altonbrown

If you're worrying about how to do Thanksgiving a week from today, I highly recommend trying Alton Brown's Thanksgiving recipes. His roast turkey is spectacular! We've made it for friends for the past five Thanksgivings, and this year we're making it for family. The two keys to the turkey are: 1) brine, and 2) don't stuff it! The stuffing sucks the moisture out of the turkey and of course there's the whole threat of food poisoning (Brown has an alternative 'stuffing' recipe). The first time we made this turkey, we were blown away. I never knew that white meat could be so moist and full of flavor! Plus, it only takes four hours or so to cook rather than all day.

To understand how Alton makes his turkey, your last chance to watch his special, Romancing the Bird, on Food Network is on November 23rd at 11 am. If you can't wait that long, the full transcript of the show is here. There's also an Alton Brown Fried Turkey recipe on YouTube.

Are you a big fan of Alton Brown's Good Eats like I am? Well, get ready to feast on some asphalt.

That's the name of his new, limited run show on Food Network, Feasting On Asphalt. Brown will jump on his motorcycle and check out places to eat in America.

The show will run for four episodes, and will start on July 29 at 9pm.

Inspired by this article, I decided to make a list of my top five favorite Food Network shows. None of that silly Top Chef or Celebrity Cooking Showdown nonsense. Just straight-up Food Network.

1) 30 Minute Meals with Rachael Ray: Okay okay, Rachael Ray is incredibly annoying. Her voice is always raspy, she always finds a reason to giggle, she constantly says "Yum-O!", and she firmly believes that "EVOO" takes less time to say than "extra-virgin olive oil". But, I've got to admit... those Cordon Bleu burgers were pretty damn good. Really, I have tried out several of her recipes without any problems, taste-wise or time-wise (always under 30 minutes!). Granted, I don't sample all of her recipes, but the ones that I've made so far have been fantastic. Once I got over her excessive enthusiasm and too-bubbly personality and gave the actual food a try, I was able to enjoy the show a lot more. Maybe you anti-Rachael people should give her recipes a go instead of just complaining about her oddly-shaped body (eh, I'm not gonna lie... It didn't make a great FHM spread, even after the extreme airbrushing).