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The Stew

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By JEFF HOUCK

The Tampa Tribune

Published: August 27, 2008

LOFTY TELEVISION

Alexandra Guarnaschelli caught the restaurant bug early growing up across the street from the Carnegie Deli in New York City. She still remembers the smells and sounds of that iconic eatery, which attracted lines of patrons around the block.

"My heritage is Italian, but I definitely would park that at the door any day to have a pastrami and corned beef on rye with a little chopped liver spread on the top," she told me recently for my Table Conversations podcast.

She and her father would go there to eat sandwiches, and Woody Allen would be two tables over eating with his family.

"It was a magical New York place," she says.

Guarnaschelli grew up to become a celebrated chef and worked in Michelin-starred restaurants in Europe and the United States for such chefs as Daniel Boulud and Guy Savoy. She currently is executive chef at Butter restaurant in New York City.

Guarnaschelli is venturing to TV on a new show, "The Cooking Loft," which debuts at noon Sunday on the Food Network. The premise: She invites four people to her loft to learn culinary secrets and ask the questions that at-home viewers would want to know. Each week, she will explore such food topics as pasta, pizza, turkey, breakfast, holiday cookies and apples as she teaches easy-to-use techniques.

The show is the last of six summer series launched by the network this year, including "Road Tasted With the Neelys," "Food Detectives" with Ted Allen, and "Ask Aida" with Chow.com food blogger Aida Mollenkamp.

If the debut show on cooking with tomatoes is any indication, she has a bright future on TV. Guarnaschelli is able to balance three difficult concepts as a relative TV novice: cooking accessible food in a relaxed fashion while paying attention to the pupils in the studio and to those who are watching. The menu for that episode: steak drenched in a fresh tomato sauce, tomato and watermelon salad with strawberries, and stuffed sweet tomatoes for dessert.

"My No. 1 goal is just to get America cooking and enjoying cooking unto itself, and to not be afraid to experiment with something in a different way," she says. "As the show progresses, I'd love to use some unusual ingredients."

You can listen to my podcast by going online to my blog, The Stew, at TBO.com, Keyword: Stew. Or you can subscribe to it for free on iTunes.

DELICIOUS TUNAGE

Speaking of the podcast, I have an update on one of my first guests,

Michael Hearst, who came out with an album called "Songs for Ice Cream Trucks" earlier this summer.

Hearst is now working on a blog called "Songs for Newsworthy News" ( www.songsfornewsworthynews.com), in which he produces a short song about breaking news topics. Story topics range from economics to science and technology to sports and politics to human interest.

My favorite so far? A little ditty called "Transfats Being Banned From Restaurants in the State of California." It's only a few seconds long, but I can't get the damn hook out of my head.

"These quirky, short songs are posted along with lyrics, photographs and a link to the original story," Hearst e-mailed me.

"As I am a bit obsessed with food, I have no doubt that there will be one on that topic up very soon. Actually, the latest post is about obesity rates in the U.S., which is ... well, sort of a result of food."

Hearst is so obsessed that he has been working on a new project with his band, One Ring Zero, in which they sing recipes from various chefs word for word.

"It's totally ridiculous and probably one of the hardest things I've ever done, musically," he told me. So far, the group has recorded songs that go with Michael Symon, Mario Batali and Chris Cosentino recipes. One I heard, called "Mario," mixes an Italian tarantella with an essence of Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb."

The project will debut sometime next year. Stay tuned.

NUKING THE FRIDGE

Earlier this year, I mentioned that this summer's Indiana Jones movie - which features Indy surviving a nuclear blast by hiding in a kitchen appliance - had provided us with "nuking the fridge," a new phrase being used online to explain when a concept goes from good idea into bizarre absurdity. (It's an update of "jumping the shark.")

In that context, the news on Monday that chef Rocco DiSpirito would be performing on the next edition of ABC's "Dancing With the Stars" has radioactive side-by-side Kenmore epic failure written all over it. It's not a Kenny Mayne-level bad idea, but it's close.

I guess we can only thank our "stars" that it wasn't Emeril or Rachael.

SAMPLING BIDEN'S COOKIES

At 3:26 a.m. Saturday, Sen. Barack Obama named Sen. Joe Biden as his running mate by text message. Clearly the campaign timed the announcement to appeal to blue-collar insomniacs, all-night gamers hopped up on Red Bull and Amish farmers who can't resist the modern temptation of a BlackBerry.

Turns out Biden has a paper trail. That trail includes a culinary history.

Seems he committed in late 2007 to contributing to a Yankee magazine article highlighting the favorite recipes of presidential candidates. His Oatmeal Raisin Cookies were judged along with those of other candidates by culinary students at Southern New Hampshire University to determine, along with an online poll, the winner of the Yankee Magazine Cookie Primary. The winner? Failed Democratic candidate Bill Richardson's Biscochitos. Hey, at least he won that contest.

You can find a recipe for Biden's cookies on my blog, The Stew, as well as links to a recipe for Obama Pie and a list of food inventions younger than John McCain.

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