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Next Food Network Star: Season 7 Finale
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Finally! The finale of Next Food Network Star: season 7! Are you ready to see who is going to be the already pre-determined winner of the most anti-climactic season in years? Then read on!
Quick question before we start: Why on Earth did Food Network air the “reunion” show before the finale? No one does that! That’s against, like, every unwritten reality TV rule in existence! Not cool, Food Network. Not cool at all. Go directly to jail. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.
The show kicked off with Giada asking Vic, Susie, and Jeff to make the “best dishes of their lives” and then present them on camera. One person was going to be eliminated after the camera challenge and would not get to continue on to become the next contestant on the Price Is Right, which caused Giada got all hyper and emphatically state that “the stakes could not be higher.”
I disagree. They could definitely be higher if they spent a few minutes in a room with Duff Goldman:
SO MUCH PUN!
Jeff made an eggplant parm sandwich and talked about his father. Then, Susie fried a bunch of pork in pure lard, and talked about her father. Finally, Vic threw a bunch of seafood in a pot and talked about, well, nothing. Such a tough choice! Who should be eliminated and not go on to film their own pilot? Judges?
And just like that… VIC was eliminated from the show – just like we called last week here on FNH, folks. Food Network showed the side of his big ol’ head in the focus group, which was a dead giveaway he was the one to go.
Next up, Susie and Jeff headed to the Food Network studios to film their pilot episode. They used Anne Burrell’s set for the day, and their director was GUY FIERI. Because let’s face it: if there’s anyone you want guiding your career, it’s him. /sarcasm
Jeff was up first, and he started off a little rough out of the gate. He was so nervous he forgot his lines, and kept awkwardly saying the word “BOOM” like he was Emeril’s mentally handicapped younger cousin. It was painful to watch.
Jeff also apparently took a page from Ina Garten, and decided to come out wearing a gigantic shent with a Mr. Rogers sweater over it. Total wardrobe fail. Jeff, you’re the king of sandwiches… not of 8th grade social studies teachers. Step it up, bro!
Susie was edited to look like she did a better job with her pilot. You know, anything to try to create a little suspense for the 3 people out there who actually couldn’t decipher the ending.
Next up, the pilots were aired for a “focus group” which was comprised of all the previously eliminated contestants. Susie’s pilot was first. She mentioned her father about 9 million times (and for those of you keeping track, that’s still a few less times than Melissa d’Arabian mentioned France).
Jeff was up next. He had one funny line about adding wine to his dish. He said, “It’s time to add the vino. Add half a cup to a cup, depending on how your night is going.” Yeah. And if you’re stuck watching Next Food Network Star, you might want to go ahead and just add the whole bottle. Trust me on that one.
In the most anti-climactic reveal EVER, Jeff was named the winner of the show. Um, surprise?
Congratulations, Jeff. We look forward to mocking you for several weeks to come. And remember, we kid because we love.
Don’t feel bad, Susie. We’re sure you’ll have a wonderful career eating in parking lots across America. Best of luck to you as well.
So there you have it, FNH! As always, leave your thoughts in the comments!
Other posts on Food Network Humor:
---Next Food Network Star Finale: And The Winner Is…---FIRST LOOK: Next Food Network Star Season 7 Contestants
---Next Food Network Star: Episode #710 Recap (Iron Chef)
---Next Food Network Star: THE LEFTOVERS
---Next Food Network Star: Episode #707 Recap (The One Where Wolfgang Puck Was A Douche)
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307 Responses
It’s Jeff.
Yup, totally Jeff. Sadly, I can see him having some sort of Guy-Ferry-Like show with his sweatbands.
Ugh sadly, I must agree. It will be another typical FN show with the host being a typical douche.
My mom actually likes this show and every week she comments on how talented the chef’s are. Ok, my horse is more talented with a spatula and a stove than Vic is.
This season sucked worse then last season. All of them really stunk up the network! Bon Voyage next five seconds of food network fame star!
This “reunion” special is painful to watch. Like, giving birth, having an abscessed tooth and kidney stones, all at the same time. Without pain killers.
*Why* did they air the reunion before the finale? That’s just so…odd. And the tension between Mary Beth and Jeff that they showed seemed so strange and lol-worthy.
True, true, Cynic. She looked so angry – such a poor loser. (Key word being LOSER) LOL
THat was weird indeed.. they made Beth look bad, poor girl
ouch! Minx
I just have to say that watching the reunion? Mary Beth is a douche. And I mean that. She is a wrinkled sack of vinegar meant only to be inserted in fishy, infected orifices.
i almost felt that Penny was justified in being a bitch to Mary Beth
Absolutely. That woman was so, so painfully fake. She’ll fake-kiss on Penny all the time while saying she hates her. Meanwhile, Jeff goes to offer her real comfort after her loss and she shoves him off?
I cannot tolerate that kind of poor sportsmanship. Mary Beth is a grown-ass woman. She lost. She needed to just suck it up and accept her pity hug with the dignity she obviously did not have.
Yeah, Mary Beth really deep-six’ed her reputation tonight with that snippy performance! Why would you do that? Her vitriol got the best of her.
Ugh, and I actually had liked Mary Beth. What a bitch. Did it start when Jeff assigned her a duck to cook in that one challenge and she flipped out? How the hell was he supposed to know she had never cooked one? She came off horribly. The other douche was Chris, which we had known, but he was even worse tonight.
Sometimes its hard to be perfect when you’re judged from all sides and angles and millions of ppl on tv, if this was you or me it would feel harder, she was my favorite too so I had to scratch my head at what was going on but that’s life..this happen, learn and move on…
It all became unwatchable after Penny and Chris left. Without the Bitch and Asshole factors, it was all blah.
Penny and Chris were the most boring and tedious people on this season. They brought nothing interesting and only appealed to white trash viewers.
also….in the first 2 minutes, Vic is already getting the loser’s edit.
Why is Susie using lard.. that sounds disgusting
cooking with lard is quite common.
and delicious.
Oh my god this is just painful. The rising levels of Toothpaste Smile might prove to be toxic before Vic even gets his inevitable boot.
Vic is totally gone after that Camera Challenge.
I hope they come to their senses, and give the show to Whitney.
I don’t understand why they even kept Vic around…how is a steroid-pumped man with tattoos supposed to be appealing and marketable?
If I took a shot every time Susie mentioned her dad in that 60 second challenge, I’d be plastered now.
It’s true. They kept saying that Suzie has, “all these wonderful stories” but I only ever heard ONE story over and over and over.
Her dad was her crutch the whole time, she didn’t mention her mother even once – from what I watched…
How dare they disgrace Anne Burrell’s set with these pilots!
Ha ha! I didn’t realize that! Yeah, I’m guessing they didn’t tell Anne about it. ‘Cause, that girl would have shooshed those two off the set!
Guy Ferry on directing pilots: “If you’ve seen my shows you might question that decision.”
Yes Guy, we agree.
It’s nice to know that there are no real qualifications to direct FN shows. They probably get homeless people off the street with the promise of free food.
“Am I in trouble?” “Do you think you’re in trouble?”
“The pressure is on, action!”
Wow, great directing Guy Ferry
Is it me, or is this *THE* most boring finale in the history of finales?!
Trust me, it’s not just you. This is boring as f***.
i’ve zoned out at LEAST 10 times in just this hour.
It’s the battle of the DULL! Yea!….. |-) zzzzzz…..
yeah I just finished dying my hair (shower included) while watching all of this and I’m pretty sure I haven’t missed a damn thing.
Multitasking during the FNS Finale! Well done, Ellen. You get the Epic WIN for the evening!
It was soooo anticlimactic!
P.S. What little respect I had for MaryBeth was shot to hell when she got snotty with Jeff when she lost. If she had tripped and face-planted by the door, THAT would’ve been Karma on Kamera!
Easier to critique than do it better yourserlf.
???
Mary Beth? Is that you?
The announcement just seemed so casual and anticlimactic. At least last season they got dramatic with unveiling Aarti’s picture,
agree…this was so suck-worthy i fell asleep half way through. i have to back to napping now.
The announcement was like an afterthought.
Exactly! No giant picture, no “contract”, no confetti, no families in the audience.
Even Brook Johnson looked bored to tears! (That poor lady always looks like she hasn’t slept in ages.)
Maybe NFNS has run its course…
I fell asleep. Woke up started watching again then fell back asleep. Still haven’t finished watching it.
I looked up and was actually surprised it hadn’t ended yet. It is SO SLOW.
Every year they do the same schtick. The first takes that Jeff and Susie do will suck. Then the last take–miraculously!–they pull it together. So tiresome.
Anyone notice that huge stain on Jeff’s shirt?
haha, yeah.
When Guy was congratulating Jeff after his last take he said something like “I would hug you but I’d get oil all over myself.” So I think Jeff had a mishap with some oil while filming his pilot.
If Susie mentions her father one more time, I am going to scream. It seems like the Melissa d’Arrabian schtick all over again. Please god let it be Jeff.
She had to get one last “Dad” comment in.
Be honest: neither of these two are worth watching for even a moment.
im so bored that iforgot to fast forward through the commercials since im a little behind…
LOL dude. That’s pretty bad. xD
It would have been more interesting if you fast forwarded the show and watched the commercials, and just watched the final 2 minutes.
Guys if you this so much, stop watching, and stop complaining! Thus is definitely the best season ever, and Jeff, is far from being a douche. He is a very funny and heartfelt guy, and i’d personally love watching his show.
why would we stop watching? Would you look away from a train wreck as it’s happening?
I don’t think anyone is implying that Jeff is a douche (he seems like a sweetheart), but rather that when he gets his own show, they’ll suck out his personality and turn him into a giant dick. Take Alton Brown, for instance. Alton Brown used to be cool. Now he’s just a jerk to everyone.
I think Alton is a jerk to people now because he realizes what the network is devolving into.
I agree. He has the attitude of a man trapped between his contract and his morals.
idk… i don’t think he has too much of a reason to be the HUGE dick he has begun. It really kicked in when he lost all that way… maybe it is because he only eats sardine on toast and plain oatmeal.
I think he’s just a jerk who forgot where he started. He’s almost never pleasant anymore, on any appearance, and I’m sure his show’s cancellation doesn’t help.
His show wasn’t canceled.
Sure it was. All these people claim ending the show was their idea.
he comes off as a jerk to me too. I never really was a fan but I thought his show was kind of inventive in the beginning. But he just treats everyone so condescending now. I know that Mary Beth was annoying but I wanted to tell him to jerk off when he came up to her face and said, what salt doesn’t come from the sea, when she said “sea salt.” Then he said something like “there was no salt before there was a sea.” Well duh! But things are still labeled sea salt. I just ate a bag of chips marked a sea salt and vinegar. Lighten up!
If they’re all going to be scripted, could they at least be elegantly scripted? The writing on this show is terrible.
*sigh* Jeff won, not gonna watch anyways
Its Jeff…who knew?!? ;-)
Guys search up next food network star 2011 and look at contestant progress. Go to the bottom and look who wins. Lol!!!
Is it me or did they outright spoil it with the Valspar commercial about paint for the new set where they said Jeff should get that lime green.
They outright spoiled it weeks ago when they released the pic of Jeff at the awards party with Aarti.
Yeah, that makes it two years in a row that they muffed the Finale! Last year, Aarti was listed as one of the Food Network Chefs before that year’s finale! Well done, FN, well done! :-P
Jeff’s show actually looks watchable. At least from the teaser promo he did. Although I don’t know. I made one of Aarti’s recipes and was hugely disappointed.
I hate Jeff, and i really wanted susie to win. I will definately be adding sandwich king to the list of shows that are so stupid i refuse to watch, along with diners drive ins and dives, and cupcake wars. What a waste of a show and my time. Who the hell wants to watch a whole show about only sandwiches!! How boring and stupid. Like every episode is going to be “Today, i am making ham and cheese! YAY! No, get out of here!.
I really hate Cupcake Wars.
Make a cupcake out of seaweed.
You lose because it tastes like seaweed.
My family is actually pretty excited that Jeff won. Why are they so excited? Because his last name is “Mauro”, just like ours. Apparently a person with that last name is very rare, despite me finding thousands of people on Google and Facebook with my name (including a convicted child predator).
Glad that Jeff won. I didn’t want to watch “Cooking with my Dad!” His show looks really watchable. Hopefully people at FN don’t screw his show over. I want to enjoy “Sandwich King!”
However I was wondering where Juba was tonight. Is he to good for this competition now? Whatever dude…
he was there in the reunion and the focus group, he just didn’t talk. (Kind of good for him, since he doesn’t do talking too well) I guess he figured he was too “simply complex” to add in his views.
Also, don’t you think adding the contestants as the focus group was the stupidest thing ever? They all have biases, how about showing it to real people and getting a legitimate point of view. Or is FN too afraid to let that happen?
*Nods* I agree that “Cooking with My Dead Dad” would have been unwatchable. I like people who have some interesting stories, but I’d rather hear a variety of interesting stories. Not the same one re-hashed over and over again. Yes, your father worked hard, yes your family seems like it was a good environment for you to grow up in, yes, all your recipes come from your family. If I was looking for a friend, perhaps I’d be more interested. But when I’m watching a cooking show I’m actually a bit more interested in the food. But I’m not a FNS exec so what do I know?
I’d like to see a show on how to make authentic Mexican food, but not “a Mexican twist on an American favorite — the hamburger” — the sort of idiotizing crap they pull with every ethnic cuisine. Food Network blows enchiladas.
Cooking With My Dead Dad. Best. Show. Idea. Ever.
For all the genuinely funny stuff posted on this site, the snarky hateful bashfests like this really bum me out. Eff y’all. Penny is a cunt. Team Mom Jeans forever!
I share your thoughts. The commenters were much funnier and creative when the herd was thinner.
@Gigi Juba was there, as were Katy and Howie, but they didn’t get asked any questions (or whatever they did say ended up on the cutting room floor).
I was hoping for Katy to discuss her Chinese workers again.
I would definitely rather Juba, Chris, Penny, Katy, Howie, and Alicia each have their own shows, than Jeff even having one episode. Thats how much that douch irritates me.
Turned on the tv at 7 pst…. Apparently fn decided to premiere it early on HD channels, sooooo I saw Jeffs commercial before I saw the show. Thanks food network, suffered through week of torture to find out in 3 seconds…….derp.
I hope Susie gets a show despite the fact that she didn’t win. I would totally watch it.
I also hope FN does not suck the personality out of Jeff.
All you people who don’t think my show will be good will be pleasantly surprised. The FN team and I have been working hard for the first season. I’m gonna bring new recipes and some great humor to Sunday morning. There will be lots of funny material for you good people at FNH.
Thanks God Bless
~~Turning any sandwich into a meal and any meal into a sandwich.~~
Kudos to you for having the cajones to post here if this is indeed you.
Hey I’ve been a fan of Food Network Humor for a while. I used to frequent this blog all the time, but I couldn’t post until the show was over. I was gonna mention the blog on the air but the crew wouldn’t let me.
Okay Jeff, if it is you….I grew up in your neck of the woods. Where is Triton?
The School? My buddy Frank’s son goes there he plays on the baseball team.
I’m so happ you won, enjoy the success and congrats :)
Jeff! If it is really you. . . .are you moving from Chicago, then?
I should have won jeff, and you know it. Your show will be boring.. Everyone already knows how to make sanwiches, they dont need you.
Lol, im not really susie, obviously
And i doubt you are jeff..
stop it.
Aw, Food Network sent you to plant their banner in the Land of Snark. Probably because you’re too adorable to hate on, but I guess sacrifical sandwich kings do what they must for their evil corperate overlords.
(Please don’t sell your soul or let them script you. Be awesome like Alton Brown used to be. If you end up with a show where the send you to eat gas station food and flirt with old cafeteria ladies, I promise I’ll cry for you a little.)
I wish I could be as good as Alton was. Right out of the gate I had stylists and writers telling me what to wear and say. I think Alton was so successful because he had a TV production background. He made the decisions. We had a nice off camera chat when we filmed the iron chef episode. We talked about his donation to the blog. He is a nice guy but he seems to hate everyone involved at the network.
That’s because he harks back to the days when the FN was actually about teaching folks how to cook and not a bunch of “reality” competition shows. It has to be disheartening to him to see what’s happened to the network.
Best of luck with your new show. Your eggplant parm sandwich looked fantastic.
this last post by “jeff” seals it for me….pretty sure it’s an elaborate troll.
If you are Jeff f*** you douche bag. If you’re not Jeff F*** you douche bag for being a pretender.
I want your egg plant sandwich recipe!!!
It will be up on the Food Network Recipe Section on the website. And so will all the other great recipes from my competitors in the finale.
Sorry I said you smell like store bought mayo.
Lemon. Just add lemon and it’ll be a compliment. Duh
The push for bringing personal stories is kind of fucking ridiculous. When I’m watching either a cooking program, a competition program or an informational program on The Food Network, the last thing I care about is something their mother or father said, their family traditions or some other anecdote culled from their lives. Just cook, compete and inform, god damn it!
Yeah. I like Wolfgang Puck’s old show. And do you hear him talking about his family or his dead dad or his vacations? Nope. He talks about food, and how to make food. If I were interested in a goddamned life story, I’d buy a chef’s biography.
Totally agree. While I see nothing wrong with the occasional “This is how my grandmother used to make this sauce,” that is where it needs to stop. If you’re frying a chicken, the narration should be about frying a chicken – I don’t need your family history or a recap of your vacation.
Actually, on Puck’s show — the one with the live audience — every episode was based on some videotaped event from his life, including a visit back home in Austria with his family. Just sayin’.
Jeff won, yawn. The judges have been kissing his ass for weeks; this was no surprise. I’ve been making sandwiches into meals for years, so his show is nothing new. Susie wasn’t going to win anyway because FN already has their Mexican food base covered with Mexican Made Lazy. Plus, hearing about her dad was touching at first, but I think it would depress the hell out the FN viewers after too long. The network needs to bring in their next Sandra.
I’m thinking they filmed the reunion special before they actually announced who won—around the same time the focus group came out—but skewed the reunion a bit to include Vic since he was in the top three. Otherwise I still have no idea why it came first. Maybe to save the time slot for Food Truck Race?
It would have been nice if the Reunion Show would have given more time to the other contestants. I DVR’d it and watched it after the final. Half of the episode seemed to revolve around Penny and Chris. I had to fast-forward past their parts.
Agreed. As far as I know, Juba and Katie didn’t speak. The camera just snapped to them a couple times. I was also surprised someone like Orchid didn’t get more screen time. She started out as a frontrunner and was pretty well liked.
Honestly, I did not watch the next food network star after the first season. I found the people so boring and fake. But I started watching this season and I just had to keep watching because of the train wrecks like Mary Beth, Vic, Penny. I must say though I am so glad about Jeff, I have been going Susie Fogleson over him since I first saw him.
I love “Susie Fogelson” used as an adjuective. Trying to decide if it means “gaga” or just plain “horny.” Either way, well done.
I hope they desanitize Anne’s kitchen from all the doucheyness that went on.
And I hate that they actually made me slightly like Penny for a few minutes, and I seriously hate Mary Beth…never liked her much, but man she’s a vile bitch.
The way Penny said she “had no idea I’d be so aggressive” made it sound like she really hadn’t known. As in, when she signed up to be a contestant on a food competition, she hadn’t realized she’d be handed a script. Just by how tired and annoyed she looked at the reunion show, and how she did not once start beeping or meowing or doing anything strange/socially inappropriate? I don’t think she’s the raging lunatic hate fest they made her out to be.
I really do feel bad for her. People are going to be walking up to that poor woman on the street and bitching her out for a badly written script she had nothing to do with. I hope they paid a lot when they bought her soul.
If it truly were about cooking, she should have gone further than she did. Yes, she walked into the room saying “they loved it” a lot, well partly because that was accurate week after week. She IS a strong personality, and even if unscripted..I respect her more for fighting to win than I do somebody like MaryBeth who’s a bitter hag who’s as genuine as a paper bag. The other women were very catty and Penny wasn’t putting up with their bullshit and went so far as to call them out on it.
While I didn’t think much of Mary Beth after she lost last week, I don’t think the other women were being catty at all. They were just reacting to Penny’s behavior.
A woman can have a strong personality and still be nice, well-liked and respected. Penny is none of those things. She acted like a back-stabbing malicious bitch and that’s what they reacted to.
Gee…really didn’t see that one coming for the last several weeks.
This season sucked huge donkey balls, and I knew Jeff would win from like episode five because they never were like “jesus you suck” or “HOT DAMN YOU’RE AMAZING” until the later episodes.
Did anyone else notice that there was an extra large picture of Giada’s breasts strategically placed behind Jeff and Susie during the finale show?
If that’s what you’re looking for, that’s what you’ll find.
Totally! I’m a chick, so I wasn’t looking for it, but jeebus it practically poked you in the eye it was so obvious.
Did anyone notice that Mary Beth didn’t make any comments as a member of the Focus Group? Maybe she wasn’t allowed? LOL Sore loser, sore loser, you suck, sore loser.
I loved Penny and I’m not white trash.
And I’m glad Jeff won. I’m a sandwich person, as is my whole family, and I think that this show could have great potential. Everything Jeff’s made looked mouth-watering. Also, over on the forum side of this place, everyone was talking about how good the sandwich he made looked. THAT, to me, is the sign of a potentially good show – when everyone talks about how good the food looks.
Just so long as FN don’t screw it up, like they do everything else they touch. They have the “anti-Midas” touch.
FN has a history of giving some of the losing contestants shows of their own anyway. Gertler comes to mind. The big goofy-looking guy, Tom, from last year got a show, I think. So I wouldn’t be surprised if they try to feature Susie Jimenez. (It will be hard for them to resist trying to profit off of someone so attractive and fundamentally decent.) I can also see them giving a shot to Mama’s Boy, maybe in another god-awful drive-around-and-comment-on-other-people’s-food programs.
And what bothered me about Mary Beth tonight wasn’t that she pushed Jeff away when she was eliminated. That’s an in-the-moment kind of reaction. It was her refusal to say she’d look at his show tonight. I mean, what the hell would it have cost her to be gracious?
And someone tell me why we didn’t see THAT elimination clip on the episode in which she was actually eliminated? Instead we saw her say, “Yes,” with this understanding sort of demeanor, and saw no hint of the other stuff.
Is this show so phony, they actually restage the big reveal?
Oy.
Wow, how ridiculously anticlimactic. So Susie’s show will be on Cooking Channel in about six months, right…?
OK, I have hated on Jeff from point one because I found him insufferable. But after watching the reunion special and watching his snarky impressions of everybody… I’m warming up to him, dammit…
By the way, what the HELL was up with the huge stain on his shirt after the pilot?
And Chris is a fucking loser asshole. I hope he slips in his kitchen and lands on a knife.
I’m happy that Jeff won, Mary Beth was my fave but I knew she wouldn’t make it, she needs to spend more time cooking! Suzie and her puffy under eye bags, tacky makeup, bald spot and snoozy dad stories needed to loose, phew… but I’m happy that dummy Vic didn’t win, that wold have been a total joke, at least Jeff looks and acts like a warm human being, not a fake or annoying douche.
Anyone else notice the amount of “soft touch” they used for the judges and yet left everyone else out to dry?
I noticed that too. Why was that necessary?
I watched this sad excuse for a show the last two weeks only because my wife loves it (don’t do there!). I didn’t watch tonight because if Jeff didn’t win I’d know there was a mole somewhere, like in the food truck race show last season that would ruin everthing…wait did that happen??? the yum yums lost??? they won every city? Sorry wrong show, same crap! Can’t wait to see the “losers” on Cooking TV where you can actually learn something!!
Happy Jeff won too, I rooted for him the whole way. He could very easily slip into douche-town with Mayor Guy Fieri, but he feels rather honest about his opinions. And sandwiches are great and can be extraordinarily diverse, so I see his show having legs. He at least feels like he can tell amusing stories.
Also, did anyone laugh at Guy commenting at Jeff about “Crutch Words”? Mr. “Money” and “Off The Hook” thinks those are a bad thing?
I literally chocked on the hypocrisy coming off of that bit of advice. This coming from a man whose entire “empire” is built off of crutch words.
Totally – I spit out my drink when I heard it.
During that take I could see him wincing about it and my first thought was, “How often is he really saying ‘boom’ to make the king of that garbage cringe?”
Oh wait, I forgot, it’s alright for Guy to do it because he has a few to mix it up a bit every now and then.
I’m glad Jeff won too, and I think he can be their next “star”, as opposed to the last 3 winners. I know sandwiches seem simple, but I’d be interested in it. And I also hope they don’t turn him into another Guy – one’s enough. As for Susie, she’ll get a show in about 6 months – either on FN or the Cooking Channel, so she need not worry. I just didn’t want her to win – I saw another RR coming, and, I’ve had enough of the RayRay and her “sammies”, “stoups”, and “bld’s”, and I didn’t want to see Susie go there. YAH Jeff.
Poor Susie never had a chance because of that other chick with the exact same show she was pitching.
This^
agreed….I told SWMBO (she who must be obeyed…a.k.a. my bride) that she wouldn’t win b/c food network already has a latin-american cooking show with a familiar theme to the one Susie was pushing….again, food network, the kings of obvious….
I agree – I don’t even see the point in pushing Susie to the end (or maybe I do now), because of exactly that reason.
AMEN to that – who’d they think they were fooling, anyway?
Give it a couple of months…Susie will be given her own show; Bravo or Hallmark have probably signed her on…
Glad Jeff won, but don’t be ignorant enough to think that this was not fixed. It has to do with demographics, Think about it, they already had an ethic cooking show led by a female, the soccer mom phony won the year before and they have the ulitmate white trash host in DDD. The gal had no chance and FN could not risk having another soccer mom wanna be chef or another white trash show. It comes down to advertising appeal and the amount they can charge for the slots.
FN has become a POS network, what happened to having shows actually about instructional cooking instead of some jack ass in front of a camera who has about as much talent as a McDonalds fry cook?
Amen to that. I watch FN a lot less these days because they don’t bother teaching anything about food or cooking anymore. I had high hopes for The Cooking Channel, which started off well filling that void, but is now being packed wall to wall with FN retreads and the same tired schtick I can see on the mothership.
I wonder if they get kickbacks from restaurants or marketing agencies when they send Guy or Emeril or Rachel or Jeffery or any of a half-dozen other hosts who do nothing but travel from restaurant to restaurant doing 10 minute spots? There are now a boatload of near-identical programs on both channels dedicated to this formula, and it can’t be because it’s all that popular. I smell payola.
Ya think? ;-) I’m pretty sure they ALL (not just Scripps/FN) use the same schtick on those America’s top N Cruise ships/has-been actors/ BBQ Shack countdown “competitions”.
they’re going to air a show about sandwiches??? they missed out a few weeks ago.
Interesting thought I’ve been meaning to post for weeks…and now can because the show is over. Notice how Aarti didn’t have *one* appearance other than the commercials for hungry kids? What kind of message is that? “You will be a star, but if you don’t “perform” as “well” as the others, your minimal “success” will not be featured, advertised and harped on in the next season as an “inspiration.”)
Also, from the promo, it looks like Jeff got to keep his sandwich idea, and Holy Colgate Batman is his set blindingly white.
I kid you not, when I saw Guy’s ugly face, I cringed, almost screamed, and covered my eyes.
Guy…on ANNE’S set.
Must…find…exorcist.
I can’t be the only one that noticed Giada tearing up when Vic left? Still watching the episode. But from the previews….you just know Penny is waiting to start some shit lol. Susie is adorable. Congrats Jeff.
Susie adorable? Dude, professional make-up artists could not make her look even remotely cute. What is so adorable about looking like you haven’t slept in two years?
And did you notice when she got the professional makeup job before her “show”–in certain angle she looked like Penny! Yikes.
Where in the name of all that’s holy did they find that hideous dress they stuffed her into? I’ve had hangovers that blinding, but usually a few aspirin and a nap helped. NOTHING could make that dress any more awful.
I always thought she was kinda cute, but when they put the “professional makeup” on her she looked kinda…old and manly…
Lol. I think its the bags. They turn me on.
I just hated how they didn’t even try to hide that the winner is predetermined by hiring a fake audience.
Seriously? Previous contestants? Some of which might not even watch food network? Some of which hold grudges?
Let’s say it had been Penny and Suzie and it wasn’t predetermined – no one would have voted Penny because she was a bitch.
Having actual viewers who actually might have some input would have made so much more sense than dragging in the losers again. I wanted to ask, “Why doesn’t Susie ever mention what a sopa IS?” And, “Why do you guys think we want cooking shows with a steady patter about people’s living and dead relatives?”
THIS! While it may have been the editing, she never once mentioned what a sopa was (which I think bears mentioning). The same with her camera challenge–it would have been nice if she explained why she cooked pork carnitas with orange sections, I really was interested in that. But instead, I got treated to yet another rendition of “Cooking with my Dead Dad: Sombrero Edition”
Exactly.
I didn’t watch much of the episode – figured Vic would lose first, then Jeff would win – suprirse, surprise, yawn – was watching the UFC fights, but I tuned in between bouts and caught Susie’s premiere. I kept waiting for her to explain what a sopa is, and I still don’t know. Some kind of finger food made on what looks like thick, raw tart dough? Whatever. And STFU with the stories already!
Blah. Congrats to Jeff. I’m glad he won. I’ll actually give his show a try.
When they flashed the picture of Dead Old Dad, my 13 yo son yells from across the room “wait —- Kramer was that chick’s Dad????”"
Seriously.
^ Love!!!
I think I remember a couple of seasons where they had a live finale and had people vote for who they would watch and wanted to win after it was down to the final 2.
Was it still predetermined? Most likely, it is really easy to get people to agree with you when you can make the one you want to lose look bad with editing.
Most boring episode in the history of this show.
I literally held a fist in the air every time Guy whistled.
I agree, Penny was a waste trying to make it with more drama
I haven’t finished watching this (PT), nor did I read this post, but DUH WHO WINS. The concept of a focus group implies an unbiased, uninformed group of people. So yeah, FAIL from the start
Then there’s the Suzy-Jeff competition–her only story is “my dad…my dad on his death bed…my dad…”
And the last few seasons there’s been a real audience. Tonight it was just the bitter others.
What happens next season? Every episode is a variation on a FN show–they have to make a menu for 9 gay men, or they have to make a whole menu with nothing but canned soup, or they have to make a dish using only two ingredients, or they have to cook a meal and as they cook they can only use the word “AWESOME!” to describe each ingredient.
So maybe Suzy gets to drive around and rate Taco Bells. And Jeff will put everything between his buns, and make potty jokes about the ingredients (sure hope he uses whole grain buns–lots of fiber jokes there. Yay!)
You guys notice how at the end of the show Bobby Flay comes on and tells us to go to foodnetwork.com to find out what the judges really think? Can’t we tell what they thought based on who was eliminated? Do you think if we logged on tonight we’d find out the judges actually loved Susie but just picked Jeff for the hell of it? That always bothered me.
Great job with the recaps. The time spent reading them each week was so much more entertaining than watching the show.
I’ve been meaning to mention that. It always bugged me too because it’s like he’s saying that what they said on the show doesn’t matter… Which very well may be the case. This show is as phony as Guy’s whole persona.
“Great job with the recaps. The time spent reading them each week was so much more entertaining than watching the show”
+1
Huh. “Only one of you will have a show on food network”. doesn’t the runner-up get a show too? A quite predictable season, after seeing “dollar signs” light up on Susie Fogelson’s eyeballs everytime she saw Jeff. Great recaps, though! Those really made the season for me :)
That wasn’t the only thing “lighting up” in Medusa when she laid eyes on the Sandwich King. She of the Dorothy Zbornak closet was *this* close to becoming Blanche Deveraux. I’m trying to recall how Jeff fared on the episode or two that she was gone.
Enywho, my theory (a “regular” guy wins – can’t have 3 female winners or more tats) panned out and the spoilers merely proved me right.
I bet Vic gets a show before Susie does
Yep. That’s what I think too. I doubt Susie will have a show at all, frankly. They already have the hispanic woman chef whose name I can’t recall that they have frantically been trying to pimp out for about a year now, with little success. I doubt they are going to switch and invest that in Susie.
I don’t think they’ve really done ANYTHING with the Mexican show (Mexican Made Easy). Too bad as her food actually looks good and achievable, usually.
Her problem is a completely unpronounceable last name, and they’ve stuck her in the Saturday AM ghetto with no re-airings. At least Anne’s show gets shown again occasionally.
Agreed. If I didn’t have a five-year-old, I wouldn’t even know that show exists (too early in the morning). I like her, and if people can pronouce Giada’s name, they can pronounce Marcella’s. Her food looks great, and I wish they’d put her on later.
Valladolid is not that hard to pronounce, I think. Va (as you would pronounce Ba in Baja) – lla (as you would pronounce YAhoo) – do (as DOmain) lid (like a the lid in a can or something). See? Easy!
That was my thought as well. Or perhaps it’s just wishful thinking on my part. Susie’s talents are in her cooking. Effervescent as she may be she doesn’t have the personality that would would make me want to watch her in the types of shows they usually give to the runners-up. Remember her commentary in Kitchen Stadium and her inability to eat anything in quantity in Chelsea market? I can see Vic in this role so much more clearly. Though Susie would make a decent ‘celebrity’ judge.
Susie F was touching herself under the table every time Jeff walked on the set!
Does this mean now that little Susie Jimenez gets a show where she has to go all over the country making a glutton of herself eating giant burritos and burgers the size of tractor wheels? P.S. That would be a very good television program. P.P.S. I would call it “Lookit How BIG It Is!” P.P.P.S. Because I’m a very subtle guy.
So, as I suspected….he was phony even before FN got their grubby paws on him.
Took his catchphrase from a book written by Tom Coliccho
http://www.amazon.com/wichcraft-Craft-Sandwich-into-Meal/dp/0609610511
How could the judges not have picked up on such an obvious ripoff?? Maybe it would have required acknowledging an actual chef on a competing network with a much more interesting show and way more talented contestants.
Oh my gosh…Colicchio’s book came out in 2009! What a loser Jeff is!
Nice catch! He’s always been way too obnoxious to me. How about the way he said brrrrraaaaaaaazzzzzzzziol. He will be giving Giada a run for her money soon on the asinine pronunciation master.
^love
Why the heck even make this show when the producers know what kind of show they want from the beginning? Fail all around.
Why this show? Because it gets big ratings. Period. The show is an end in itself. If it actually does produce a successful FN host (so far, only Guy F) then that’s a bonus. There are obviously tons of people out there way may qualified to have a show than any of these contestants. The FN execs know where to find them without staging a reality show. (They could start with the many talented and camera-ready contestants that Chopped seems to have no trouble finding.
That said, I think that the FN brass really does thing they have a potential star with Jeff. A regular midwestern guy who makes sandwiches could go over big with a male demographic that FN ignores. And unlike several FN hosts, he obviously does enjoy entertaining and being in front of crowds. (Remember. Failed stand-up comic).So they could trot him out for all the promotional appearances Guy F. is to busy to make. (Or groom him as a successor if Guy bolts the FN.)
Personally, I can’t stand Jeff. I think he’s a big, smarmy phony. He reminds me of a slick car salesman, or the guy in the office who comes on like he’s your best friend and then stabs you in the back. Just that Chicago accent alone is enough to make me not watch his show.
Well done Jillian! You called it a couple weeks ago. I have to say that I yawned an incredible amount watching the show that I actually went to sleep knowing how pre-ordained it was. Couldn’t have been a more fucked up show.
me and thee (went to sleep) I felt myself getting drowsy and told my bride “wake me when they get close to announcing ‘sandwich boy’ the winner.” Sure enough, I crashed with 20 minutes left (had spent the day in the georgia heat) and she woke me up b4 the announcement. Definite f’ing snoozer of a show…
I thought Giada was giving her self some purple nurples
How politically incorrect! I mean really? Picking a white man over a minority? This must be protested.
Right! I was wondering if FN was going to give in to political correctness and pick crybaby Jiminez, especially since she wept until the very end. She brought a river of tears to the finale and the way the two bobble-headed female judges kept grinning and nodding at her, I thought for sure she was going to win. Thank god she lost and I never have to see her tear-stained face again.
oh you probably will see it again…in her show, which the runner-up always gets….
Guy Ferry is so annoying. I’m surprised Jill didn’t make fun if his off-camera remarks when Jeff and Suzie each made their pilots. He was practically orgasming with fake excitement.
And when I first saw him standing behind the set, I was sobembarassed for him and the network. The man is a walking joke. He looks like such a clown. He’s not the one you should base your company’s reputation on. He could have very well gave been standing there with a pile of spaghetti on his head and wouldn’t have looked any less ridiculous.
Guy needs to give Anne her hair back.
haha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
During the reunion show, what was with all the tension between Mary Beth and Jeff? I don’t remember seeing anything happen between them during the show, but now there’s friction? Did I miss something?
I was wondering if it wasn’t shown so that their feud didn’t taint our opinion of Jeff.
Now we know that Mary Beth will not get a show…
If I never see Mary Beth’s mug on TV again it will be too soon.
I was a bit surprised at that, too. I was also surprised that the Victionary never made it into any episode before the reunion.
Also, since I’m listing things I was surprised about, why didn’t Katy or Juba say a single word during the entire reunion? There were several shots of Juba grinning, but I barely knew Katy was there. She only existed as a set of knees behind other ex-contestant’s shoulders.
I was surprised we didn’t hear more about the Victionary because while it doesn’t make me want to take Vic more seriously as a food authority, it does make me find him more appealing in that “mama’s boy” way they were trying to sell us.
I’m not sure why you were surprised that Katy (of the Chinese Worker fame) and Juba (who can cook but can’t talk) weren’t featured. They weren’t liked or hated enough for anyone to care what they thought. I’m amazed Howie got a line considering he shouldn’t have even been on the show to begin with.
Right? Is she still made at him for giving her the duck to roast. Because, in case you missed it, SHE HAS NEVER COOKED A WHOLE DUCK BEFORE!
I would have been pleased with either of these finalists winning, and do agree that Jeff was picked because the male demographic is completely ignored. We don’t need another “chick oriented” show but I think Susie will get a show regardless…haven’t I seen Tom on a few? I also think that Jeff can play to a crowd, which is something Susie seemed to lose the last couple of weeks.
I think Susie is adorable, but relied on the “dead parent” card too much…too bad that card was already overused last season by the always lousy, teary eyed Aarti. You remember, how “my mum used to always make me lamb when I was sad, I miss her and the lamb so much.” Unlike Aarti, I suspect Susie’s dad is really dead.
It was fairly predictable though….when picking a winner no man can be better looking than Bobby, no woman can be more attractive than Giada.
If Suzie wasn’t cute, I don’t think a lot of people would have been rooting for her. She didn’t have much personality on camera. She had good stories, but she never presented them in an interesting way. They just felt a little flat. At least Jeff puts something into his stories, even if it is a little ‘schtick’. That schtick can be controlled and presented in a more pleasing manner. Suzie never seemed real unless she was tearing up about her parents and that gets old real quick. Without having to resort to that every show, shed become real boring to watch. I could have easily seen her show turn into rhe Mexican version of Giada where she has a fiesta in her backyard that she had to cook for.
I completely agree…I enjoyed the schtick, even the early stuff that made the judges cringe. Jeff had “it” and that is why he won. I would watch his show because he is hilarious.
Susie may have gotten by on tears if Aarti did not get there first. But she lost something as the season progressed….maybe it became evident that she (like Aarti) was a one trick pony. When all else fails, cry. But i did find her far more likable than Aarti.
Even though I thought it was Jeff already – when they panned to the contestants right before they announced, Susie was already having to hold back tears. I knew then..this was a re-edit of the announcement (like they showed during the reunion special with Mary Beth and snippets of the other).
I don’t necessarily think MB came off as a douche when she rejected Jeff’s hug. She could have just been morbidly embarrassed that she broke down, and didn’t want anyone touching her. I tend to be that way, too. Of course there could be tons of backstory we don’t know, but I understood where she came from.
I am sooooo glad Jeff won. It just made me so angry how the judges were all “Susie’s great. She has a story. Blah blah blah.”. Seriously, if I watch a cooking show, I don’t give two craps about where the hell the chef learned it! I want to know how to make it and if it tastes good. Pork cooked in lard? Did her father die of a heart attack? Surprised she didn’t mention that in one of the million times she talked about her father.
There is no link between consumption of saturated fat and heart attacks. Saturated fat doesn’t “clog your arteries.” Cooking in lard is actually much healthier than using vegetable or seed oils. So I was actually very pleased to see her cook the pork in lard in the traditional manner.
That was one of the most bizarre finales ever, from the over-all tone that lacked any kind of excitement, to the anti-climactic. reveal. In the past, hasn’t there been a studio audience? And the reveal is done by revealing the picture of the winner? And then there’s some cheering, maybe confetti, etc.? Bobby delivered the announcement in the same tone of voice that he’s said, “The chef who is going home is…”
I couldn’t even look at Guy Fierri. He’s just gross, from his multi-colored mustache & goatee to his ridiculous bleach-blond hair. And I had to laugh when he criticized Jeff for saying “boom” to fill-up dead air time. This from the man who gave us the oh-so-eloquent “off the hook” and all of his other inane sayings.
I wish they had shown the clip of Jeff dripping sweat into a dish he was preparing…and the subsequent look on Giada’s face. Priceless. Or, maybe they did. I was so bored that I fell asleep a couple of times.
I wondered about Jeff’s sweatband during his “pilot” – I knew he wouldn’t keep that thing on. Maybe the A/C is better at Anne Burrell’s set.
Yet another show on Food Network I won’t be watching.
Still can’t figure out how Vic made it to the final three.
Chocolate-covered asparagus – ‘nuf said!
It’s because he’s an idiot boy and he grins all the time.
First, thanks for all the recaps. They enhanced my enjoyment of this show and gave me something to read every Monday. You could have made them even longer, in my opinion.
I’m happy that Jeff won, I think his show will be fine. Even if you’re not interested in it, it will still be far from the most annoying thing on the network.
This was a total demographic choice, and I think the judges have known for weeks who they wanted. They probably had a pretty good idea before week one. The last few years have seen plenty of women and clowns dominating the network. A down to earth guy from the midwest is actually something exotic for Food Network at this point in time, and it gives them a much needed dose of normalcy to appeal to that audience that is tired of the Aartis, D’Arabians and Fieris. If he doesn’t go overboard on the schtick, I think he could do well for them.
Also, am I the only one who found Jeff’s food the most appealing throughout the night? I would honestly try both of his sandwich recipes. Normally, Susie’s food looks great, but I wasn’t sure what either of her dishes were tonight. I’ve heard of deep frying in lard, but she seemed to be simmering pork and vegetables in it. Would have been nice to better understand what she was doing. And those things she made in her pilot? Didn’t know what those were either, and they didn’t look very appealing. I was also never clear on what Vic’s fish thing was. And that, Susie Fogelson, is why I’d rather hear about the food than family stories.
And why did they make the former contestants the focus group? Because they already knew who they wanted. Same reason why they concocted that challenge to take out Vic. Guy Fieri has gel and sunglasses to buy, he doesn’t have time to direct three pilots, especially when they don’t even really need two.
“Why on Earth did Food Network air the “reunion” show before the finale? No one does that! That’s against, like, every unwritten reality TV rule in existence! ”
Incorrect. ust about every reality show airs their reunion right before the finale. Project Runway and The Bachelorette come to mind.
So…are Giada and Susie Fogelson going to the same plastic surgeon? Because they’re starting to look like they’re morphing into the same person.
YES! I noticed that too! And while we’re on the topic of Susie, can someone please explain why her hair always looks like someone went at it with a garden rake? WTF? Curly hair is beautiful, but for goodness’ sake, she looks like
I meant to say she looks like a crazy person (computer malfunction). :)
I wonder if the sudden “villainization” of sore-loser Mary Beth is an attempt to make the audience forget how much they hate Penny? I think FN likes her and can see Penny getting a show/more work even though she didn’t finish in the top.
Somehow I had failed to notice Jeff’s sweater, that does look pretty ridiculous. So funny how they start out fumbling and magically wrap it all up by the 3rd take right?
I about died when he started the “Boom” thing, I thought great we have another Tyler Florence on our hands. Glad he nipped that in the bud!
But I won’t watch his show anyway – since I don’t eat bread.
Did anyone catch Tuschman’s comment about Suzie speaking “Mexican”? Mexican is not a fucking language – they speak Spanish.
He is a slimy, slippery ignoramus.
I did like Jeff’s imitation of Tuschy and the “hole in two”. I’m almost surprised they let that one slip by.
Loved that joke and was also surprised it was in the final edit!
Loved when Jeff did Tusch.
Too funny, though I thought he was referring euphemistically to the food culture. Perhaps giving him too much credit.
You should look into your language history. The Spanish language was brought there by Spaniards, it has evolved into a version of Spanish called Mexican Spanish (Mexican for short). It is actually a more popular term to use in the US where English speaking Mexicans incorporate Spanish into their English language. So it’s not exactly incorrect of Bob to have said that to Suzie.
I noticed it to, but it wasn’t the “speaking mexican” part that made me laugh- it was the fact that he said she had such “joie de vivre”, but he didn’t “want to [call her something] mexican.” Joie de vivre (or joie de vive, whichever is spelled right) is french, not spanish.
Also, I might have just been really stoned, but guy’s facial hair/goatee/mouth area looks like an old hairy woman’s vagina. It freaks me out.
Oh, come on, people! The most anticlimactic finale in recent memory??? Remember the Aaron McCargo, Jr. season? FN telegraphed that win for weeks. The clincher, when I actually said WTH and laughed out loud, was when Adam won the Las Vegas food challenge, Lisa came in second, Aaron was a distant third–and the Flayman announced that they were not eliminating anyone that week!!!
In that week’s camera challenge, Bobby F the Director had Lisa rapelling down a glass wall while discussing wine choices or something and Aaron had the difficult promo of throwing some dice on a craps table.
FN actually had to formulate Aaron’s POV for him and they edited the finale to show the studio audience grinning like idiots and laughing heartily at everything Aaron said.
So, definitely not the most anticlimactic or telegraphed finale in recent memory!
Very true. The might as well have called the series ‘Aaron Gets a Show Out of This Fake Competition’. So blatant no amount of editing was going to make it look like anything less than the fix it was.
Also in that episode the had to entertain an audience. no amount of editing made Aaron’s performance in any way decent. I think that was when they had to change the rules.
I’m in no way a Lisa fan. But the woman was afraid of heights stuck in a harness being pulled up and down. Clearly it was a though thing for her to do. She did it but still got criticized for not sucking it up enough. Yet Aaron took countless takes and they praise him for being able to walk across the room.
Yeah, and look what a “star” Aaron ended up being for the network. His show is hardly ever on, and they trot him out every once in a while as a guest on someone else’s more popular show.
It was a truly priceless season of TNFNS!
And P.S. I’m glad Jeff won this season. Since I don’t cook and I love to make sandwiches because of that fact, I think I’ll actually watch Jeff’s show. Unless it gets way too difficult for me to follow. Which will probably happen.
It was actually quite entertaining watching them scramble around trying to find reasons/excuses to keep Aaron on the show.
They sure as hell couldn’t put Mormon Kelsey in any of those scenarios (booze, gambling, showgirls!). It was preordained that she go in 4th place and frankly while young, she had the most potential of anyone there.
Frankly, of all the contestants who have had, or still have shows, I’ve only liked her, Amy and the Hearty Boys, but all in fairly small doses.
Jeff gets one shot and it won’t be recorded; my viewing will remain incognito as far as Nielsen is concerned.
Aaron is an uneducated moron. I actually liked Lisa that season and am rather proud that if she was offered another show on FN, she did not accept it. Though she did appear on Chopped All Stars.
That’s the season I gave up on the show, because it was SO blatantly obvious they changed the rules to save his ass.
Now I only watch to see how early I can guess the ultimate winner.
At least now when I tune in to FN I won’t have to stare at the thirteen inch promo logo for the next FN star. It had gotten so large it was blocking out people’s faces on the programs.
In some cases this was a good thing.
I was okay with either Jeff or Vic. Just as long as it wasn’t some minority female who specializes in cooking crap that I wouldn’t feed to my dog. You know, like last year’s winner Aarti Farti.
I got the distinct impression that Suzie’s father was an illegal. She kept saying “when he crossed the border”, not when he moved here.
Racist much?
I actually heard her mention “crossed the border” too and wondered exactly what she meant by that. It did sound like he came here illegally.
When you get here legally you don’t cross a border?
I was just saying it sounded ‘suspect’. It would seem like if anyone came here legally, they’d want to stray far away from using phrases that made it sound like they border jumped. Just sayin…
I’m getting sick of the whole “Limiting yourself into one cooking style” type of show anyway. Why do these people have to stick with just one type of cuisine? I may be Italian, but I don’t cook it every day. I also cook Asian and Spanish stuff too. And once these chefs have been on for a while, they start getting bored and making up gross shit just because it has to be different than the other 10,000 recipes they’ve made in the past.
Why can’t FN bring on a chef who can cook ANY style?? What I was getting with the judges loving Suzie’s whole Mexican POV is, she can’t cook anything else real well, so they wanted her to stick with what she knows. If she can’t cook anything but Mexican, why would I want to watch this person? What authority does she bring as a food specialist if she only knows a narrow culinary viewpoint? Shouldn’t a FN “Star” be able to tackle any cuisine?
Some “chefs” do cook a variety of different cuisines, like Sunny, Ray Ray and Guy, but their food looks like vomit so it doesn’t really count.
I wish they would let their Mexican hosts cook real Mexico food instead of Americanized crap with Mexican “flavors.”
Must have missed all that, I only had/have eyes for GIADA!!!!!!
Hmm… Didn’t watch much of the episode, but from what I saw, it looked like Giada was in soft focus. You might want to don some beer goggles if you look for her IRL.
Ah, Exactly! I wondered why she was so fuzzy! And what was with her awkward cross legged stance in the triangle red dress? Did you notice that?
Yes, that was strange. But did you notice Susie Fogelson’s legs? She should not wear short skirts.
LOL…the picture and caption with Ina was priceless!
THANK YOU for re-capping this poop fest so I didn’t have to watch it.
I’m sure it was painful for you and I, for one, truly appreciate your sacrifice.
That Ina thing really made me laugh hard. Best part of the recap.
Also of note, how many shows can this cat possibly do before we’re all bored shitless? Sandwiches for Christ’s sake? I can’t wait to see the one where he actually (wait for it)………………puts cheese and ham between two slices of bread. Oh the humanity!
even if you had no brain cells, you could tell that Jeff was going to win by the way they went on and on about how “marketable” his show would be to audiences when they were “deciding” at the last minute to make the star. They never said that about Susie’s show. Fogelson went on about how she would like to air a show about sandwiches and how likable he would be to men and women. You could just see the dollar signs in her eyes.
Did anyone else notice that the clip they used in the reunion of Jeff running into that fridge thing while making fun of Alicia was from the finale episode, despite the fact that they acted like the finale had not yet happened?
I haven’t seen the reunion show yet (I refused to watch it first, so I tapped it), but I believe Jeff actually did run into the fridge as well with Alicia.
I didn’t see the reunion, so I can’t comment on if it was in fact the same footage of him when he made fun of Vic in the last episode… was it? I’ll be watching the reunion taping tonight and check it out.
OK, I just watched it and you’re right. It was the same clip. I don’t know why they used that one when he (I believe) did the same thing in an earlier episode.
I was wondering about that too! And I was thinking about the logistics of the reunion/finale “focus group” – like they would have had to do them both within a relatively short time to be able to have them all there. I was thinking “really? they did a reunion show and then stuck around while they filmed the last episode to participate in the ‘focus group?’ that doesn’t make sense.” So now that you say it, faking that the reunion was after the finale makes sense.
I think they kept all the contestants in the eliminated house in LA and shipped them to NYC with the final group, but again put them up in a loser house. How else are the last four eliminated in LA available to do Iron Chef in NYC?
It was a 2 month commitment, and if you look at MB, who has real straight hair, you can see how it grew up during that time. At any rate, they probably taped the finale then the reunion, which would explain all the backslapping Jeff got; Stevie Wonder could have seen who won from the edit Jeff got on the reunion show.
Of course, FN editors are idiots, so I don’t expect anything less from them.
-My guess is that all contestants agree contracturally that they all will remain around for (3?) months in a hotel room (after elimination from the house) until ALL the filming is finished.
-Otherwise, eliminated contestants returning home would give the winners away
-This way they are all available for subsequent challenges and “focus” grouse
-Your thoughts?
Makes sense – kinda sucks for the first person, though, doesn’t it? Sitting in a hotel room for 3 months after being eliminated the first day?
Sounds like a perfect gig to me — getting paid to hang around, with none of the pressure.
I still hate Tucshman…you can pop coke bottles with that nose of his.
The dead giveaway was when they kept Ms. mexicana Susie around. Uh, how many shows about Mexican cooking do they already have at FN?
My wife IM’d me right after the finale was over (I was making an emergency run to Trader Joe’s, a store no one at the FN has ever heard of) asking “how many douchebags host shows at FN?” My response was “All of them except one – Ina.”
You’re joking right? The only piece of advice the woman gives is to use ‘good’ ingredients to make sure her neighbors in the hamptons are happy but wont give up a few hours to see a terminally ill kid whose dying wish was to meet her – that behavior doesn’t qualify her as a douchebag?
JK, you realize that story is a crock of s***, right? Mommmy said he wanted to meet her since he was 3. 3-year old boys want to meet Spongebob Squarepants and superheroes, not some old woman he doesn’t know.The mom wanted this, and thought she would be roaming through the house at the Hamptons.
More than likely IG’s PR team screens a shitload of emails, and most of them are probably scammers. What are the odds that Ina even saw the original mail…probably slimmer than most think. And when she found out, she said she had a scheduling conflict but offered to take the kid to the FN set to play in the kitchen. Mommy declined.
Mommy had a whole Diss Ina site set up complete with a PayPal “gimme money” button. She has scammed trips to Hawaii out of that site. She began backpedalling when the haterade spill got out of control. Including mentioning that her kid was not dying and was not terminal….in fact, the survival rate for his disease is 96 percent.
But her blog site garnered million$ of hit$ after di$$ing Ina. You do the math there. I $u$pect there i$ more to the $tory…..
She couldn’t have picked someone richer than a daytime host on Food Network? Seems like an elaborate scheme for very small payoff.
Regardless of the Make-A-Wish thing, I think naming Ina as the pinnacle of FN hosts is ridiculous.
She is one of the better hosts of FN. And probably one of the last original players since most moved to the cooking channel I have to pay extra to get.
Now I get Faarti Paarti and other crap from TNFNS “winners.” And Sandra was better when she was half in the bag.
I too am surprised you never hear about Trader Joe’s on FN. It’s got that “douchebag/foodie/we’re better than you” persona that’s perfect for FN.
Actually, the reunion show for project runway happens before the finale.
I was also glad that Jeff “won” (i.e. he was hand-picked on week one). The Food Network must be realizing that they have become Hysteria House, manufacturing heavly produced little clon-like ticky tacky chefs that learn to master what was mysteriously become the standard schtick for any FN presenter (you know, thinks like “OMG, it just melts in your mouth, it’s SO good, you can taste the peppery arugula! It’s a party in your mouth, the flavors just explode” (you get my drift). Now perhaps Jeff will bring some sanity/normalcy into FN?
Also, I hope that he doesn’t fall for the paternalistic approach that the FN takes towards its viewers whom they think know nothing about food or the world and think they can get away with saying things like “I am making the Greek “pagoto”-variety of ice cream” (“Pagoto” simply means “ice cream” in Greek, nothing special about it), anyway, don’t get me started on that one (which includes Giada’s Italian pronounciation of Italian ingredients) Jeff, you are (gasp) perhaps our only hope? Don’t disappoint us!!
Oh lord, a dude making sandwiches is our only hope? Let’s see…meat + bread = sandwich. Most 3 year olds can do this. Even bachelors can do it. I need a show to tell me how to make a sandwich??? He’d better do it under water or standing on his head or strapped to the wind of an airplane.
I didn’t watch because, thanks to you (and I do mean thanks) and Mr Obvious, I knew Jeff was the winner. I DO hope his show shines. No, really, I do. I would HATE to see one of the losers get their own show on Cooking Channel … even though I don’t hate Kelsey’s Essential enough to stay away from it. “Like you Kelsey! I really really like you!”
If Jeff doesn’t douche it up like Guy Ferry I’ll watch The ‘Samwich’ King. Fogelson is probably with the Manwich people right now trying to put together a deal ala Melissa d’Arabian and Hidden Valley Ranch.
Did you see the part where Guy “On Point” Fieri called out Jeff for using buzz words!?
I wish someone at the reunion would have done a Giada impersonation… that would have made the whole season a little less awful.
I would have loved to have seen Jeff shove two melons in his shirt and start prancing around and over-annunciating words with all of his teeth showing.
For some reason, I’m picturing it like the scene in Liar, Liar when Jim Carrey is aggresuvely making fun of the new boss in the conference room. LOL
I think Jeff was the right pick to win. He has a sense of humor, is interesting to watch, his food generally seemed good, and most importantly for the bean-counters at FN, he can pull double-duty in that he would be equally capable of doing a cooking show and doing presenter duties on a primetime FN show. I don’t think anyone he was up against had the right mix for that… Susie would be good at the former and Mary Beth at the latter.
I think they should give Dzintra and Alicia their own show. They could call it ” What the Fuck? with D and A.” I would totally watch those two running around all sweaty and nervous, tripping, flinging shit all over the kitchen. It would certainly be more entertaining than every other show featured now.
You know, Dzintra actually owns a small restaurant where I live, and in person she is actually pretty normal and nice. Absolutely nothing compared to the way she was on FNS.
It would fill the void left by the newly sanitized Sandra Lee… which would be AWESOME.
Dyzintra and Jyll deserve a show…
A new show about sandwiches WOW!!
After the first 10 sandwiches we will see how to diversify:
1- Steak sandwich in white bread
2-Steak sandwich in RYe
3- Steak sandwichin Ciabatta roll
4- Steak sandwichin french bread
and so on.. but wait he will keep you interested, by takin out the onions in one, adding aioli to one and mayo next week. And the real twist, this week is toasted and next week is cold!!!
Can’t wait for this sandwich King (sarcasm included)
totally agree.
Project Runway has always aired their reunion show before the finale… so not really that big of a deal.
Jeff did well and suzy did too. Last year they gave the loser the most outrageous food show who is even worse then he was in the show originally. Arti is last years winner and does not hold a candle to these two people. I think suzy deserves a show too dump anyone of the ones on there already starting with Duff, Ina, Giada, Rachael, or Feiti. Any one of them could go. But knowing the Fn they will most likely give a spot to penny the biotch from hell. Maybe a cameo on heat seakers with the bro’s yo.
What is it with all the posts saying there aren’t enough sandwiches to base a show on?
There are hundreds of variations on a sandwich. Unless FN plans on running new episodes of the Sandwich King for ten years or more, they should have no problem coming up with new topics.
Throw in soup, salad, condiments, etc, and there’s plenty to do a series on.
Check out the Scanwiches blog sometime. You’d be amazed at how many options are out there.
Is it a limitless concept, like other shows on FN? No, but it’s got enough to get a decent run. We all know he’s going to end up hosting some variation on DDD in the end anyway, since that’s his strength.
I agree. No offense to anyone, but it definitely sounds like the typical ignorant American viewpoint. Every culture has its own version of a sandwich which gives Jeff and absorbent amount of possibilities. Just because you’re only familiar with ham and cheese or PB&J, doesn’t mean that’s where it ends. I am actually interested in watching his show. I hardly ever make sandwiches because that’s the one area where I don’t feel too creative. I hope to get some good ideas from this guy. At least it’s something different on FN and (shockingly) something that’s finally relatable to me.
…absorbent???
LOL, damn auto correct. That was meant to be “an abundant amount of possibilities”
When I saw ‘absorbent’, for a minute, I thiught it was a reference to ‘The Moistmaker’.
The second picture of Jah’Dah made me laugh SO hard. The shent picture of Ina was also laugh-out-loud funny.
This is probably one of my favorite posts based on the number of times I laughed at it. Great work! Thanks to you I only had to watch the first couple episodes of this awful show when it started… and I could just find out everything else in a faster, funnier format.
So did anyone notice that Bobby Flay said in order to be a good FN star you needed to have a good vocabulary. They best vocabulary in Food television is owned by Nigella Lawson. They ought to send Giada over to Nigella for vocabulary lessons. These 2 are most definitely 2 ends of the vocabulary Bell curve.
For the record, several reality competition shows air the reunion special before the finale, such as Project Runway and Rupaul’s Drag Race. The idea is to get all of the contestants together one last time to debate who was the worst and who might win.
I’m catching the reunion show right now on Food Network and let me just say that this is the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen. And yet…I continue to watch.
HILARIOUS! I am laughing out loud!!! I love the Food Network, but it’s so fun making fun of people, right?
Thanks food network Canada for playing the reunion special before the finale. Good call. (also for skipping last weeks episode of top chef desserts with the bake shop wars)
It really was pathetic.,
“A lot of people don’t know the difference between satire and mean-spirited ridicule.”
Thank you! That has been one of the reasons why I stopped reading the comments on this site for a while. I hate how people love to post the most hate filled stuff whilst hiding behind the anonymity of their computer. There definitely is a fine line between making fun of someone in a humerus manner and just being outright mean and nasty. I like making fun of people, but some of the comments here are just uncalled for and total turns me off to this site sometimes.
p.s. Jill always cracks me up because she knows the difference.
*humorous, dear. it’s “humorous”- unless you’re talking about the bone in you upper arm…
Thank you for the support of my statement, but it seems the post from which you drew my quote has been deleted. Likely because I didn’t kiss Jillian’s feet. I’m not saying she doesn’t always crack you up, and I’m not saying she never cracks me up, but at times I’m not entirely certain she does know the difference. You’re funny, Jillian, but a 21st century Dorothy Parker you ain’t.
LOL – You know what I mean ;) Damn you autocorrect. I gotta stop replying from my phone.