Khaopaat wrote:

JoelF wrote:

zoid wrote:Anybody know what channel it is on Comcast (Oak Park)?

If you had FLN/Fine Living Network, it has taken its place on most systems. At least it did so on DirecTV.

Actually, this substitution happened for anyone who once received Fine Living Network - Scripps Networks pulled the plug on Fine Living, and replaced it with Cooking Channel.

It looks like it should be channel 124 (former Fine Living channel) for Comcast in Oak Park.

Thanks!

I'm loving the Galloping Gourmet. I snuck in a quick peek today and he was simply hilarious. Yes, I realize he was most likely soused, but his schtick was totally endearing. To me. YMMV.

Also lots and lots of Canadians. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Dmnkly wrote:And Iron Chef Japan is homeless once again.

*sigh*

Not so! I've been checking out this channel throughout the evening and it's on right now, 10-11 pm CT.

Regarding the channel overall, I remain skeptical (because I know there's a financial goal that will eventually dumb down the programming to attract the broadest possible audience) but I've enjoyed a fair amount of what I've watched tonight. It's a lot less slick and canned than the current incarnation of Food Network and reminds me a bit of FN back in its early days. For now, there appears to be a strong focus on cooking, and many of the hosts I've seen tonight are new to me, which is enjoyable. At a glance, they seem much more interested in cooking than in being celebrity chefs and more interested in teaching than entertaining.

At the moment, in spite of the fact that there's no HD version on my system, this channel is a fun diversion. Where it goes from here seems pretty clear and based on the dilution of content on other Scripps Howard networks, it's nothing to look forward to it. But while they're revving it up and still tyring hard to hit the core audience, I think there's stuff on this channel that would definitely appeal to some LTHers.

=R=

OMG - Cooking Channel is showing Two Fat Ladies!
If they start re-running Floyd On Fish I'm sold!

I will say after further viewing here and there -- I am drawn to the David Rocco show -- La Dolce Vita. I mean..how can you find appealing people romping through Florence, making delicious looking food and enjoying themselves bad? And I've already bought ingredients to make a couple of things he's made. I especially like that they don't put subtitles under all the Italian -- it's kind of fun to get that international thing of someone speaking English to Italian and vice versa. Plus -- his friends seem genuine and interesting and, God forbid -- real.

I also enjoyed Chinese Made Easy -- very simple recipes and for someone who has always been intimidated by Asian food -- it seems very approachable and easy to do. The "international" factor on Food TV has always been really dumbed down so it's kind of cool to see Jamie At Home and Nigella reruns too.

I just hope they promote great new programming going forward. It would be really interesting to me to see something like DDD but set in Europe -- with someone less...ferocious -- than Guy Fieri. Sometimes i find him fun to watch but usually I get tired of everything being "money".

I've always loved the Galloping Gourmet. I also like his new show, Graham Kerr's Gathering Place, though I've only caught it a few times.

Two Fat Ladies on tv again? Whoo-hoo!

ronnie_suburban wrote:

Dmnkly wrote:And Iron Chef Japan is homeless once again.

*sigh*

Not so! I've been checking out this channel throughout the evening and it's on right now, 10-11 pm CT.

Allez Cuisine!!!

I presume it's the FLN version and not the old Food Network Backdraft soundtrack version?

I'm watching something called "Bill's Food" right now and he gives oven temperatures that seem ridiculously low (cook a casserole of sausages and potatoes at 200 degrees for 30 minutes, for example) until I realized that he is giving Celsius temperatures. That's going to throw some people for a loop when they try to duplicate these recipes at home. I'm surprised there's nothing reminding the viewers about this.

stevez wrote:I'm watching something called "Bill's Food" right now and he gives oven temperatures that seem ridiculously low (cook a casserole of sausages and potatoes at 200 degrees for 30 minutes, for example) until I realized that he is giving Celsius temperatures. That's going to throw some people for a loop when they try to duplicate these recipes at home. I'm surprised there's nothing reminding the viewers about this.

It seems like they are doing this sometimes, as earlier during Jamie Oliver's show they flashed up on the screen that 170 C = 350 F

They had me at Nigella and Two Fat Ladies. They lost me at Ask Aida. She's awful.

lazygal09 wrote:They lost me at Ask Aida. She's awful.

But, on the other hand, Padma was cooking up a storm in an evening gown this morning.

I'm watching something called "Bill's Food" right now and he gives oven temperatures that seem ridiculously low (cook a casserole of sausages and potatoes at 200 degrees for 30 minutes, for example) until I realized that he is giving Celsius temperatures. That's going to throw some people for a loop when they try to duplicate these recipes at home. I'm surprised there's nothing reminding the viewers about this.

It seems like they are doing this sometimes, as earlier during Jamie Oliver's show they flashed up on the screen that 170 C = 350 F

I was watching a baking show over the weekend hosted by Rachel Allen, which is a UK production, in which all the ingredients were provided in grams and millilieters and the temps in Celsius ("bake at 180 degrees") with no conversion. I think since a lot of the new shows are probably cheap pickups from Canada or the UK, they haven't spent the money to modify the shows with notes. Jamie Oliver's show was originally on FN and they would have done it on that network.

Watched this channel today for a few hours and enjoyed some of the shows. One focused on gastropubs and highlighted the food at Publican.
Future shows look like they will feature chefs like Grant Achatz - how bad can that be!

Damn, I was hoping Ask Aida was Aida Turturro, of Janice on the Sopranos fame. There's a gal who looks like she'd know a few things about Italian food.

Mike G wrote:Damn, I was hoping Ask Aida was Aida Turturro, of Janice on the Sopranos fame. There's a gal who looks like she'd know a few things about Italian food.

If she's anything like the character she played, she'd probably teach you a bit about conceiving of & running cons, and the latest in Italo-American profanity as she cooked.

It's all good.

Damn, I was hoping Ask Aida was Aida Turturro, of Janice on the Sopranos fame. There's a gal who looks like she'd know a few things about Italian food.

Nah - her name is Aida Mollencamp, and she writes for chow.com (FKA chowhound.com). Very annoying show; I gave up on it in its first run on Food Network when, in response to a viewer query, she proclaimed that cherry tomatoes couldn't possibly be used in a pasta sauce. Ummmm. . . .what?

Dishnetwork has a free preview of this channel going on until the 28th. So I have checked out a few programs.

Some are reruns of FN shows.

Interesting reruns of The Galloping gourmet.

Of there shows I like Luke's Vietnam.

Some shows are turned off pretty quick.



Actually watching Unique Eats now, and saw boudreaulicious @ one of the X-marx dinners. Kudos to you for the camera time

Not a channel I would pay for, and its not in HD so its brutal to watch (like cave drawings compared to an HD broadcast), but Ill watch for free on occasion for the next few weeks.

jimswside wrote:Not a channel I would pay for, and its not in HD so its brutal to watch (like cave drawings compared to an HD broadcast), but Ill watch for free on occasion for the next few weeks.

I've barely watched this channel at all since I posted about it back in June and this is certainly one reason why. It's hard enough to watch marginal programming but when it's not in HD, it's that much harder. I'm guessing an HD version will eventually be added but even if it is, the mostly re-treaded content here just doesn't hold up.

=R=

jimswside wrote:
Actually watching Unique Eats now, and saw boudreaulicious @ one of the X-marx dinners. Kudos to you for the camera time

you outed me

Just kidding!! Pretty funny huh!! Possibly the most intoxicated I've been this year! BYO and cameras are a lethal combination.

zoid wrote:OMG - Cooking Channel is showing Two Fat Ladies!
If they start re-running Floyd On Fish I'm sold!

Floyd was way cool. Unfortunately, he died a few months ago. My brother and I used to watch him in the wee hours on public TV (?) in the 80s.

jimswside wrote:Not a channel I would pay for, and its not in HD so its brutal to watch (like cave drawings compared to an HD broadcast), but Ill watch for free on occasion for the next few weeks.

I'm getting the cooking channel in HD on dish network, although just like on food network hd many of the shows are SD, stretched/etc for the hd stream. But unique eats is in HD for me.

what bothers me is that there's still almost no cooking, at least not in primetime..

gleam wrote:I'm getting the cooking channel in HD on dish network, although just like on food network hd many of the shows are SD, stretched/etc for the hd stream. But unique eats is in HD for me.

I hate that stretched, fake HD. I think it's worse than LD with the old-style aspect ratio.

Interesting about Dish Network offering an HD version of Cooking Channel. That's not the case with DirecTV or Comcast (at least not in my region).

=R=

ronnie_suburban wrote:I hate that stretched, fake HD. I think it's worse than LD with the old-style aspect ratio.

i agree wholeheartedly. it stops me from watching those shows entirely. my favorite is when they fail super hard and stretch something that is already letterboxed, making it even more abysmal.

You think somebody like Rachel Ray or one of the domestic divas would get on the horn to their agent and say, "Do you see what they're doing to my butt?"
Stretch-o-vision is not kind to human bodies not centered on the screen.

I DVR'd the Unique Eats marathon yesterday and watched a few episodes last night, some of them were pretty good. Is it me or do the majority of the people find a way (especially Amanda Freitag) to use the word unique 67 times per segment? I know it's the name of the show but c'mon. Maybe it was the insomnia, but it began to drive me pretty crazy...

Jeff

I am totally hypnotized by "Two Fat Ladies," and I'm not sure why. Most of what they cook doesn't really appeal to me. The ingredients they use are sometimes unfamiliar. Heck, even the oven looks weird to me. They go out and shoot their own grouse! One "lady" has wicked red fingernails and loves to sneak a smoke. They both appear to have been around the block at least twice. I've recorded all the episodes and enjoy them even more each time I watch them. Anyone else?

sundevilpeg wrote:

I've read that the Cooking Channel will be taking the place of FLN (Fine Living Network). If that is the case, where oh where will I be able to watch Whatever, Martha!??????

I have precisely the same concern. I am completely hooked on this show, for the same reasons I was hooked on Mystery Science Theatre 3000 (which had an identical format). I like that it gives Alexis Stewart a relatively constructive hobby, too.

Apparently, Hallmark Channel is going to be the new home for Martha Stewart starting this month, with new episodes of "Whatever, Martha" premiering in 2011. (phew!)

As for the new Cooking Channel, I do enjoy Nigella, Julia Child and Co, Luke Nguyen and of course the Fat Ladies. Everything else just seems like generic, overproduced cooking shows. Someone else in this thread waxed poetic about the PBS Create channel. I have to second that. I've been finding myself watching this channel more and more lately. I regularly DVR Ming Tsai and Lidia Bastianich.

razbry said:

I am totally hypnotized by "Two Fat Ladies," and I'm not sure why. Most of what they cook doesn't really appeal to me. The ingredients they use are sometimes unfamiliar. Heck, even the oven looks weird to me. They go out and shoot their own grouse! One "lady" has wicked red fingernails and loves to sneak a smoke. They both appear to have been around the block at least twice. I've recorded all the episodes and enjoy them even more each time I watch them. Anyone else?

I love the Two Fat Ladies because so much of it seems totally unscripted. They are completely natural with each other and even what they say directly to the camera is very natural and easy. I sometimes feel as if I"m sitting in one of these ancient kitchens that they often end up in and am just hanging out, maybe drinking a beer while they slowly do their prep. No hurry, no rush, just hanging out and cooking. And they're both saucy ladies, which I like. I like that they go somewhere and just cook for odd groups of people -- and that there's usually a theme related to the people that they cook for. I think it's refreshing in this day of Giadas and Rachael Rays to see these non conventionally pretty ladies being charming and funny and cook the hell out of things. I'd much rather have their old fashioned recipes than a 30 minute meal, any day. Especially if I get to sit at the table with them and listen.

earthlydesire wrote:Especially if I get to sit at the table with them and listen.

That would be tough, since Jennifer Paterson died back in 1999.