phillygold

Finally, honest to goodness cooking shows again! The Food Network had become all game shows and cooking competitions, almost all of the time. It literally had reached the point of becoming unwatchable for me 90% of the time.
Looking at the listings, some of the Cooking Channel shows seem promising. We shall see...

TimF1975

I totally agree about the FN. Looking forward to seeing reruns of Julia Child and other classics...

masstech

Some competitions are okay. I like the iron chef battles but the rest of FN is mostly a waste.

uncertaintraveler

The Cooking Channel is brought to you by the Food Network, and includes some of the same "chefs."

Just saying.

Source.

MarqFlyer

The Food Network used to be pretty much exactly what the Cooking Channel promises it will be. If the FN evolved (devolved?) into what we see today, what is to prevent the same thing from happening to the Cooking Channel?

There are a whole bunch of channels that used to be great: The Travel Channel used to show great documentaries on what you'd see when you travel to a particular place; the History Channel used to show documentaries on history; the Discovery channel used to show great pieces on science and nature. Now they're all about "reality" shows with guys driving trucks in the arctic, guys fishing, people playing poker, people looking for ghosts, people seeing how much they can eat before they puke, etc. Often with lots of obscenities bleeped out -- which I guess gets the ratings up.

Let's hope this new channel sticks with the current plan....

MSchott

TV networks evolve into what he viewers want to see. The FN is full of reality style shows because that's what people watch. It's somewhat unfortunate but it's life in 2010. I do like many of the FN shows like DDD, Chopped and Throwdown and some of the competitions. Iron Chef USA is not for me. When I want real cooking shows I go to PBS.

cordelli

Good story about it in the NY Post yesterday

http://www.nypost.com/p/entertainmen...hGBmlq0cQ83kTJ

MarqFlyer

I understand that -- it's why I made the cautionary comment about the new channel turning into the same thing as the FN. The OP sounded pretty excited about the return of "honest to goodness" cooking shows," and I was pointing out that it may not be long before the Cooking Channel devolves into a "battle" of this and a "contest" of that.

What I don't understand is why viewers seem to want every show nowadays to have a "winner" and a "loser."

Dugernaut

Well maybe not all the time. I looked at the schedule this evening, and Mo Rocco is hosting one of the shows.

BLI-Flyer

MTV and VH1 used to show music videos.

BigBopper

That's not really an accurate statement.

TV Channels evolve into what they think will be the most profitable. Reality shows, especially the competition shows on FN that are usually co sponsored, are extremely inexpensive to produce.

Do you really think shows like the West Wing get canceled while they're still highly rated because the executives think people want something else? No, it got canceled because it was the most expensive show on TV to produce. FN is no different.

I'm pretty certain the reason the new network as some of the same personalities is because it's reruns of the shows the did on FN. Cost, almost nothing!

csufabel

When no executive is quoted, then I have reason for suspicion. In searching for other stories, I read five and I only saw one quote.

"The feel and style we're going for is a little grittier, a little edgier, a little hipper," said Cooking Channel's Bruce Seidel (FN's Senior Vice President of Program Planning and Special Productions).

Apparently, for us in the USA, the shows are basically ones from FN-Canada. In the two shows I watched, they mentioned numerous dishes from the same NYC eatery. That didn't do much for me; plus, I really have never heard a hipster talk about their cooking skills.

phillygold

You can add the Weather Channel into the mix as well. they used to give me the weather, now they serve up too many Storm Stories and How Weather Changed History (or whatever the heck it is called).

relativelynormal

Too bad there isn't a channel on where they show old episodes of shows that FN never shows anymore. There used to be a lot of interesting informative food shows on the channel in the late 90s-early 2000s era. Anybody ever a fan of Taste with David Rosengarten? Man, I loved that show. I wish they brought that one back. Two Fat Ladies (or whatever it was called) was great too.