I'm a little late to the Pushing Daisies party, and probably ain't nobody going to read this, but here's my theory on how he can eat:

When he puts his own pies in his mouth, the fruit immediately rots because that was the state that the fruit had been in before he revived it. When something redies from his touch, it immediately returns to the state it was in before he revived it.

So if he touches a porkchop, sure it may shudder a little and some blood might start squirting, but then he can touch it again and it'll turn right back into an edible porkchop.

The actor who played Billy Balsam was driving me crazy with familiarity: I just looked him up in the IMDb, and realized he was Mike White! Great pairing of him with Molly Shannon, given that he wrote "Year of the Dog," which she starred in. He also wrote "Chuck and Buck," and a few episodes of "Freaks and Geeks" (as well as playing Kim's slightly addled brother). What a perfect sensibility for the "Pushing Daisies" universe.

I loved seeing Kenny Banya as Andrew Brown. I was expecting him to say at any minute, "that's gold Ned. Gold".

Also, on the comment of the fruit: So we've seen that if he eats a pie created with his fruit, it dies again...

so what would happen were he to eat meat? Or anything that used to be dead for that matter.. wouldn't it all come back to like then die the next time he touched/chewed it?

perhaps it's best not to think about.

This is such a lovely show! I really love it.

As far as I'm concerned I never really liked the aunts, so I liked that. And as long as Emerson stays around one way or another, we're sure to have a good time!

I've been wondering about the whole dead fruits thing as well, I'm also wondering if Chuck's flowers (on the roof) could be affected... I doubt it, that'd suck, so Ned has to be some secret garden of always dying flowers.

http://88.191.26.34/i_watch_tv/2007/11/29/pushing-daisies-bitter-sweets/

Those are going to be two long weeks for sure...

as I recall when Ned revived the fruits, he had a lot of plants around, flowers and the flowers wilted while the fruits florished, and that was the trade off. Once the fruits are in the pie he doesn't touch them again, the crust and pie tin are the barriers.

sort of a nice recycle factor.

Also on the fruit front, there was a scene in one episode, I can't remember specifically but he picked up dead fruit with one hand and revived it and then passed it to the other hand, which was gloved.

I feel the need to squash the speculation before it starts to run away.

In the introductory scene of the third episode it's shown that as he's reviving the peaches and tossing them to Chuck, the flower bed along a window sill is the (probably intended) victim. It's also been reiterated a couple times that trades are roughly equivalent. A dog for a squirrel, a bird for a bird, a plant for a plant, and a human for a human.

Worst episode yet.

Another comment about the fruit... it's been irking me too about how he can revive the strawberries and no other strawberry/plant is shown to die in it's place. I don't think you can have the mold be the offset since mold isn't a plant and so they're not in the same species/type/whatever as a strawberry.

And what about the tables that they sit at in the Pie Hole - they're made of wood which were trees, so wouldn't they come alive when Ned touches them? Or do we assume that Ned has already touched all of the tables twice to kill them off permanently.

In the end though, I put all of these questions into the back of my head and just enjoy the show for what it is - a fun time.