Back in Emeril's pre-Katrina heyday, chefs and serious foodies used to dismiss it as the Bam! network. Now it's disdained as All-Rachael, All-The-Time. You know, the Food Network, not about cooking so much as lifestyle (travel, glitz), weaponry (knife-wielding, cake-frosting) and tours of candy factories. Deliberate programming choices, made to draw viewers too sedate for Housewives and too chicken for Survivor. more ›

It's a newer, thinner Dan Thiessen presiding over Bellevue's 0/8 Seafood Grill and the adjacent bar, Twisted Cork. "I stopped drinking and lost 80 pounds," he confides, no mean feat for a dude who clearly wants to become the Tom Douglas of the Eastside. more ›