CATEGORIES

Preview: Travel Channel’s Feed the Beast

From Travel Channel, the network that has brought us some cool food shows the last few years such as the Adam Richman Man vs. Food franchise, and various Andrew Zimmern and Anthony Bourdain shows, comes a hip new gluttonous guilty pleasure–Feed the Beast, hosted by Mikey Roe. The show premieres on Wednesday, March 6 with two 30-minute episodes back to back at 9:00 pm and 9:30 pm ET/PT, with the San Francisco and Austin episodes first in line.

The premise of the show is that Roe is a creature of late night, and appreciates everything that the midnight to sun-up time frame has to offer–from night life, to parties, to–you guessed it–food. And, just like night life in general, the craziest combinations and food offerings are also abundant after midnight. Roe is someone who really appreciates these foods too, and he also appreciates the atmosphere, activities and the alcohol that goes along with that food. He also knows where to go, and as a hybrid of, say, Richman and Guy Fieri, Roe knows how to make you want to try some of this crazy food right along with him. In fact, after watching the screeners on Sunday, my wife and I cooked up some Mexican breakfast for dinner.

You won’t believe some of the things Roe gets to eat, and it’s remarkable that he samples all of the crazy combinations of foods–for example, deep fried peanut butter and jelly sandwich followed by a jackalope sausage and bacon bloody mary. I don’t know if these were literally filmed in one night, or if there was much editing to be done, but if it’s all in one night, I’m seriously impressed by how much of an iron stomach Roe has.

Fans of some of the above mentioned shows are going to love Feed the Beast, and are going to love watching Mikey Roe take us to these crazy places. I just know it.

  

Mikey’s This and That

So for Super Bowl Sunday, we stayed home which is how I like it–primarily because I’m a football purist and like to focus on the game. But hey, I’m a foodie so made some good food too. My wife has been doing something similar to South Beach Diet, and so we kept things relatively healthy and low-carb. But that doesn’t mean it can’t be tasty. We made Andrew Zimmern’s Asian wings that I have covered on here before, South Beach Texas Bowl o Red which is basically beef chunks in a thick chili sauce, and Mark Bittman’s Black Bean Soup from a Men’s Health Magazine. I could not find that online, but here is a version of Bittman’s that is close.

This new show “The Taste” on ABC looks pretty cool. It’s essentially a food version of “The Voice,” with big names like Anthony Bourdain and Ludo Lefebvre and Nigella Lawson–the judges have to taste a spoonful of food prepared by someone that they don’t know is a home cook or a professional. And it looks like it has a big budget set. My wife and I barely got through the long 2-hour premiere, but it’s definitely a show that looks like it will be worth watching.

Have you guys noticed food prices going up? I have not researched this but man, it seems like simple things that were $4.99 a year ago are $6.99 now. Or maybe I’m imagining things.

Man, speaking of food, it’s dinner time and I’m hungry. See ya!

  

What’s the grossest thing you would eat?

I’ve noticed that on lots of food-oriented TV shows lately, hosts and contestants and just regular people are eating foods that I wouldn’t touch with a 10-foot pole.

Remember “Fear Factor?” They would make people eat bugs, but now it seems like bugs are exotic cuisine. In Asia, they eat bugs like it’s nothing. Yum, bugs in your ice cream? Oh yeah, that’s good! Yikes.
Anyway, on Food Network’s “Chefs vs. City,” one of the obstacle course stations was to eat bugs at some place in New Orleans that specializes in bug cuisine. Really? And I mean they were eating grasshoppers, ants, and other disgusting creatures.

Then they make the chefs on “Chopped” make creations with stuff like chocolate covered grasshoppers, and the one I saw recently–canned haggis. So we’re talking tripe and other organ meats mixed with oatmeal. Oh, and they did rabbit kidneys the other night. Really, does anyone really eat this crap?

On Travel Channel, Anthony Bourdain has partook in some pretty disgusting things, like when in Italy they break open a lamb’s stomach and dip bread in the blood that spews out. EWWWWWWWW. Are you serious?

Then, speaking of Travel Channel, there is Andrew Zimmern. Okay, his show is called “Bizarre Foods,” and while I would eat about 5 percent of what he eats on the show, I recently got hooked on the show a bit and was even DVR-ing episodes of it. But then he did it. The dude was in Viet Nam or Thailand, and he ate at a place that served….are you ready? You might want to look away……he ate bull penis and testicles. Yes, Andrew Z ate a schlong and balls. I know they put weird shit in hot dogs, but i’m almost sure they never use the unit of an animal. But the worst part was, the dude ate it and liked it. And he has the, ahem, balls, to say he refuses to eat walnuts. Are you kidding me???

So I ask you…what is the grossest thing you would ever eat? I think I draw the line at hot dogs, seriously. Let me know and I’ll post this on Facebook too. Blah!

  

Top Chef All Stars premieres December 1

All you foodies into the hit show on Bravo, “Top Chef,” will get a strong dose of competition beginning on December 1 as “Top Chef All-Stars” kicks off with finalists from previous seasons. As always, Padma Lakshmi will host, along with judges Tom Colicchio and Gail Simmons, and new judge Anthony Bourdain.

I had the chance to talk to Colicchio and Bourdain briefly during a conference call for the new season last week, and here is a full transcript on Premium Holllywood.

But below is my question and how the two responded to it. I feel like I probably should have had a more in-depth or thoughtful question, but, well, I was curious!

Mike Farley: Hey guys how are you doing?
Tom Colicchio: Hey Mike, good how you doing?
Mike Farley: Good. So when I first took a look at this press release the first thing that came to my mind was wow, there is going to be a lot of big egos this season. I’m curious…
Tom Colicchio: You talking about the two of us?
Mike Farley: …no the contestants.
Tom Colicchio: Oh, okay.
Mike Farley: But I’m curious if there were any fights or bickering that might have may, you know, been stepped up this season as compared to seasons in the past.
Tom Colicchio: I guess you’re going to have to just watch that.
Mike Farley: Okay.
Tom Colicchio: Just watch it happen, as they say – the tag line goes, watch what happens. We can’t comment on…
Anthony Bourdain: I think if you look at the players, you know, it is fair to extrapolate or anticipate that they’re, you know, it would not be unusual or unnatural for some of these personalities to clash.
But we don’t really – there is not a lot of duking it out in front of Judges Table. Though there was some of that.
Mike Farley: Right. Okay, well thanks guys.
Tom Colicchio: Sure.

  

Related Posts