Featured Chef
Alton Brown
Alton Crawford Walter Brown (born July 30, 1962 in Los Angeles, California, United States) is an American food personality, cinematographer, author, and actor. He is the creator and host of the Food Network television show Good Eats and the miniseries Feasting on Asphalt and Feasting on Waves, and he is the main commentator on Iron Chef America. Brown is also the author of several cooking how-to books and a regular contributor to Bon Appétit and Men’s Journal magazines.
He brings a knowledge and enthusiasm for the science of cooking and food, and a humorous approach to his shows. Bon Appétit magazine named him "Cooking Teacher of the Year" in 2004. He was named Best Food Guru by Atlanta magazine in 2005. In 2008, he guest starred on Nickelodeon's hit TV series SpongeBob SquarePants in the show's sixth season episode, House Fancy.
Early career
Brown received a degree in drama from the University of Georgia. He began his career in cinematography and film production, and was the director of photography on the music video for R.E.M.'s "The One I Love." He has also worked as a steadicam operator on the Spike Lee film School Daze.
At some point, he noticed that he was very dissatisfied with the quality of cooking shows then airing on American television, so he set out to produce his own show. Not possessing the requisite knowledge, he enrolled in the New England Culinary Institute, graduating in 1997. Brown says that he was a poor science student in high school and college, and focused on the subject to understand the underlying processes of cooking.
Good Eats
The pilot for Good Eats first aired on the Chicago, Illinois, PBS member station WTTW-TV in July 1998. Food Network picked up the show in July 1999, and continues to air new episodes. Brown seems to take particular delight in making tongue-in-cheek references to pop culture, such as when he lectured an actor dressed as cartoon character Wimpy during an episode on hamburgers. (For trademark reasons, the surname was changed to "Whimpy.") He has made numerous references to Fight Club in reference to the cooking processes of lye, such as an episode in which he discussed the process of curing olives. Episode titles themselves include references, such as "Mission: Poachable", "It's a Wonderful Cake", and "My Big Fat Greek Sandwich." A Good Eats episode takes about three days to produce, according to the special episode "Behind the Eats."
Many of the Good Eats episodes feature Brown building makeshift cooking devices in order to point out that many of the devices sold at conventional "cooking" stores are simply fancified hardware store items that are sold at grossly inflated prices, and not much more effective than his "homemade" gizmos. For example, in the episode "Flat Is Beautiful", Brown uses a flat un-glazed quarry stone purchased at a hardware store as a substitute for a much more expensive pizza stone sold at a cooking specialty store. In an episode on barbecue, he made a barbecue smoker out of an electric hot plate, a pie pan, a flower pot (with basin), and a thermometer. He also used a similarly designed smoker in an episode entitled "Where There's Smoke There's Fish" to prepare a salmon. In an episode devoted to coleslaw called "Salad Daze II - The Long Arm of the Slaw", Brown makes a more convenient shredding device by attaching a cheese grater to a folded cardboard pizza box. In a contribution to Wired Magazine he described converting a paper shredder to function as a pasta machine. He has many times stated "You must think like MacGyver!" He has also expressed a penchant for items that are "multi-taskers" as opposed to "uni-taskers." For instance, in the episode "Choux Shine", he suggests that casual cooks should avoid purchasing a piping bag for applying a batter and instead use a plastic bag with a corner cut out. Brown repeatedly states that the only uni-tasker in his kitchen is a fire extinguisher.
To find out more...
Please visit Alton Brown's website at www.altonbrown.com to learn more about what he's up to! And don't forget to catch him on the Food Network on his show Good Eats and as the commentator on Iron Chef America.