EVERYTHING that Sandra Lee does is wrong.

LOL! Could not agree more.

I've just started watching Kitchen Boss at TLC and Buddy's techniques (and the amount of salt that goes in every recipe!) makes me cringe. The food is a good inspiration, though, like the halibut fish sticks he made yesterday.

I DVR Julia Child on The Cooking Channel every day just to remind myself that no cook is perfect and it's fine to get flustered every once in a while, even on national television.

Sandra Lee is horrific. Aside from her annoying personality, i hate the fact that she's always using cheap shortcuts. It's fine to dress up a box cake mix and make it your own, but using a seasoning packet to make meatloaf is just ridiculous. It's fine that people learn to cook using some of these short cuts, but i think it'd be a lot better if she were teaching us how to mature as cooks, and empowering viewers to realise how simple some of this stuff can be. Rachel Ray has a much better approach, even though i often find her giggling annoying as well.

It's always been my understanding that oil in pasta water keeps it from bubbling over, not to keep the pasta from sticking.

when baked goods are seen eaten straight from the oven, aren't they usually prepared versions of the recipe, completed well in advance? that's always been my understanding of how these shows work. maybe not everyone would assume that but who eats piping hot stuff out of the oven?

jsmith87,

While it keeps the pasta from sticking to itself, it also keeps the sauce from sticking to the pasta.

My biggest pet peeve is when a host will say to saute onions (for example) for a certain length of time before moving on to the next step - but then they don't do it! Emeril is especially guilty of adding things too soon and not really cooking things for as long as he should.

I watched an Emeril live episode once he was trying to whip egg whites and it wasn't working it was fun to watch as they had to get a new bowl. Mistakes happen its good to see them made and know they are human

If you want to help keep the pasta from boiling over just rub some oil or butter around the rim of the pasta pot. This way your sauce will adhere to your pasta instead of sliding off.

Thanks fr that tip Deborah, I never thought about it!

I think the point is putting oil in the past water is unnecessary- the important thing is to use a big pot with plenty of water (and salt). Then the pasta won't stick. I don't think putting oil in will do anything bad (unlike rinsing the pasta in cold water- yuck!) Maybe the author of the post can weigh in on what she meant?

@mwall4-the reason is this: there is a time constraint for the show. In a 30 minute show, they have about 18 minutes to demonstrate cooking a meal-with commercial breaks. Who wants to watch onions cook for 5 minutes? That's why they have the dishes cooked at different stages to show you what it is supposed to look like. And in addition to that, if they stopped and showed you how to make corrections, that would take more time as well. The skills of cooking, like most anything else in life, are learned by experience. You can't cover every possible thing that could go wrong and every way to correct it within a half hour segment.

Maybe you could pitch a show idea to Food Network and ask that they do something like this, or little pointers during commercial breaks.

That is an awesome tip, Deborah, I've never heard it before. Thanks!

Anyway, Sandra Lee isn't a chef. She's a cooking celebrity. Which isn't an insult, it just means that if anyone complained to me that she didn't know how to use a knife, I'd probably laugh right in their face. :D

I've heard the let-bread-set thing many many times, and I have to admit it mystifies me slightly. I'm sure they're right, because they're the experts, but there is nothing as wonderful as tearing into fresh baked bread the second it's cooled down enough to pop in your mouth without burning. Maybe I just like under-set gluten or something?

The errors I notice when watching kitchen shows are when the chefs make statements about nutrition that are misleading. For instance Rachael Ray (although I love her recipes) will occasionally say that because one of her dishes is so healthy you don't have to feel guilty about eating a huge serving, which makes me cringe. I am in the weight loss profession and I know how not-true that statement is!

"Does it bother you when TV chefs make mistakes?"

No. I never watch them.

so agree with you: when these TV personalities use knife incorrectly, it makes me cringe!

Does anyone else hate how Sandra Lee talks? It's an unnatural cadence and it makes me want to scream. She is the WORST. Also, the Neeleys probably have the worst knife skills of anyone. It takes her forever to dice a freaking pepper.

@eaturveggies1 - I agree with you for another reason, which is, whenever someone says, "you don't have to feel guilty about pigging out", the statement is so laced with guilt, that it makes me cringe.

MAJOR pet peeve: when celeb chefs pronounce food words wrong. i.e. "MARs-capone" "Chi-POL-tay" ... I know it's probably a small detail to some people, but it just sounds stupid! If you're making a living being an expert about food, you should know how to pronounce ingredients.

I have also heard several Food Network "chefs" claim that a tomatillo is a green tomato, or in the tomato family. Wrong and wrong. Again, if you're supposed to be an expert, you shouldn't say things like that.

And @purdygirl, I hate the way she talks! To me, it sounds like she's always coming off of a laugh, if that makes any sense. Like she just finished chuckling. But all the time.

@thethinchef - I totally agree about mispronounciations! If it is a newer ingredient or dish to me, I might not know the correct pronounciation, so I'm supposed to trust that these "chefs" know, but half the time they are wrong!!!

And @kaete - I am so with you on fresh, warm bread! I am all about eating baked goods straight from the oven, I just can't wait after waiting all that time for it to bake! Cake is the worst, especially if I want to frost it - takes an eternity to cool while smelling so delicious!!!

i really hate it when they measure while holding the liquid measuring cup in mid air.

Who can stand to watch "cooking shows" at all anymore? The annoying idiots who really know very little about food and cooking outnumber the smart and knowledgeable by about 99 to 1.
A few PBS shows are the notable exceptions.

I hate it when they eat and talk at the same time. "OHMRRRGDSSGUDDD" AUGH

Only reason I used to watch Sandra Lee was for her drinks. She is good with a cocktail, but I would never make any of her food. And since I don't have cable anymore it makes it difficult to watch any cooking shows, besides the fact that I am vegan and don't care to watch all the meat-centric cooking.

@ Christine M- I agree, his execution is sloppy... but I actually like watching him because so is mine. The average person doesn't have expert knife skills, etc. I could do without the cheesy voice overs, though haha.

I don't have cable so the only time I see any of these shows is at my aunt's house. Something about them bothers me but I can't put my finger on it.

mascarah: I don't see the big deal with measuring cups in the air. Even picky BAKING recipes have a grace of about 5 grams either way. It would be tough to be off by more than that just because the volume measurement isn't entirely level :P

Iron Chef is filled with mistakes. Burnt onions, egg whites overwhipped, etc. It's awesome. But I still have my doubts that they get all that food done in an hour.

When they take things out of the oven without oven mitts, it is obviously not hot, so why bother the charade of taking it out of the oven? I wouldnt care if the finished dish was just sitting to the side, I BELIEVE it was actually in the oven at some point.

@graciela - I agree that the site of burnt/undercooked foods lends to the authenticity. But I do believe they can do it in under and hour. The prep time is what takes so long, not the actual cooking, so if you have some stuff prepped, and you have help, you could do it.

Iron Chef America is a bastardisation of what was an awesome Japanese show. Whereas in Japan, the chefs didn't have nearly as much help, and had to come up with all recipes themselves, and the ingredients were truly a surprise, the American version tells the chefs before the show that the 'secret' ingredient will be one of three things. And they have expert chefs cooking with them, and you'll notice, they don't seem to come up with all the recipes themselves. It's horrid, predictable, and a pale imitation.

@Kaete: Actually, Sandra Lee is a chef. She went to Le Cordon Bleu. She sucks big time, but she is a chef. She openly admits to not understanding why they wasted so much time doing things "the hard way" in school.

My biggest pet peeve is when they use metal utensils on their non-stick or enameled cookware. I know that the shows have big budgets or are given cookware by their sponsors, but people at home do not have this luxury. My cookware is an investment, and I always use wooden spoons or silicone on them. I absolutely cringe when I see someone scraping a non-stick pan or the inside of a pristine Le Creuset dutch oven with harsh metal utensils. Rachel Ray is the only TV cook I have ever heard remind her viewers to not use metal on certain cookware.

@haley .... I die a little every time he uses his gorgeous knives to scrape garlic off the stainless steel press with the *sharp* side of the knife.... it truly kills me.

I hate the charade that everything tastes "soooo mmmm mmm good! (orgasmic sounds)" Really? because I hardly see that pinch of salt going a long way on three pounds of beef.... I would appreciate it if they once said "hmm, good, but I think I over-whipped the batter"

@laurakat: Sandra Lee is not a chef. She attended ONE course at Le Cordon Bleu.

http://www.vogue.com/vogue-daily/article/sandra-lee-the-woman-in-white/

Even if you look at her official bio it will say that she attended Le cordon Bleu and the University of Wisconsin. They say nothing about graduating from those places because she didn't. Nothing which has any bearing about why she sucks. Her show is horrid because it is a legitimization of how harried Americans already cook. I'd like the show more if it was her simply making the recipes off of Campbell's soup cans, rather than pretending that she invented things as awful as she makes.

I have to jump on the yuck bandwagon RE Sandra Lee. The cadence and tone of her voice is perhaps appropriate for a misbehaving toddler. Maybe. And the word "tablescape" should never. ever. be. used. again. Seriously... she spends hundreds on decorations for dressing up cheap slop? Her show is about saving money and time. Her decorations do neither. And they're over-the-top tacky. Ugh.

But back to the question at hand. Not an error per se, but I hate it when they don't scrape all the batter into the pan, leave a lot of a viscous ingredient in the measuring cup, etc. I know it's probably to save time for the show, but it's poor form, can wreck baked goods, is wasteful, and appears to teach bad habits. At the very least they should say something like, "For demonstration purposes I'm not scraping the molasses out of the measuring cup, but you should or the recipe will be short on liquid." Or some such.

A friend made Sandra Lee's Kwanzaa cake over the holidays. It was truly awful. I would no longer trust a thing she says.

i hate when tv chefs don't rinse off produce before using it. i'm looking at you, jamie oliver.

I recently watched an episode of The French Chef on Cooking Channel and Julia was making roast chicken. First, she patted it dry with lovely green avocado green paper towels then proceeded to wipe the counter down with it and then chucked it into the sink! Made me laugh out loud at how things have changed. :)

I'm not a fan of Sandra Lee, but there are people who can't cook to save their lives and need every shortcut they can get. Hopefully, they'll learn from the shortcuts and eventually broaden their horizons. I have so many cookbooks and watch so many cooking shows, I just get tips and ideas and tweak recipes to suit my taste and ability...so far, it's working out pretty well.

@thethinchef re: tomatillos - actually, yes, they are in the tomato family, Solanaceae. But don't give them much credit, so are a huge number of the plants we eat, like peppers, potatoes, and eggplant!

Jamie Oliver has a realtively new 30 minute meals TV show in which he shows that yes, you too at home can make three fabulous dishes in 30 minutes. Except you can't. Tests have shown when 'real' people cook the same 3 course meal it can take up to, or over an hour. That's kind of annoying. As for TV cooks/chefs not having the proper knife skills etc. I don't mind- they're only human. Just because they're on TV doesn't make them Gods of cooking.

After watching her biography (on A&E?), I like her. I think that her primary audience isn't the foodie group, but people who can't really afford nice things, or the financial luxury or spare time to cook from scratch, but still want to make an effort.

@panda cakes - I am SO with you on the metal utensils with Le Creuset. That is the one thing that bothers me the most.

The only thing I like about Sandra Lee is that she gave me new ideas for crockpot use. Iron Chef America irritates me to no end as I loved the original Iron Chef. The only person I like watching is Alton Brown on Good Eats.

Haha I have to admit I love Jamie Oliver. It's only because I had a crush on him when I was a teenager that I ever cared to learn about food. So they serve their purpose - it also doesn't hurt that most of his recipes required hardly any actual cooking and always tasted great.

Sandra Lee on the other hand... YUCK. Everytime I catch a part of her show and watch her cooking it makes me a little sick. I've heard her cocktails are great but I can't stomach the meat and box heavy content long enough to get their.

On the other hand some celebrity chefs make cooking and food look glamours and sexy. Like Giada ? and Ina Garten. I still like watching their shows but I hardly ever try their recipes. I just like to look at their beautiful kitchens and table settings and watch someone else cook for awhile - but the food can't make me sick. I even like to watch Paula Dean but I hardly ever see her make something I think I'd want to eat. I'm pretty picky I admit.

*there. sorry had to correct it.

peaceofwestphila, Jamie Oliver probably doesn't wash his fruit and veg because he uses organic stuff, and often produce from his garden. The only reason you would need to rinse that stuff is if it had dirt on it.

Some of these people are cooks and some of these people are chefs. Cooks aren't going to have the knife skills a chef has. The other day I was watching an old "Julia & Jacques" show and I forget what she was doing, but she said, "That's the chef's way of doing it, now a home cook like me would just..." I was really struck by that. Even with all her training she did not consider herself a chef--she did not have that experience of intensive restaurant cooking under pressure to deliver.

These comments are hilarious. I've stopped watching Food Network for all of these reasons. Not that I care about knife skills that much (mine suck, why shouldn't theirs?) and while I think Rachel Ray and Sandra Lee are annoying, after watching bios on both of them, they are pretty interesting people. Ditto Emeril. But the catch phrases have GOT TO STOP! "Yummo" and "Bam!" and "tablescape" should be stricken from the English language.

Anthony Bourdain is still my favorite chef, if only because he glorifies rural and poor-people food and does so in a loving, but snarky way.

There's so many cooking shows (I'm looking at *you*, Food Network) that take far too much artistic license with their shots. I don't want to seen an extreme macro shot of dicing tomatoes.

No one looks at food food from less than an inch away... I want to see what you're actually *doing*.... ugh.

subtlefrog - I have read that tomatillos are in the gooseberry family, not tomato family. Are gooseberries related to tomatoes?

@goStanford. Tomatillos and cape gooseberries are part of the nightshade family (as are potatoes, tomatoes, and eggplants) and thus all related.

If you're interested in cooking shows that seem more realistic, homey and fun I'd suggest any of the following (taken with a grain of salt):

Good Eats
Sam The Cooking Guy
Anything on PBS
Some of the shows by Martha Stewart
Anything starring Julia Childs

I also enjoy some of the videos by home cooks you find online at places like YouTube. I want to see real people really cooking not a cooking fantasy.

I have to say that 10 years ago, when I first moved away from home and then into an apartment with my future spouse, I really did not know much about cooking. I could handle heating things up, but aside from that, I had no real kitchen experience. Then I stumbled on 30 Minute Meals, the pre-overexposure era. Rachael Ray gently guided me into the world of cooking. I really would not know what I am doing in a kitchen now if it weren't for her tutelage. Though I find her incessantly annoying now, back then, she was pretty mild and had some neat ideas. She made cooking approachable, easy, and fun for a new cook like myself. I just wish she had stopped while she was ahead.

Sandra Lee: ugh. I don't hate her personally--I just find her food abhorrent. I suppose there is a market for those kind of cooks, but I am hopeful I'm not invited to their home for dinner. :)

Giada's overpronouciation of Italian words is as annoying as her need to talk about her baby in every show over and over and over. I watch her on mute, when I actually watch.

I have to agree with the comment about Jamie Oliver--he likely gets his fresh produce from his garden, so no need to wash unless dirty. Also, I like to wash my produce before I put it away, and perhaps he does this too. Except for mold prone stuff like berries, I really think this makes cooking so much more enjoyable. Takes me about 20 minutes to wash and store all my produce for a week, and then it is ready for quick use when I go to cook during the week and I don't have to deal with that step.

Regarding the pasta water that boils over issue...I place a wooden spoon over the pot (heard that tip a while ago) or better yet, LOWER THE HEAT!

My coworker and I watch Sandra Lee every Wednesday just so we can laugh at her. So mean... But it's also hilarious to watch her pour "suuuuuper simple" taco seasoning over everything. Although it does surprise me that SHE has decent knife skills compared to some chefs. HOLD THE KNIFE RIGHT.

Oh, my other pet peeve is when they complete the most challening step during commercial breaks!

i've never seen her show, but from these comments sandra lee sounds pretty rough. that said, her recipe for grilled pork chops with peach salsa is over-the-top delicious and amazing and awesome. if you serve it to friends (that can handle spicy) they will like you more. (mango salsa works too.) http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/sandra-lee/grilled-pork-chops-with-peach-salsa-recipe/index.html

I can't stand to *watch* Sandra Lee (her voice is definitely annoying), but I have a couple of her cookbooks and I've enjoyed every recipe I've made from them. As a beginning cook, I never thought to augment pre-packaged foods, and often everything I cooked was bland and boring. As such, I hated cooking. Sandra Lee's books have given me courage to try new things with both pre-packaged and fresh made food, I've discovered ingredients I may never have tried and combinations I never would have come up with (blue cheese in mashed potatoes? Never would've done it before her, but it's OMG my favorite thing ever)...

Her techniques have their place, but it's definitely for a *beginner* audience - not someone who complains about the knife skills used by TV chefs.

Sara Moulton and Nathalie Dupree were always the best mistake makers. Love them both!!

After reading through some of these comments, some of you guys might really enjoy http://foodnetworkhumor.com/ if you haven't been there already.

Tons of snark and pointing out how asinine some of the "recipes" developed by the Food Network chefs really are.

Based on the site's feedback, it seems that the Food Network regularly patrols this site and makes modifications or changes to the FN site in response to catching and making up of errors or stupid recipes. Nice way to waste a bit of the afternoon.