Pat Fish's Blog: TV-Fashion & Food Review, Project Runway, Hell's Kit,Top Chef, Next Food Network Star

We’ve got fashion and cooking in this TV review post. Project Runway is a hit fashion design reality contest now running full speed on Lifetime TV. There’s pics of winning, losing and mediocre fashions plus some critiques, comments on the contenders.

Running now we’ve got Hell’s Kitchen as well as BravoTV’s Top Chef Vegas. We’ve got reviews on the shows, the food and the contenders.

Finally, we follow up on Melissa D’Arabian, winner of this past year’s Next Food Network Star. Her food is cheap to make but read what the real cost is.

All with pics and video you’ll find nowhere else on the Internet.

Pic of the Day

Lifetime’s “Project Runway” A Fashion Hit

I have quite enjoyed “Project Runway” now featured on Lifetime. As I understand it, this series of a reality show for fashion designers was featured on another cable network and just changed over to Lifetime this week. I daresay this is an indicator that the show has been very successful as Lifetime is a network for women and women are probably the base audience for this series. Alongside our fine homosexual brethren I add with a smile.

So far I’ve been busy compiling pic montages of the series and have little verbiage to add. I think this is a great series but it is definitely for fashion afficiandos let’s not kid ourselves.

Site for the series HERE

I have a few comments on the remaining nine contenders as it’s a bit dizzying to keep up with all the fashion designs, who did what, as well as observe personality quirks of the contenders.

Epperson, now here’s an odd fellow. He has about thirty pounds of hair on his head and once he had to wrap all the dreadlocks up in a scarf and he looked like one of those fellows who ride around on flying carpets. Epperson does do rather unusual designs and one thing to note about this show, the ordinary is not where you want to go. The show doesn’t cotton to out-of-this-world fashion designs either, be cautioned. But it is a show designed to capture the designer with a fashion flair that would still be acceptable to your ordinary female.

A couple of very young females are very much in contention this season, to include Shirin, Althea and Carol Hannah. I’m talking young women in their early to mid-20’s here. Quite impressive to be in the top ten on this American Idol of fashion design.

Finally, somebody tell Gordana to please find some shampoo and wash her damn hair. Gordana is NOT, ahem, one of the younger females in this contest. She’s not such a bangup fashion designer either.

On to the pic montages and join in for additional opinions, caveats, brickbats and unrequested opinions.

2009 Contenders for Project Runway
Christopher
Johnny-sent home
Louise-sent home
Irina
Ari-sent home
Nicolas
Mitchell-sent home
Shirin
Gordana
Carol Hannah
Ramon-Lawrence-sent home
Logan
Malvin-sent home
Qristyl-sent home
Epperson
Althea

Hell’s Kitchen Fall 09 Down to Four

Fox’s Web Site for the Series HERE.

I tune in to this series but it holds little allure for me. It is almost a icon in the field of cooking show contests but folks an hour of bleeped out cussing gets old real fast.

Which is not to say I’m not intrigued by the series and now that it’s down to the final four I am keenly interested. I even, by now, have a favorite I think will walk away with the top prize.

I cover all shows from 9/8/09 through 9/29 with this post, including the pics.

One of the major laughs that stands out recently is the week two of the contenders could not tell lamb from venison. Now folks these are both food items I never cook but I’m sure I’d be able to tell them apart.

We also had a couple of shows in a row that had two contenders, both now eliminated, that couldn’t seem to cook a halibut thoroughly.

Kevin, I think, is going to win this thing.

Below some pics from the shows being reviewed.

suzanne, tenille, dave, ariel, kevin-left on hell's kitchen
suzanne sent home, kevin, ariel won…prettiest dish, cleaned streets

Top 4 left in Hell’s Kitchen as of 10/4/09:
Tenille
Kevin
David
Ariel

Top Chef Vegas-The Cadillac of Cooking Shows

The Next Food Network Star is the cooking show contest for us home cooks. But for the really talented cooks out there, Top Chef is the way to go.

I’ve been watching this cooking series regularly and have compiled some pics from the September shows on thru the most recent NEW show on 9/23/09.

On one recent show the contenders cooked snails. On another they cooked proteins with appropriate French sauces.

In the most recent NEW show, aired on 9/23/09, guest judges were Penn and Teller of magic fame. Which was really a smile in that Teller doesn’t talk. And just how is he going to give a critique on the food without uttering a word?

Well he made gestures and all and somehow it worked.

Contender Robin won the Quickfire challenge which was to create two dishes that reflected the “yin and yang” of something, like good and evil or angel’s and devil’s in our lives. Robin is a contender that looked headed for elimination but this win should put her back in contention.

The elimination challenge on that night was to “deconstruct” a meal. Folks this is a food fad only a chef would dream up.

The idea is for the chef to create a dish on the plate that, after presentation to the client would require a client to eat the various parts as prepared on the plate to achieve the totality of the dish deconstructed.

An example would be the losing meal of this elimination challenge, a popular dish known as Seafood Paella. This dish usually has various types of seafood combined with a rice and some sort of flavorful sauce. Deconstructing this dish would have the Chef presenting the sauce over here, the rice over here, the different seafoods here and here and here. The client could then pick and choose just how to eat the meal instead of having the whole thing put in front of him or her with no choice.

Well hey, like I said, it’s a Chef’s dream.

Contender Ron was sent home for failing to properly cook his seafood while managing to OVERCOOK his rice. Well damn, a chef what can’t cook rice deserves to be sent packing.

A redheaded southern type chef, Kevin, seems to be running away with this thing. Keep an eye out on him.

Below some pic montages from recent episodes.

Following Up on Melissa D’Arabian’s New Food Network Show

Melissa D’Arabian was proclaimed the next food network star this year and it took me a while but on 9/6/09 I managed to find her show, featured on a boring Sunday afternoon entitled “$10 Dinners with Melissa D’Arabian”. I thought it would be cool to see how Melissa did with her new show and I watched it with thoughtful eyes.

First, Melissa looks pregnant to me. Just throwing that out there.

On the show I watched as she prepared something called “braised pork” along with Cuban black beans and drop biscuits containing green onions.

The meal cost only ten bucks as advertised and would feed four people. But I thought the meal was very complicated to prepare, requiring all sorts of pans. The meat needed braising in a fry pan than roasting in an oven…many hours so.

Of course I suppose there must be some trade-off of money and time but I’m just not that poor to be dirtying a house full of pans and spending hours on my feet for one meal.

Melissa did a very good job but will she be the next Rachel Ray?