On Demand Weekly

Media savant T Tara Turk goes deep inside cable TV to reveal Video On Demand's Hidden Gems so even the busiest of our readers can get the most out of On Demand TV. Tell Tara what VOD shows you think deserves her attention.

Around the World in 80 Plates (VOD Hidden Gem)
Warning: do not watch this show on an empty stomach

By T. Tara Turk

Bravo TV’s “Around The World in 80 Plates” is just what you expect a Bravo food show to be: highly stylized (more on that later), filled with slowly escalating drama amongst the contestants, big personalities, little personalities, food and fun.

With hosts Curtis Stone (Aussie celeb chef who started out on the TLC channel’s “Take Home Chef”) and Cat Cora (the only female Iron Chef who’s slowly creating her own culinary brand - and bares a striking resemblance to my favorite fictional gastro character on “Treme” - Janette Desautel) we see Bravo trying to keep up the cool host factor though few could compare to my favorite Tom Colicchio! Perhaps this show is a bit tougher than Top Chef as Cora and Stone are noted chefs and Padma Lakshmi is lesser known in that aspect.

The beginning goes like this (you’ve been here before if you watch Top Chef): chefs are picked, flown to a city, meet each other, presented with a challenge, compete, like/dislike each other under the stress of the competition and one team loses though this time the losing team (like Gordon Ramsey’s “Hell’s Kitchen”) votes one chef from their team off the show. That last bit creates a more catty atmosphere than we’re used to with Bravo’s food shows. In many ways, including the catty bits, this show feels like a precursor to the more civilized “Top Chef” franchise.

But this show has a slight advantage over “Top Chef” in that the chefs are traveling to a different city each episode, asked to spend a short amount of time in local restaurants, then asked to recreate local favorites with their own twists.

This first episode was tricky as it was in London

and pub culture is a bit of a religion there

- especially when you introduce, gasp,

Nigella Lawson as a judge!

The original queen of television gastro indulgence (sorry Paula Deen), Nigella’s stardom and frankness when judging takes this show up a notch. I know we probably won’t see here again but putting her in episode one, sets the judging bar really high.

Media savant T Tara Turk goes deep inside cable TV to reveal Video On Demand's Hidden Gems so even the busiest of our readers can get the most out of On Demand TV. Tell Tara what VOD shows you think deserves her attention.

No Reservations (VOD Hidden Gem)
Where will Anthony Bourdian go next (CNN)?

By T. Tara Turk

It’s kind of hard to do this Anthony Bourdian “No Reservations: Lisbon” after doing Bravo TV’s “Around the World In 80 Plates” because one definitely has more substance, culture and depth than the other but the one has contrived catty kitchen behavior, backstabbing and highlights the difficulty of cooking under competitive pressure as opposed to social and cultural pressures. I guess it’s kind of like deciding if you want your food fast or do you want to sit down and enjoy it?

Bourdain’s shows are always like taking a mini educating vacation with a host that never takes himself too seriously but knows the right questions to ask. You’d think his stints on things like Bravo’s “Top Chef’ or the attention he gets for calling out Paula Deen on her promotion of butter under her health circumstances would make him more of a public eye puppet like one of the Housewives. But that’s not the case. Bourdain is still Bourdain.

For example, his trip to Lisbon not only highlights the fact the city is the best place to go for inexpensive seafood creations (some that had me going on Kayak and looking for flights) but it’s also a country still healing from an oppressive rule that would have you disappear if you asked what democracy was outloud. Bourdain collects writers, musicians and chefs to give a bigger picture of the city as opposed to the one nighter “Around the World in 80 Plates” gives you.

In addition to this in depth discovery, you can go to the Travel Channel’s website and rehash your own Bourdain tour. You can get a list of restaurants Tony visits, activities he’s tried and some possible accommodations that won’t have you feeling like you’re touring the global Days Inn chain instead of actual historical places.