458 replies to this topic

[orchidgal]

In her new daytime cooking series, 5 Ingredient Fix, host Claire Robinson proves delicious dishes only need five ingredients or fewer to make cooking easier, faster and down right irresistible. Claire shows viewers how to enhance the natural flavors of carefully-selected, fresh ingredients to illustrate her belief that each ingredient should truly stand out in a recipe. With eclectic and elegant menus perfect for every occasion, her straightforward cooking style promotes healthy, seasonal eating as well as stress-free shopping. Claire minimizes fuss and maximizes taste to achieve mouth-watering meals in no time!

However, in an apparent attempt to gain notoriety for the new Food Network show, salt and pepper are exempt from the ingredient count.

[grainofsalt]

And the difference between "enhancing natural flavors" and "maximizing taste" compared to "turning up the volume" is????

If the recipes are good, the ingredients obtainable at a 'regular' grocery store, the dialogue is listenable and she doesn't wear cleavage bearing tops, I'm willing to give Claire a chance.

ymmv

[KCMOCook]

I caught the first part of this show and didn't think it was that bad. Claire seems low-key and personable, and seemed to know what she was talking about. For the small part that I saw, she only mentioned her husband once, and didn't notice any annoying personality traits. I thought her roast looked good, but $$$$. I'll give her another chance and watch some complete episodes.

Now, where did SHE come from? I don't understand how some of these FN hosts just appear out of nowhere, then others have to fights their butts off on NFNS and Chopped.

[Latecomer]

I saw the promos but missed the first episode. I like the concept behind it. A friend of a friend taught home ec for many years, and her personal philosphy is that you don't need a exhaustive list of ingredients and steps to make a tasty meal. I agree with this completely. We're now trying to teach this idea to my friend. This show may help with that.

[Hieland Foodie]

I enjoyed the show especially the millionaire's shortbread. Brings back fond memories.

[iamme2]

Now, where did SHE come from? I don't understand how some of these FN hosts just appear out of nowhere, then others have to fights their butts off on NFNS and Chopped.

Exactly what I'd like to know. Like Aida, she appears to be young, slim and attractive, and, as you said, came out of nowhere...was she a contestant for another of their shows that TPTB took a shine to?

[biakbiak]

Like Aida, she appears to be young, slim and attractive, and, as you said, came out of nowhere...

Aida didn't really come out of nowhere, she was the food editor at Chow.com for several years before she got her show and that website is quite popular with people who are into food.

According to her bio, Claire has worked behind the scenes as a culinary producer for Easy Entertaining with Michael Chiarello and PBS' Everyday Baking for Everyday Food. So I imagine that is how she was noticed.

Edited by biakbiak, Apr 9, 2009 @ 3:20 PM.

[lvmb123]

Like Aida, she appears to be young, slim and attractive, and, as you said, came out of nowhere

Aida has been writing for chow.com for some time. According to the FN site, Claire went to the French Culinary Institute in NYC and has worked as a culinary producer on a few shows.

[singerr]

How did this woman get on the FN with a show? She is intelligent, informed, nice, down to earth, and she is not annoying! No weird made up words, no yelling or yapping, no stupid sayings and she looks normal! I wonder how long before they dump her!

[orchidgal]

I can see the logic behind leaving salt and pepper (and oil?) off the list of ingredients, but I have to say that I really don't agree with that decision. As others here have noted, salt and pepper certainly are ingredients and should be counted, as the addition of each can make or break a recipe.

I have to admit that the beef filets with the blue cheese butter in today's episode looked divine.

[braggtastic]

I may give this show a try. The only chef show I watch is whatever Jamie Oliver is doing, and I think I've seen each At Home episode at least twice now. I guess there are no reruns of this, since I missed the first episode.

[Latecomer]

I can see the logic behind leaving salt and pepper (and oil?) off the list of ingredients, but I have to say that I really don't agree with that decision. As others here have noted, salt and pepper certainly are ingredients and should be counted, as the addition of each can make or break a recipe.

I think that's a standard viewpoint though. I have a couple of five ingredient or less cookbooks and none of them count salt and pepper in the five ingredients.

I saw it today and I liked it. Definitely worth watching.

[addicted_aardvark]

Amazing that she conned FN into carrying her show. She wears too many clothes on her upper body, unlike Gee-ada. She uses real ingredients and simple appliances. She makes a whole meal and cooks the dishes in a logical order (like, mousse first so it can set) rather than the random method applied by Aunt Sandy of preparing the item requiring 8 hours in the slow cooker last. Oh yeah - and she's low key and professional, without any stupid sidekick, and we only see silly humor in the outtakes at the closing credits.

(As an aside, why to cooking show producers insist on the hosts having the food processor turned around backwards so the buttons face the audience? No wonder she had trouble getting the bowl seated; I doubt I could properly construct mine if I turned it around.)

Oh - and its funny that nowadays baby spinach must be so common that she had to explain why adult spinach was necessary. I don't remember learning about adult vs baby spinach when I started cooking fresh spinach, there was just "spinach". Then we got "baby spinach" but it was a special thing.

The show does continue to pique my interest.

[Jadzia81]

I couldn't watch it. Well, I did watch about half. And yes, she's low key and made a reasonable meal, knows her stuff, isn't flashing crazy cleavage etc, etc. But her voice and cadence in speech absolutely drove me nuts and I couldn't stand it any longer about 15 minutes in.

[nycapa]

I have to say, I'm very interested in this show. I think the title unfortunately suggests a gimmick that might bring Sandra Lee or RR to mind, but when I actually watched it I realized that it was quite the opposite. Yes it's 5 ingredients, but they are all real, fresh ingredients, and it's real cooking. I'm an accomplished cook, grew up in a restaurant, work in the food world, and I don't see this so much as dumbing down. The best food I've eaten has been simple, few ingredients, with real understanding of what each ingredient contributes to the dish. That's what it seems is going on with this show, and that's pretty exciting. Plus, there is really nothing objectionable about Claire, which is a breath of fresh air.

I always say the best food is the simplest, properly prepared food. I'm crossing my fingers that this is what this show is about.

[Watermelon]

I can see the logic behind leaving salt and pepper (and oil?) off the list of ingredients, but I have to say that I really don't agree with that decision. As others here have noted, salt and pepper certainly are ingredients and should be counted, as the addition of each can make or break a recipe.

I don't see the problem with regular salt and pepper, but when you start using gray salt(like in the episode I saw), I think that's a little much. Non-foodies do not have gray salt just sitting on their shelves.

[JohnnyBravo]

First positive: Claire is hot.

Second positive: Nice, simple recipes with solid techniques.

Third positive: Claire is hot.

Fourth positive: The ingredients don't require that one travel to Madagascar or Bolivia in order to obtain them.

Fifth positive: The production is fun...cool music, bright graphics.

Did I mention that Claire is smokin' hot? Yeah, I think I did.

[yosemite209]

I have no problem with leaving salt & pepper off the 5 list, as they are ubiquitous in nearly every dish. I like the culinary point of view in this show; good, solid recipes that are easy to make without a trip to the gourmet shop for half the ingredients.

Claire is okay; maybe she'll grown on me as time goes by. But sorry, JohnnyBravo, I don't think she's smokin' hot at all. Not even close. Aida, on the other hand...

[KCMOCook]

I'm OK with not counting regular S&P and certain staples that most of us have in our pantries as part of the five ingredients. I think it is more of the overall concept. So far, everything I've seen Claire make seems doable, although maybe not the most economical, like her premiere with the expensive rib roast.

Claire's pretty and so is Aida -- just in different ways. I just don't like the concept of Aida's show. I think she'd be really great if she was on her own show -- sans "techno geek."

[braggtastic]

I saw the breakfast episode - not sure if that's the 2nd or 3rd in the series. I'm kind of getting excited about cooking due to this show, which if you knew me you'd fall down laughing. It all seems so doable and since breakfast is often my favorite meal, everything she made looked so delicious.

Question: can I substitute a metal cooling rack for the baking rack that she used to make the bacon? The one I have looks very similar. For all I know, it actually is a baking rack, but I've always used it as a cooling rack and referred to it that way.

[csichick]

Question: can I substitute a metal cooling rack for the baking rack that she used to make the bacon? The one I have looks very similar. For all I know, it actually is a baking rack, but I've always used it as a cooling rack and referred to it that way.

One and the same. Happy cooking.

[Napaluna]

According to her bio, Claire has worked behind the scenes as a culinary producer for Easy Entertaining with Michael Chiarello and PBS' Everyday Baking for Everyday Food. So I imagine that is how she was noticed.

I don’t think so. My friend worked on Michael Chiarello's show and said Claire was an intern who came with a friend one season only. Apparantly the only time she went in the kitchen or worked with the food was to wash dishes!

My two cents are even though she’s not very experienced, I like the idea of 5 ingredients as long as they are organic and local. I pine for the days when real chefs ruled on Food Networks and not just pretty faces with empty resumes.

[orchidgal]

I have been trying to pin down just why I have a problem with omitting salt and pepper from recipe lists. When one claims salt and pepper as ubiquitous ingredients, that to me implies that salt and pepper must necessarily be ingredients in every recipe. So do I need to add salt and pepper when I make a pitcher of iced tea? Or pepper to the pancake batter I am making for the morning breakfast?

Conversely, in some recipes salt and pepper are some of the star ingredients. Steak au poivre would be nothing without pepper - and copious amounts of the pungent spice. A brine or a salt-crusted meat dish each require large amounts of salt - so much so that a new box of salt might need to be purchased just for that recipe.

Also, in yesterday's episode, Claire made a point of explaining why she was using gray sea salt in one of the recipes. I have table salt, kosher salt, rock salt, white sea salt in a disposable grinder and a block of pink Himalayan salt in my kitchen. For that recipe, I would have to go purchase the gray sea salt that was specified.

That being said, I really can appreciate the idea of good food simply prepared with few ingredients. I just object to the artificial constraint of limiting a dish to X number of ingredients.

Edited because I really can spell.

Edited by orchidgal, Apr 19, 2009 @ 1:43 PM.

[iamme2]

I pine for the days when real chefs ruled on Food Networks and not just pretty faces with empty resumes.

From an interesting article in the NYT re the agent who handles most of the big name chefs on FN (including the overexposed Rachael Ray.)

JON ROSEN, agent for a particular brand of talent, was watching the screen, judging.

Another agent wanted Mr. Rosen’s opinion on a woman he was thinking of signing. The woman, Claire Robinson, a former television producer, had sent a DVD of herself demonstrating a recipe as she pursued her dream of having her own show on the Food Network.

Within minutes Mr. Rosen had seen enough.

“Lock her up,” he recalled saying that day last August. “She’s going to be a star. She pops off the screen. Sign her today.”

This weekend, the third episode of Ms. Robinson’s show, “5 Ingredient Fix,” will be shown on the Food Network.

Mr. Rosen, 39, knows what he is talking about. He heads the “branded lifestyle” group at the William Morris Agency in New York and is agent to a pantheon of stars in food show business, Rachael Ray, Bobby Flay, Al Roker, Katie Lee Joel and Giada De Laurentiis among them, many of whom credit him for the scope of their success.

Ms. Robinson of “5 Ingredient Meals” spent $3,000 of her own money making the demo DVD Mr. Rosen saw. Although the Food Network has committed to only six episodes of her show so far, ratings have been promising. She continues to dream big.

“I wear aprons on every show,” she said by telephone last week. “I could see that being a future product. Also I am really into knives, culinary knives. So I’d love to have my own brand of knives.”

This is what Mr. Rosen has wrought, a world where such dreams might come true....

Although an adequate cook as far as I have seen, Ms Robinson's eye is firmly on the merchandising moreso than the food it seems.

Edited by iamme2, Apr 21, 2009 @ 4:30 PM.

[orchidgal]

Although an adequate cook as far as I have seen, Ms Robinson's eye is firmly on the merchandising moreso than the food it seems.

Sigh, at least she is right at home with the rest of the network's celebrity "chefs".

[buttersister]

Welcome to FN! Where, btw, you'll be signing over the merchandise rights to TPTB.

Meanwhile, if she keeps cooking real food without nicknames, I'll give her a pass, sts, on the salt & pepper. Grey salt is a specific enough ingredient (as would be pink peppercorns) to warrant being a countable ingredient. **Remembering picking up a big container of grey salt for a couple of bucks in the basement of the Paris Inno store a bunch of years ago. Thanks, Parisian friend!**

[addicted_aardvark]

Her show may well be cooking with few ingredients, but it sure isn't inexpensive cooking or narrowly-defined "American" cooking (whatever FN seems to think that is. Sandra Lee??). Duck breasts with port/cherry sauce? Potato/cauliflower gratin? Earl Grey shortbread cookies? And using French and talking about the menu idea being influenced by her time in France? Encouraging use of real vanilla and not the fake stuff (like that made by FN's advertisers). Shhh. FN executives please don't watch this show.

Yes, the set and her color-coordinated wardrobe are still a little too white and stark (but not so much as Giada's). And the outtakes of her flubs are silly and giddy (but at least they are used only in the bumpers and closing credits, not the show itself. Spice Fairy, take that.) And she is indeed young and attractive (but I still have no idea what her girls look like). But at least the show will give viewers some insight into the idea that cooking this real food with few ingredients is indeed simpler than Sandra Lee's "super simple" concoctions using packets and slow cookers.

Although I do think including her French bulldog on the show - including sitting at the counter - was a little too much trying to be Martha Stewart. Plus, the beat-up wood floor that was in the shots of her dog made me wonder exactly where this series was filmed. It was definitely old, beat up hardwood with dirt splotches on it. I suppose it could be a set in a warehouse type space.

I have a cauliflower that I'm going to roast (not in a gratin with potatoes though), but doubt I'll be sating my desire for duck breast for awhile.

[toolazy]

I couldn't watch it. Well, I did watch about half. And yes, she's low key and made a reasonable meal, knows her stuff, isn't flashing crazy cleavage etc, etc. But her voice and cadence in speech absolutely drove me nuts and I couldn't stand it any longer about 15 minutes in.

Bingo. I only lasted about five minutes. I'm going to have to try again, though, because I really want to like this show.

[Jadzia81]

I still can't get through more than a segment, and I'm glad to hear that I'm not the only one who has trouble with how she speaks. For awhile I thought maybe I was just being totally irrational. And it's too bad, because I really do want to watch and like her show. From her recipes and comments here I can see that she's basically the antithesis of, well, basically everyone on FN in the last few years (except for Anne Burrel and what's her name, the Cooking Loft lady). This is a very good thing. But her cadence just drives me nuts.

[braggtastic]

I don't have a problem with how she speaks, but since I like breakfast foods more than duck and such, I enjoyed last week's show much more. It inspired me to ask my boyfriend to get the blender from above his kitchen cabinets, dust it off & bring it over. I made a delicious smoothie with vanilla soy ice cream, soy milk, some tropical blend juice I had & frozen berries. I didn't measure anything and it blended into the most gorgeous purple color & was exactly enough for two glasses. Total success!