Now streaming on Netflix: 'Chew on This' TED Talks

Had enough of Food Network shows? Bored by yet another food-themed reality show? Here’s something that might tax your brain and intrigue you at the same time.

Now streaming on Netflix, a collection of TED talks gathered under the title “Chew on This.” They’ve put together 14 episodes, one as short as four minutes, most 15 minutes or so. Think of them as food shorts.

Talks include Dan Barber's (Blue Hill, NYC, and Blue Hill at Stone Barn) “How I Fell in Love With a Fish.” Mark Bittman lectures on “What’s Wrong With What We Eat,” while Ann Cooper, the "renegade lunch lady"  talks school lunches.

My interest tends more toward pizza-obsessed author Peter Reinhart on “Bread,” and maybe Dan Barber’s “Foie Gras Parable.”

I can see now, though, I'm not going to be able to wrest the remote control out of husband's hands until baseball season is over.  

Sorry, the talks are not available as DVDs, only the streaming format. 

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-- S. Irene Virbila
Twitter.com/sirenevirbila

Photo: Netflix

3 Things: Pig & Beer; 1886's cocktails; 'Food Forward'

There's a flower in my cocktail: Spring cocktails are in bloom at 1886 Bar at the Raymond in Pasadena, where head barman Garrett McKechnie and staff have created a new seasonal drinks list. Highlights include the Wild Orchid: Torontel Pisco, Vergano Bianco vermouth and Grand Marnier with a little hefeweizen, served up with an orchid garnish. The Cinablossom (not to be confused with the "cinnamon challenge") mixes gin with lemon, cinnamon-bark syrup and a fire for a table-side garnish of freshly toasted cinnamon. The Vintage Caprice Flight features three vintages of 1886's Beefeater Gin barrel-aged Caprice. First try it freshly made with Beefeater Gin, dry vermouth, Benedictine and orange bitters; then aged at 4 months; and finish with the 12-month vintage. 1250 S. Fair Oaks Ave., Pasadena, (626) 441-3136, www.theraymond.com. 

On the TV: Sunday's first episode of Season 2 of "Game of Thrones" isn't next week's only TV premiere. On April 5 at 10 p.m., "Food Forward" debuts on PBS, a documentary series about chefs, scientists, farmers, fishermen, teachers and others creating a more healthful food system. Shot in New York, Detroit, Milwaukee and Oakland, the series aims to celebrate the pioneers and visionaries who are developing alternatives to our food system, such as John Mooney, who set up a space-age hydroponic farm on top of a historic building in the West Village of Manhattan. The series addresses other topics such as school lunch reform, sustainable fishing, grass-fed beef and soil science. 

Pork, with suds: Bruce Kalman of downtown’s Urbano Pizza Bar and Gavin Mills of Hollywood’s Wood + Vine are hosting "Pig & Beer" on Sunday at Urbano, a porky feast with beer pairings by “The Beer Chicks” Christina Perozzi and Hallie Beaune, to benefit Alex's Lemonade Stand. The chefs picked a free-range, acorn-fed pig from ReRun Ranch in Hughes, Calif., to be cooked and presented by the duo. The two chefs will alternate in presenting and discussing each course, "from the savory and sweet to the weird and wild." Growers from ReRide Ranch, Weiser Family Farm, Coleman Farms, Thao Farms and more are contributing produce. 4 p.m. “PigTails”; 5 p.m. dinner. $50 per person. Call for reservations, or email urbanopizzabar@gmail.com. 630 W. 6th St., Los Angeles, (213) 614-1900, www.urbanopizzabar.com. 

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Photo: The Wild Orchid at 1886 Bar. Credit: Acuna Hansen.

Andrew Zimmern from 'Bizarre Foods' to stop by Royal/T in January

On Jan. 13, Royal/T Cafe and Andrew Zimmern, the TV personality behind the Travel Channel's "Bizarre Foods," will team up for a pop-up dinner themed "California Dreaming."

The pop-art-inspired exhibition space in Culver City is hosting the culinary event, which will reflect Zimmern's take on California cuisine while introducing Angelenos to innovative ideas and out-of-the-ordinary foods.

The five-course dinner menu will feature sea urchin and yellow-tomato-vegetable aspic; linguine; a veal tongue tartare and chile-braised lambs tongue quesadilla; a grilled Broken Arrow Ranch venison chop and a cioccolato orrare da gustare for dessert.

Tickets to the event are $150 per person and can be purchased online.
                      
8910 Washington Blvd., Culver City, (310) 559-6300, royal-t.org.

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-- Caitlin Keller

Photo: Andrew Zimmern. Credit: Stuart Freedman / Travel Channel

Nigel Slater's 'Toast' coming to Nuart Theatre in October

Food writer and cook Nigel Slater's bestselling memoir Toast: The Story of a Boy's Hunger, an autobiographical account of his childhood told through food -- 1960s British food, that is -- was made into a film by Ruby Films for BBC1 in 2010, starring Helena Bonham-Carter and Freddie Highmore.

Clancy Sigal, who reviewed the book for the Los Angeles Times in 2004, says "I don't know when I laughed so hard at such a poignant story as Nigel Slater's boyhood.... Among its many delights, his memoir is an easily digestible lesson in how to let your stomach heal your hungry heart" (read the full review here).

The film will be showing at the Nuart Theatre for one week, starting on Oct. 7.

Nuart Theatre, 11272 Santa Monica Blvd., West L.A., (310) 281-8223, landmarktheatres.com.

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Marja Vongerichten shares soul food of Asia in "Kimchi Chronicles"

 

“I’m not a foodie,” Marja Vongerichten declares.

The host of the new PBS television series “Kimchi Chronicles” lounges on the couch at Tom N Toms, a small coffeeshop in Koreatown, tearing into a warm pepperoni pretzel and grimacing in pain at the thought of dinners that can drag on for five hours.

And yet as the wife of three-star Michelin chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten, she’s had to sit in on plenty. But haute cuisine is just not her style, Marja said, no matter how extravagant and luxurious the courses are.

She’d much rather double-dip into a steaming communal pot of cheonggukjang (a hearty, stinky Korean stew made from fermented soybean paste) or spoon the messy red juices of galchi jorim (simmered beltfish in broth) into a full bowl of steamed rice. Her style of food, Marja said, is food with soul—more specifically, home-style Korean food.

“I call Korean food the soul food of Asia,” Marja said, not only because Korean food consists of simple yet bold and comforting dishes like one-pot stews and pickled vegetables, but because it draws upon her innate familiarity with her roots and soul.

Marja was a 1970s G.I. baby—born to a black American G.I. and a Korean mother. At the time, Amerasians like Marja were discriminated against, so when Marja was 3, her mother gave her up for adoption.

“I had memories [of my mother] but it was only of her physical presence,” said Marja. “I could only picture her from waist down at the height perspective of a 3-year-old.”

Save the puppies. Buy a fish spatula.

 
Usually, it's chef Gordon Ramsay delivering the memorable one-liners on "MasterChef," where 100 home cooks are vying for a $250,000 payday and bragging rights as the titleholder of "America's Best Home Cook." This week, that crowd was whittled down to 18, largely due to Ramsay's deft wielding of the verbal ax. He dispatched one organic farmer and his lame-o fish dish by bleating his decision: "E-I, E-I NO!"

But Tuesday night's best line belonged to chef Graham Elliot, who all but shuddered when he saw one competitor man-handling a flaky fish fillet, and said: "Every time someone uses a set of tongs on a delicate piece of fish, God kills a puppy."

Elliot didn't elaborate on this cooking commandment, but we found this 'splainer from Times Food Editor Russ Parsons on why fish spatulas are so handy in the kitchen:

Maybe it's a little thing, but have you ever noticed how normal frying spatulas always seem a little clunky to handle? A fish spatula is built to work from an angle rather than head-on. It's also thinner and lighter, which makes it better suited for handling delicate filets (hence the name). But they're by no means only good for seafood; they work just as well with eggs, crepes or just about anything fragile that needs turning.

Add it to the other culinary words of wisdom being handed down this season: Save the puppies. Buy a fish spatula.

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--Rene Lynch
Twitter / renelynch

Photo: Elliot talks to one of the "MasterChef" contestants / Fox

Chef Gordon Ramsay on the one ingredient you should NOT have in your pantry

 
Do you hear that sucking sound? That's the white truffle oil market going down the drain.

As Season 2 of "MasterChef" returned to Fox on Monday night, there was plenty of tension and drama and leg-pulling. There was also a break in programming to talk about the most ridiculous, worthless cooking ingredient on the market, and why you are a cooking neophile if it has a spot in your pantry:

'Food Nextwork Star': Meet Penny Davidi of Los Angeles

 
Season 7 of "Food Network Star" kicks off Sunday night with three SoCal competitors all vying to be the next Guy Fieri. We chatted with the local finalists in advance of the new show. Yesterday, it was Jyll Everman. Today, we meet Penny Davidi of Los Angeles, restaurateur and former owner of Pizza Rustica, which she helped turn into a successful franchise:

This much is guaranteed: Penny is going to be the talk of Season 7. She teeters in on impossibly high heels and never stops. Before the first episode is over, she'll be labeled a cougar, threated with bodily injury ("I'll literally beat you over the head," her nemesis tells her) and she'll receive high praise in the judge's room.

'Food Network Star': Meet Jyll Everman of Glendora

Season 7 of "Food Network Star" kicks off Sunday night with three SoCal competitors all vying to be the next Guy Fieri. We chatted with the local finalists in advance of the new show. Today, we meet Jyll Everman of Glendora:

Everman owns Jyllicious Bites, a catering company, and teaches cooking-and-entertaining classes at Village Kitchen Shoppe in Glendora and throughout Southern California. She considers herself a finger food specialist, turning out bite-sized comfort food such as miniature chicken pot pies, baked potato skins and more. So, if she wins the food world's equivalent of "American Idol," that's what her show will focus on as well: "I take all the things you love big and making them small."

That culinary approach is a hit the real world, she said, adding that clients love an all-finger-food spread. But she said it backfired in at least one challenge in the "Food Network Star" kitchens when she applied her "big-to-small" tricks to a featured ingredient: prime rib. The judges "don't want a prime rib bite, they want a prime rib," she said.

'Next Iron Chef' cast announced: Not an L.A. chef in the bunch

 
We know this much: Your "Next Iron Chef" will not be from Los Angeles. Seasons 2 and 3 of "The Next Iron Chef" both included L.A. chefs. And both of them -- Andrew Kirschner and Eric Greenspan -- were eliminated in the very first episodes. OUCH!

So is it a coincidence that Season 4 of "The Next Iron Chef" doesn't include a single L.A. cheftestant? Food Network isn't saying.

But Tuesday's announcement that the new season begins shooting in Los Angeles and New York and is slated to debut Oct. 30 sets the stage for another celebrity death match between Anne Burrell and Robert Irvine. This rivalry could reach epic proportions if the recently "Chopped All-Stars" showdown was any indication. (Someone might have to put Irvine on suicide watch if he doesn't beat Burrell in this thing. He'd probably happily pass on winning "TNIC" as long as he outlasts Burrell.)

There's more in store for "Chopped" fans, too. We'll finally -- finally! -- get to see Alex Guarnaschelli on the hot seat. Visit our entertainment blog, Show Tracker, for a look at the rest of the lineup, which also includes a former "Top Chef" favorite.

-- Rene Lynch
Twitter / renelynch

Photo: Anne Burrell gives a contestant the business on "Worst Cooks in America." Credit: Food Network