201 TV Cooking contests

TV Cooking Contests

I confess--I am nutty for cooking competitions on television! It is escapism at its best.

While researching this article, I found an excellent history of television cooking contests in an Oct. 24, 2014, The Atlantic article.  

https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2014/10/the-year-when-cooking-became-a-competition/381037/

Turns out that the Japanese Iron Chef that was televised in translation on the Food Network beginning in 1999 started it all. In its second year, it beat out Emeril Live, which had been the most popular show on the network. Then came Iron Chef America and The Next Food Network Star in 2005.

I felt that the witty commentary of Alton Brown made the show, which Is why I loved his Cutthroat Kitchen. The show is no longer aired, which is understandable because it would be hard to top all the ridiculous things the contestants were forced to endure. 

Guy Fieri is also diabolical to chefs in Guy's Grocery Games but only in a foody kind of way--no cooking on a kiddy stove or wearing lobster claws when cooking. Guy asks for a gourmet meal cooked only from the frozen and canned aisles. Hey, that is easy, my mom did it all the time!

The most popular of the contests is Chopped in which contestants fix three meals that must include mystery basket ingredients. My husband Harry, who will tolerate these shows for brief amounts of time, mixes his metaphors and tells me that I am an Iron Chef who could easily win Chopped. 

No way! I know I would get a basket that had a goat head or organ meats, that fruit that stinks, along with gummy worms, and then be asked to fix an appetizer in 30 minutes!

I also like the baking contests such as the Spring [Fall, Winter, etc.] Baking Contest, Cupcake Wars, and Cake Wars. There are also Christmas and Halloween contests that include pumpkin, etc. carving and sugar artistry--the dynamics among members of each team can be interesting, although it is probably staged!

The Atlantic article pointed out that the Food Network viewing audience has increased because of the cooking show competitions-- when other channels are losing viewership. Therefore, the network adds more food contest shows. I notice that they are searching for the magic host, a person like Ted Allen or Alton Brown or Guy Fieri. For some of the newer programs, they need to search a little bit more!

Again quoting The Atlantic and Tasha Oren, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, who studied the Food Network, “Most people who watch TV about cooking don’t cook,” she says. “They watch for the sport of it, for the fun of it.”

I do cook but she is right--I like the game and guessing who will win.

Trish                

200 Three broads--200 Blogs!

Three Broads – 200 Blogs (from Glenne)

Well, dear friends and blog readers, we have come a long way. Apparently we have some “staying power” as well. This blog is number 200. As Savvy Trish said - in our first blog which hit the web on August 

4, 2014 --even though we have retired we have “unshared collective wisdom” which folks may enjoy. So over a fateful lunch (with no alcohol involved) we decided we would create a blog in which we would we wax poetic or speak mundanely on a given topic of our own choice.

We have addressed a very wide range of topics in nearly five years: exercise, shopping, the weather (I like cold, Trish and Frances prefer hot), books, trees, holidays, being left-handed (me), recipes, family, 

memories of first loves, theatre, travel, gardening, dogs, Canada geese, reality TV, movie, rummage sales, libraries, clowns, sports, genealogy, cemeteries, school uniforms, disasters, technology, frustration, pet peeves , and random thoughts.

Trish calculated our page views at over 100,000. Not too shabby. Also interesting is that while most of our readers are U.S. residents, the next highest demographic is Russia/Ukraine.  (Is this generated by Trump/Putin?--oh,

 Getty Photo from MSM 

just a wild thought!

We hope you have enjoyed some of our savvy words. No, we hope you have enjoyed many of our words and found them savvy.

Finding a new topic is sometimes tough. We want to entertain. We want to give you something to think about. We are all avid readers. I fear we may be the type who read the cereal box at breakfast. New ideas can arise ….

What topics can we think about addressing? A website called Branding Strategy Insider says societal changes that should be examined include: the power of sheer numbers of both Baby Boomers and Millennials--can they find common ground? how to effect cultural understanding among religions and races; examination of the evolving definitions of gender including LBGT and the #metoo movement.

These are some heavy, but extremely important topics. Not a day goes by that I don’t shake my head as I read a real newspaper (my trusty NY Times) or online local pages. It appears we had better start addressing these topics including climate change and the border wall. Notre Dame’s fire is certainly a sad, sad topic.  I thought about the possible 

Photo from American Society
 of Civil Engineers--
underside of bridge

causes of the fire and my mind went to the infrastructure of America’s roads and bridges. What’s the next disaster. 

We Three Savvy Broads are all near the same age. We have common interests and essentially agree on most big issues. None of us, however, deal only with our age group. We have friends of various ages, interests, and political outlooks. 

Frances, having been a section editor of a newspaper, is probably the bravest of us tackling current issues. Trish knows more history than I will ever know. I like humor. I find it everywhere. Going back to the border wall, I remember the South Park show where Americans (including the South Park cartoon gang--Eric Cartman, Stan, Kyle, and Kenny) were trying to keep the Hispanics from going SOUTH across the border. It was silly; it was funny; it made its point! This, too, is a subject worth discussion! 

I am a big Billy Joel fan. History could be taught with this song of his. This hard-hitting song addresses over 100 issues from the 1950s and 1960s. (I counted them!) And so many of them are still issues: Korea, birth control, Cuba, Lebanon, China, hijackings, cocaine, race, foreign debt, etc., etc., etc. I also think of Bob Dylan’s “There’s a battle outside and it is ragin’ / It’ll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls / For the times they are a-changin',."

200 blogs and more to come. Maybe it’s protest time again? What is moral? What is ethical? What is legal? Whew. I am causing myself anxiety. SO ENOUGH OF THIS. 

American life is not all a downer. It’s spring. It’s Easter weekend. 

The trees in bloom make our Shenandoah Valley look like a fairyland in pink and white and green. The Shenandoah Apple Blossom Festival® kicks off its 92nd year on April 26th for 10 days of fun, friends, parades, and parties. I must stay positive. We’ll all three stay “savvy” and hope to keep you entertained.

Glenne                     

199 Victory in Virginia

Victory in Virginia

We were always avid basketball fans when we were teenagers and young adults. The excitement of the game was something we lived for and followed each week of the season. Our high school team during our senior year even won the state championship. Nothing as exciting as that!

Our love of the sport continued as we attended graduate school and raised our family. We attended college games as often as we could, and of course supported the high school games as our son played and our daughter cheered.

As time went on, we still loved the sport, but it seemed as if we got busy in other directions and never made it to the games anymore, especially at the collegiate level where the games were so exciting and intense.

The Ralph Sampson era at the University of Virginia was an amazing time at the ACC school in Charlottesville. My husband really was engaged at that time in the sport and got very upset over many of the games. We really didn’t want to be around him if UVA was losing.

Years seemed to pass so quickly and all of a sudden it had been years since we went to a game. This month brought back some of those exciting times as UVA won the men’s NCAA championship.

This win was meaningful as it was a first for the state school, and it redeemed last year’s loss so early in the tournament.

The semi-final and final games did not disappoint as both were a fight to the finish. Neither side gave in or gave up and kept the pressure on. Those three-pointers are so dynamic and a couple of those can change the game quickly in either direction. Free throws also played a prominent part and actually determined the end of the semi-final game. 

In addition, we watched the women’s championship game this month, but since we weren’t alumni of either school, we didn’t have a preference. Nevertheless, it was an exciting game that was also a fight to the end.

The skill, speed, and dexterity it takes to make those baskets and keep the ball in play are such a marvel. The game has evolved with the shot clock and some rule changes but no matter what, it is still fast paced and thrilling.

The game itself dates back to 1891 in Springfield, Mass. James Naismith was the founder who used peach baskets as the goal. Thirteen rules were established then, including “a player cannot run with the ball. The player must throw it from the spot on which he catches it, allowance to be made for a man running at good speed.” Of course, these have been added to and revised.

And what team could go wrong with a coach named Tony Bennett! Every time his name was repeated, I of course thought of the crooner who has withstood the test of time with his melodious sound entertaining generations and generations. Coach Tony Bennett showed his tenacity with directing this championship team. 

I also am pleased for Charlottesville to have this positive event after the summer of 2017 with a White Nationalist rally that ended in death and destruction. So great to have celebrations instead of vigils for the loss of life. 

Way to go Hoos!!            

Frances            

198 To edit or be edited?

To edit or be edited?

I have been doing a great deal of editing lately. I am working on a book that will be made up of documents concerning the life of Judge Richard Parker, the judge who sentenced John Brown to death.

I subscribe to a grammar editor called Grammarly.com. There is a free service from them, but I pay for the high-price spread. 

Documents from 1840 to 1880 make up most of the Parker book. Grammarly is hilarious to read when it examines 19th Century writing:

When you are working on a document--Word, email or this blog--

Grammarly highlights the offending word or phrase and adds the comments in a column to the right. I ignore most of its comments about old-fashioned writing style and look only for misspelled words and other typos. Of course, the spelling is different too and once I check the original handwriting, I ignore those offenses as well. It does help me find my typing errors!

Much like other services, Grammarly provides weekly feedback.

 

Since I am editing old documents, I don't pay too much attention to its assessment of my regular mistakes. I love commas, but Judge Parker did not!

I proofread the blogs we write for Three Savvy Broads, but my co-authors are also good at spotting errors. I also proofread articles for the Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation magazine, providing one more check for the editor. I get much practice editing!

So it felt a little strange when I received editorial feedback on an article I submitted to the Winchester-Frederick County Historical Society Journal. There were not too many changes, and most came from differences in style. But one question really bothered me. I was afraid that I had over-footnoted because I wanted to show that I had verified all the information I presented. A question about the correctness of a fact was a surprise.

I went through about 100 pages of notes to find where I picked up the fact and could not find it! I emailed the Library of Virginia to find the correct answer, and they answered one day later! I had included an incorrect fact, and a good editor, Bob Grogg, spotted it! 

No matter how good your editing skills are, a second set of eyes are essential!

Sort of savvy editor Trish