Obaid

CEO

April 19, 1993 was a defining day in the history of TV.

It marked the launch of a new basic cable channel called the Television Food Network.

Viewed through the prism of today's fragmented micro-targeted pop culture landscape, it seems

unremarkable, but back in 93, the TV Food Network was mocked and derided as a sign of

television's dissent into absurdity. Originally its programming was targeted at elite

gormons and presented by hosts like Lifestyles with the rich and famous Robin Leach,

Gorma Magazine editor David Rosengarten, and Donna Hanover, the then wife of disgraced and

discredited former New York City Mayor Grudy Giuliani. But as the channel evolved, it discovered

a recipe for bigger ratings, scoring its first mainstream hit via New Orleans chef Emerald Legasi,

a natural on camera, with its outsized personality, running list of catchphrases, and tendency to

punctuate seasoning with an outburst of BAM! The new Food Network, having dropped TV from its name,

serenity's programming on down-home fare presented by every men and women, amassing a stable

celebrity chef's including Bobby Flay, Rachel Ray, and the now shunned Paula Dean.

Then in 2005 Food Network launched its reality competition show, The Next Food Network Star,

and its season two winner would transform the channel, a Bay Area chef with bleached blonde

hairstyleed in Bart Simpson's spikes, with the Piercings tattoo sleeves and flamenblaze and

bowling shirt of a karaoke DJ. Guy Ferry, who'd legally changed his last name to its original

Italian spelling, Ferry. This dead ringer for the singer from Smash Mouth smash the

expectations of a chef. The Sammy Hagar of the kitchen, Hoke Hogan in a chef's coat, a chugalow,

and it would become not just the next star, but the biggest star in Food Network history,

...