Everybody has an idea for a cooking show
In 1949, Lena Richard launched her career on TV with Lena Richard’s New Orleans Cook Book, a show so popular that WDSU-TV, the station that hosted it, started airing episodes twice a week. In 1963, Julia Child’s iconic show The French Chef started, making her the household name she is today. In 1993, Essence of Emeril began, and then, of course, Top Chef started in 2005.
These are, of course, just a few examples of the food shows people have tuned into over the years. Food television — and video — has had so many iterations and has changed so much, that if you really did a deep dive, you’d have a big — and probably pretty interesting — project on your hands.
Today’s guest on Food is Karen Katz, a multi-award winning TV executive producer, showrunner, and writer. Karen has worked on competition, lifestyle, documentary, reality, children’s, and music/variety programming both domestically and internationally, but her new book, Getting Sauced: How I Learned Everything I Know about Food from Working in TV, focuses, in large part, on the food side, with much about her time as the executive producer of Emeril Live during its pinnacle.
This is a subject that is rightfully fascinating to many, and Karen’s lightheartedness and candor do not disappoint. Hope you enjoy this behind the scenes conversation! (And you can find Karen’s recipe for French Harvest Soup right here.)
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