If you are a reality show junkie, you can get your fix pretty much year-round and on every major, minor and/or cable network. Food Network’s signature reality show–the type of show that has weekly eliminations–is Food Network Star, the program they use as a breeding ground for, um, Food Network stars. It’s now in its 8th season, and what really put this show on the map was the winner of Season 2–a dude named Guy Fieri. More recent winners have been Jeff Mauro, the Sandwich King; Aarti Sequeira, and her show Aarti Party; and Melissa D’Arabian (Ten Dollar Dinners).

In recent seasons, they have had 8-10 contestants, but this year they expanded it to 15 and started it earlier in the calendar year. The first episode aired last Sunday and episode 2 was last night. This year, instead of having regular judges and food network execs Bob Tuschman and Susie Fogelson along with network superstar Bobby Flay, the producers have done it differently by making up three teams of five–each with a coach. Flay is now a coach, and his competitors are Giada De Laurentiis (who was a judge for most of last season) and Alton Brown (who has also guested on the show) The contestants were hand-picked by each coach–and as you might expect, they sort of reflect their coaches’ personalities and, to some degree, their cooking styles. The team that wins the weekly challenges is all safe, and Bob and Susie choose one from each of the other two teams for potential elimination. The two are given a task in which they will be judged by Bob and Susie only.

Some of these contestants look like stars immediately, which is usually the case early on. It’s also typical for some of them to look just awful the first week or two as they may know how to cook, but presenting that on camera and/or to a live audiences is another thing altogether. There just aren’t many people out there who can do that effectively. Cristie Schoen from Team Alton is one of those who just couldn’t do this, and she was sent packing last Sunday. But Josh Lyons from Team Giada barely escaped elimination. That guy fronts a rock band (something he referred to about twelve times last week) but he is really awkward talking about food on camera.

Last night it was between Kara Sigle of Team Bobby and Judson Allen of Team Alton. If Alton had lost another team member, it would not have looked good. But Kara was the one sent home, and wow, was she ever awful in the main challenge, in which the contestants had to use a landmark NYC restaurant as a reference point to create a dish that they had to describe while being a “tour guide” on a double decker bus. Kara had Sylvia’s in Harlem, known for chicken & waffles. Kara complained about her assignment and was doomed from the beginning, especially when she tried to just re-create the dish and not do anything creative with the idea.

So it’s down to 13, and while we don’t intend to post a weekly recap, we may write about the show every once in a while. If you watched it last night, let us know your thoughts in the space below.

If you watched last year’s “Chopped All Stars” on Food Network, you know that it was riveting and must-see TV. I, for one, was thrilled to see some of the judges, who were generally very difficult to please and very hard on the contestants, have to compete and see what it was like on the other side. But even better, in addition to the “judges” round, there were three other rounds with themes–former contestants on “Food Network Star,” for instance, and then one final round featuring the four winners. Former “Next Iron Chef” contestant Nate Appleman won last year’s inaugural crown.

So of course, Food Network had to make Season 2 of “Chopped All Stars” (premiering Sunday, April 8th) bigger and better. Seriously, if you are a Food Network junkie, you’re going to freak when you see this list. Here, I’ll just lift it right from the network’s press release:

Part 1, “Iron Chefs Do Battle” Premieres Sunday, April 8th at 9pm ET/PT
Competitors: Iron Chefs Cat Cora, Marc Forgione, Jose Garces and Michael Symon
Judges: Scott Conant, Aarón Sanchez, Geoffrey Zakarian

Part 2, “Prime Time vs. Day Time” Premieres Sunday, April 15th at 9pm ET/PT
Competitors: Show hosts Keegan Gerhard (Food Network Challenge), Jeffrey Saad (United Tastes of America, Cooking Channel), Aarti Sequeira (Aarti Party) and Marcela Valladolid (Mexican Made Easy)
Judges: Amanda Freitag, Aarón Sanchez, Geoffrey Zakarian

Part 3, “Food Network Star Contestants” Premieres Sunday, April 22nd at 9pm ET/PT
Competitors: Food Network Star Season Seven Finalists Justin Balmes, Penny Davidi, Vic “Vegas” Moea and Chris Nirschel
Judges: Scott Conant, Amanda Freitag, Aarón Sanchez

Part 4, “Judge Remix” Premieres Sunday, April 29th at 9pm ET/PT
Competitors: Chopped judges Alex Guarnaschelli, Marc Murphy, Marcus Samuelsson and Chris Santos
Judges: Amanda Freitag, Aarón Sanchez, Geoffrey Zakarian

Part 5, “Grand Finale” Premieres Sunday, May 6th at 9pm ET/PT
Competitors: Prior episode winners
Judges: Anne Burrell, Amanda Freitag, Aarón Sanchez

I mean, seriously? The “Judge Remix” round is going to be awesome, but really, all of them are compelling themes. If you saw “Food Network Star” last year, you know that Penny Davidi is a great cook but also a drama queen who is sure to add to the ratings.

And if you’re not familiar with “Chopped,” the show is hosted by Ted Allen, and the four contestants have 20 minutes to cook an appetizer using four items in a mystery basket, after which one contestant is “chopped,” or eliminated. Then the remaining three cook an entree in 30 minutes, and the two finalists have 20 minutes to make a dessert. The producers of the show, of course, find all kinds of weird ingredients and put items together that should never go together (for example–jelly beans, fish, purple carrots and potato chips). But that adds to the fun.

So there you have it–another great season of “Chopped All Stars” awaits next month. Will you be watching?

Have you guys seen the new Rachael vs. Guy Celebrity Cook-Off show on Food Network? Well if you haven’t, let me fill you in and I guarantee you will watch–especially if you love watching celebs duke it out on reality shows. The show airs on Sunday nights, and last Sunday was the series premiere. And the premise is that Rachael and Guy, two of the Network’s more prominent stars of the past decade, head up teams of four celebrities in a cooking competition. As is the case with many of these type shows, we’re talking (my apologies to those competing) celebs that are kind of washed up, B-listers or C-listers (or at most high A-minus).

We’re talking Taylor Dayne, Aaron Carter, Summer Sanders, Coolio, Cheech Marin, Lou Diamond Phillips, Alyssa Campanella, and Joey Fatone. Yikes. The first episode had them break into two teams, each coached by Rachael or Guy, and they had to cook for 300 guests at an outdoor BBQ party in New York City. The best cooks seem to be Phillips, Marin, Sanders, and Coolio. Dayne and Carter were the two worst cooks on the losing team, and had to face off in a 30 minute shrimp challenge to see who went home. The loser was Carter, who wound up in the bottom because of a horribly bland macaroni salad. Dayne was able to stick around, much to my chagrin, because while she was quite the star in the late ’80’s with gorgeous, flowing hair, she had some serious plastic surgery done and looks frighteningly like Michael Jackson.

Anyway, do yourself a favor and check this show out….it’s funny and quite entertaining.

A number of new genres of television shows have become extremely popular in recent years, due in large part to the wider exposure of specialized networks and the general expansion that always permeates the entertainment industry. For example, there are a number of shows that revolve around “dark creatures” – such as vampires, zombies, etc. – that have become very popular just in the last two years. However, even more sweepingly popular, because of its variety, is the concept of cooking shows, or rather, food-related shows, which have become some of the most popular items on direct tv. Generally, there are three types of food related shows – informative, instructional, and competitive. Here is a brief glance at each type.

Informative cooking shows strive to show you things about the food or cooking industries. This of course can have a good deal of variety within itself. It may apply to showing an audience the best restaurants in a certain area, or simply some of the best dishes around. Consider “Man Vs. Food” as an example. In this show, the charismatic, food-obsessed host Adam Richman travels the country exploring towns for their most famous restaurants and dishes. Each episode culminates in an eating challenge in which Richman devours something either deathly spicy or shockingly huge. It’s a great show for showing off the top restaurants in popular areas, as well as some decadent treats and dishes.

Instructional cooking shows are more about showing the audience how to prepare certain types of dishes or meals. There are many different shows that follow this basic formula, and often the audience sees fit to literally cook along with the host. One good example is “Boy Meets Grill,” in which star chef Bobby Flay shows his audience different tips not only for how to cook great food, but how to throw an amazing barbecue. These shows, in general, are very helpful for those who have culinary interests or inclinations.

Finally, there are competitive cooking shows, which may well be the most popular. These shows – such as “Top Chef” – feature host chefs, celebrity chefs, and cooking contestants, who compete for who can make the best dish, often with all of them using a single ingredient at the core of the dishes. Generally, contestants are eliminated one by one, until only one chef remains, and is crowned Top Chef. This can be instructional, as you do get to see amazing food created, but it is meant primarily for entertainment purposes.

There are so many food related TV shows now that it gets mind-blowing to try and watch them all or to even DVR them all. But I want to turn you on to two that have new seasons happening now that you should absolutely watch, especially if you are a foodie.

The first is “Top Chef: Texas” on Bravo. I haven’t watched this week’s episode yet but caught the season premiere last week. The production company Magical Elves consistently hits home runs with their shows, especially this one. This year it’s big, just like the state of Texas, and in addition to regular judges Padma Lakshmi (host), Tom Colicchio and Gail Simmons, they have added Emeril Lagasse and Hugh Acheson. And they began with something like 30 contestants, but only half or so of which will actually wear the Top Chef chef coats and have a real chance to compete for the title of Top Chef. This show airs on Wednesday nights on Bravo, and if you haven’t seen it, you have to check it out. This is one show that knows how to keep us interested and just delivers quality shows every week. I can’t wait to see how this season progresses.

The other show is “The Next Iron Chef: Super Chefs” on Food Network. The “Next Iron Chef” reality show brought us the likes of Jose Garces and Michael Symon, but this season is like no other. This time, they have all celebrity chefs, many of which we have already seen on Food Network such as Beau McMillan, Anne Burrell, Robert Irvine, Geoffrey Zakarian, Alex Guarnaschelli, Michael Chiarello and Marcus Samuelsson. Sign me up! So far two episodes have aired, and it’s clear that the level of competition is maybe like no other show that Food Network has ever seen, mainly because of how incredibly talented each chef is. Whoever came up with the idea of going this route as opposed to finding ten great restaurant chefs we have never heard of? Genius. This one airs Sunday nights on Food Network.

That’s it for now. There are more great shows going on and many more holiday themed shows we can talk about, but I think you should check these two out before the seasons get too old.