuring a slutty-looking blonde and a lot of hot pink. I shall not watch it. I believe the end is nigh for The Food Network if it has to keep resorting to cheezier and cheezier "cooks" and premises.
This just made me throw up in my mouth more than any of her nasty dishes. Consider, if you will, that Marc Summers is the producer of something like 1/4 of the shows on that network. I mean, his years on Double Dare should have prepared him to withstand any level of gross-out, but still...Quote:
Originally posted by Tuckerfan
Mental picture: Marc Summers pulling a Double Dare flag out of Sandra Lee. Yeah.Quote:
Originally posted by OneCentStamp
And Artifex- Secrets of a Restaurant Chef? Seriously? You know that's just Guy Fierri in drag right?
As someone without cable I do all my cooking-show watching on PBS. And let me tell you, it is far superior to the stupid Food Network. I could watch America's Test Kitchen all day (done by the Cook's Illustrated people). I also love watching anything with Jacques Pepin, especially the old shows of him and Julia Childs. And there's this Norwegian guy who cooks outside in cool places in Norway. I doubt I'd make much of his food, but it's still cool.
I did see Sandra Lee a few years ago while indulging in some cable at my parents' and I was speechless. I agree with all the hatred of this putrid piece of crap. That is all.
Didn't Ming Tsai go to PBS after he lost his Food Network gig? That dude can cook.
YES! I love him!!! He can cook and he's sexy!Quote:
Originally posted by OneCentStamp
Since I last typed this I was subjected to Mr. "Anne Burrell" again over the weekend and I've figured out what the Secret of a Restaurant Chef is (besides tucking her Guy Fierei wang out of the way and combing her hair with an electric toothbrush)Quote:
Originally posted by Cluricaun
Salt. That woman puts salt in things like Paula Deen puts butter in things. She puts more salt in cooking water than I put in entire meals.
The Food Network has to be stopped.
Okay I just googled Anne Burrell because I had no idea who she was, but my god! from the picture I saw I'm not even sure if you can properly say Guy Fierri in drag, as it implies at least trying to look like a woman.Quote:
Originally posted by Cluricaun
OK, everyone who's hating on Anne Burrell can step outside with me right fucking now. :Shake:
Salt is pretty awesome, guys.
I, personally, loathed Ming Tsai but I admit he could cook.
I love PBS's cooking shows, too. But I never have time to watch TV on Saturday during the day, which is the only time we get it.
And, I like watching Martha Stewart, too. Only, is she still on?
Really? That's the hill you want to die on, defending Bozo the Chef? She's not personable, she's not fun to look at, and she's a mediocre cook at best. A salt obsessed brick shithouse with a fright wig on it about the best thing you can say.Quote:
Originally posted by OneCentStamp