Food Network Awards

The Food Network. Love it or hate it, every foodie turns it on every now and then. This evening I was looking for a recipe on FoodNetwork.com when I saw an ad for the Food Network Awards which will be an event held at the annual South Beach Food & Wine Festival (which this year has partnered with the Food Network for the first time) in February, 2007. The award show will be televised on the Food Network sometime in April, 2007.

The first-ever Food Network Awards combines the fun of Food Network with the glamour of South Beach to make a completely unique, entertaining, off-beat awards ceremony unlike any other. From a red carpet hosted by Ham on the Street's George Duran and walked by the likes of Snap, Crackle and Pop, to appearances by your favorite Food Network stars, this is a fresh, new awards show. The best part? We're asking our viewers to get in on the fun. Cast your votes now in our five viewer's choice categories and don't forget to watch the Food Network Awards, coming in April, 2007.

I am intrigued by this because I love award shows. AND, I love food. AND, we get to vote! When I saw the bright red "Vote Now" on their homepage, my mind sped forward and I put my judging cap on. This is important since I will be voting for the likes of Paula Dean and Emeril. And I suppose I will have to make my decision one way or another about Rachael Ray. I excitedly clicked my way over to the voting page . . .

Viewer's Choice Award Categories are:

* Favorite Comfort Food Combo
* Best Ballpark Eats
* "Professional Grade" Food Applicance You Can't Live Without
* Favorite Childhood Classic Read
* Favorite Cool & Classic Cocktail

You can't necessarily tell it from the category headings, but there is no voting for ANY Food Network show. The "nominees" are various foods, drinks, books, appliances and baseball stadiums. I felt fleeced for a moment but I voted anyways. I am slightly suspicious of advertising being incorporated into everything. But, the awards show could be interesting to watch - if they do it right. But Snap, Crackle and Pop being on the red carpet smells like overkill of advertising to me. There is also a sweepstakes you can enter to win a trip to the awards show.

Emeril tries to cook healthy on the Food Network

Thank God the holidays are over. I can finally have my Food Network back. Ever since Halloween, they have been airing a month's worth of cooking turkey in preparation for Thanksgiving and then another month of all sorts of holiday food geared toward Christmas. It was definitely overkill for me.

This week the Food Network seems to be focusing on healthy eating and dieting. It makes sense since so many people start diets at the beginning of each year. I get a kick out of watching Emeril Lagasse try to make diet food. He's the king of pork fat! While his recipes featured on the Fit for Life episode of Emeril Live may have healthier titles than his normal recipes, they should not be considered diet food!

Jorge Cruise, author of The 3-Hour Diet, was a guest on the show as the diet and health expert. The two of them played off of each other. Emeril made his version of a "healthy" pizza with sliced potatoes, pepperoni and truffle oil while Jorge made chicken on pita bread mini-pizzas. They both looked good but of course Emeril's looked better. However he never claimed that both recipes were comparable calorie-wise.

It got comical as they each made a lasagna recipe. Jorge made a traditionally healthy turkey and spinach lasagne and Emeril's had lobster and crabmeat. They both sound healthy, but Emeril's contained 6 Tbsp of butter as the first ingredient!

To check and see if my suspicions were correct, I ran each of the recipes through the Weight Watchers recipe builder. I know many people don't understand the Weight Watchers points thing, but I like it. It's way easier than figuring out calories and all that. You usually get 24 points a day. Based on this, you can understand that if one serving of a recipe has 12 points, that portion of food is half the food you are supposed to eat for the entire day. A typical meal is 5 to 7 points. (You get to eat more food than that but to explain that would to be to explain the entire Weight Watchers plan.) I adapted Emeril's recipe to use fat-free milk and cheeses.

Emeril's Fresh Crabmeat and Lobster Lasagna
11 Points

Jorge's Turkey and Spinach Lasagna
9 points

I was surprised that both recipes were close, but I'm sure there would have been a much bigger difference if I didn't change everything to fat-free in Emeril's recipe. And let's be honest, fat-cheeses usually change the consistency of things. And I can't image how a bechamel sauce made with skim milk would work out.

Even though I didn't get any diet-friendly Emeril recipes (he couldn't stop with the butter!), the discussion between Emeril and Jorge was very informative. Jorge made suggestions on how to lighten up the recipes and provided information about why certain food are good for our bodies.