Just eat it!

Your table manners are some cryin' shame
You're playin' with your food, this ain't some kind of game
Now, if you starve to death, you'll just have yourself to blame
Just eat it

Anyone who has been reading my blog for a while will know that I love TV...and love a good reality show. Yeah, I know, "good reality" seems like an oxymoron. And even among those of us who just can't get enough, there isn't agreement about which ones to watch and which ones to avoid. But right now, I'm really happy cause the week is filled with reality shows about cooking!

You better listen, better do what you're told
You haven't even touched your tuna casserole
Just eat it


If you can tolerate the yelling and screaming, then you just can't have much more reality show fun than watching Hell's Kitchen. In this one, contestants compete to win a job as a chef in a resort restaurant. And the group of contestants is managed, coached, berated, yelled at, ridiculed, and eventually tossed one by one by Chef Gordon Ramsay. Chef Ramsay is a world-renowned cook with restaurants all over the world, cook books in the book store, and various TV shows in other countries. And he might just have an anger management issue. He throws food, breaks plates, calls people names, and forces the censors to bleep about half of what he says. And a viewer - one with a soft heart and an ounce of compassion - might feel sorry for these poor fools on the show. My heart isn't soft. They knew what they were getting in to. The payoff is huge. And when he humiliates them just one more time because they "can't cook the fucking risotto"...I can't help but laugh as the contestants make up lame excuses, blame each other, and cry for their mommies.

Have some more yogurt, have some more spam
It doesn't matter if it's fresh or canned
Just eat it


Want your cooking competitions to be a bit more civilized? Some high cuisine boiled down to some odd competitions? Take a shot at Top Chef. With a bus load of hosts/judges (Chef Tom Colicchio, Gail Simmons from Food and Wine magazine, Padma Lakshmi, and Ted Allen from Queer Eye), this show takes the high road in cooking competitions. The contestants engage in individual and group challenges, usually cooking pretty high quality stuff. Of course, they don't hesitate to throw in the challenge involving snake and eel and cow tongue and other oddities. And there is always at least one standout contestant who just knows he/she is way better than everyone else there. It is such fun to watch that person lose!

Have a big dinner, have a light snack
If you don't like it, you can't send it back
Just eat it


Finally, for a twist on cooking and reality TV...a cooking show about being on a cooking show. The Next Food Network Star is a cooking competition but some of the challenges are more about dealing with the stress of cooking in front of a camera than the actual taste of the food. The fun is watching them not handle that stress very well! And the judges on this show include two staff from the Food Network who are so kind that I want them to be in my family! Very different from Chef Ramsay.

Have some more chicken, have some more pie
It doesn't matter if it's boiled or fried
Just eat it

By the time you watch all three of these each week, you'll be glad you aren't learning to be a chef. You might or might not be hungry, depending on what you've seen cooked. And if you are watching Hell's Kitchen, you might need to grab a beer and decompress.

Have a banana, have a whole bunch
It doesn't matter what you had for lunch
Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it


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Lyrics from 'Just Eat It' by Weird Al Yankovic