I used to be a pretty big Food Network addict. When I lived alone and had only 6 channels, every night my default station was Food Network. I had my favorites, but really I watched everything they aired(1). It was good because not only did it entertain me but usually it also inspired me to actually cook things, and specifically to cook things better. Cooking appeals to me for two very fundamental reasons: because it's basically an unreachable pursuit of perfectionism, and because after a certain point you can mostly just wing it as you go.
Anyway, marriage and devoting time to things outside of myself and whatever else has caused me not to watch Food Network as much. Also, quite frankly, watching the same type of those shows gets tiring. The only ones I still watch are "Good Eats," and the contest/straight cooking shows like "Iron Chef" and "The Next Iron Chef"(2). I watch these because Alton Brown is still ridiculously informative, and because I like watching the absolute pros during "Iron Chef." And, because I love Jeffrey Steingarten.
Steingarten is the lumpy grey-haird frequent judge of "Iron Chef" and constant judge of "The Next Iron Chef." And he's a son of a bitch. He talks with an arrongance and a lisp as though he forgot to swallow his oyster, and I can't pin down if either are at all affected. He's the most knowledgable and nasty judge I've ever seen on those shows. He's like what Simon Cowell could be if Cowell didn't always operate as though he were his own media empire.
There is always one truly great moment of every "Iron Chef" episode: when the Chairman unveils the secret ingredient with his hyper-aggressive arm-waving style, followed by the super-intense bulging-eyed stare from one contestant to the other. It's all pure theater(3) but by god I can never get enough of it. Someone should make a youtube video of just all the secret ingredient reveals one after the other. I would be mesmerized.
The more times I watched "Iron Chef," the more I realized that there was often another great moment of many shows, the moment when the judges are introduced and Jeffrey Steingarten is one. That's right. Part of the reason I watch this very competitive cooking contest show is to see a somewhat obscure judge. To my great enjoyment, he usually tears to shreds whatever celebrity-type judge they have with him, but I've also seen him and Bobby Flay butt heads numerous times during the food presentations. He's a very tough critic who doesn't seem to care what others think, and he doesn't begrugde people their inferiority. I like that.
1. I even watched the one show that even then I hated: "Unwrapped." Mark Summers used to be awesome when I was nine and he was on "Double Dare." Now he's very lame and unbelievably annoying. He's the host/narrator of "Unwrapped," which is basically a half-hour version of the Mr Rogers segments where he tours the factories, except the only factories Summers tours are ones that make licorice or peeps or fritos--junk food. Summers&co apparently missed the fact that what made Mr Rogers's forays into industry were great because they were so short (yes it gets boring just watching a machine assembly line) and because his target audience was dumb little kids. I should mention now that "Unwrapped" usually airs around 10pm. However, none of this is what makes me want to hurt myself while watching the show. It's Mr Summers's delivery. He can't go more than three or four words without making a huge inflection, like he's constantly doing a radio advertisement for a big sale at a used car lot. Watch one episode and you might not notice, watch a handful over a week and you definitely will, watch a dozen and you'll want to slap that son of a bitch every time his smiling face appears in that old-timey diner booth surrounded by jujubees.
2. I always thought you were supposed to italicize TV series and quotate individual episodes, but just now did a check of nytimes.com and they are quotating series. I've got my eye on you, Sulzberger, don't lead me astray.
3. For instance, The Chairman isn't actually the nephew of the Japanese Iron Chef guy. He isn't even Japanese and he's just an actor named Mark Dacascos who was born in Hawaii to a Hawaiian-Filipino father and an Irish(!)-Japanese father. Sorry to crush that illusion.
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