Ed Ranks Food Network Celebrities

Something to watch...
while waiting for the inevitable grasp of death.

Here they are. Your top 15 Food Network Celebrities. You might think some people are missing. Well, here is the reason those people are missing:

1. They are a nobody. Sorry people, Ree Drummond and these other obscure nobodies are not famous. They just exist and have shows.
2. They are one of a million Iron Chef or other food competition show people, so meh.  Sure, Bobby Flay got famous enough to get his own shows and be a celebrity in his own right... so he'll make the list. But the Food Network has pumped out dozens of Michael Symons, Cat Coras, etc. I guess some of the winners who went on became moderately famous and sometimes maybe even got their own shows. But I don't have time for all that nonsense. They're off. 
3. They were already pretty famous before Food Network.  Wolfgang Puck was super famous way before Food Network became a thing. So he's not really a Food Network celebrity. Masaharu Morimoto was already famous from the original Japanese Iron Chef, so it's not like he needed the Food Network to put him over either.
4. Anthony Bourdain is not a Food Network celebrity, people. Sure, he had A Cook's Tour on the network waaaay back in the day - but our buddy Bourdain (RIP) got famous from the Travel Channel.  Besides, if I put him on the list he'd be #1 by default so it wouldn't be fair.

15. Robert Irvine - Gordan Ramsay sucks, so you can imagine how much this fake Gordon Ramsay sucks. He also lied about his resume and stuff.


14. Mario Batali - Used to be cool until we learned he played grab-ass with the ladies. Now we all know he's just an asshole. Oh well.  Will it stop me from making his recipes from their website? Not necessarily.

Pictured: Paula Deen lighting up some wood for a BBQ.

13. Paula Deen - Is she a racist? Yes. Is she a hypocrite for promoting foods with forty pounds of butter while simultaneously not revealing her own medical diagnoses as having diabetes and shit? No, not really. Come on, that's crazy talk. Just look at this woman. How was she "hiding" the fact that she had diabetes? She's a fat southern woman that throws butter in anything. Just watch two minutes of her show and you're like, "Oh, this bitch probably has diabeetus." But she ranks low for being a racist, for sure. Will it stop me from making her recipes from the Food Network website? HELL NO. This bitch has some amazing recipes [stolen from black folk].

12. Ina Garten - A lot of people like the Barefoot Contessa. I do not. Why? Maybe it's the whole "fuck kids with leukemia" thing.  Yep. I hope I've totally ruined Ina Garten for you if you didn't already know about that.

11. Guy Fieri - I mean making fun of Guy Fieri is sort of like beating a dead horse. I don't want to pile on. Everyone knows this guy is totally ludicrous. Someone decided it would be a good idea to give the lead singer of Smashmouth a food show and to allow him to open up restauants where he names common, basic things that already exist like aoili into "poppin hot whammo slap-yo-mamma jizz sauce YEAAAAHHHHHH."  The unfortunate thing that gets lost in all this is that the places he goes to in his show are mostly actually kind of awesome, old school places that deserve to be shown and which the average American can actually afford to go to.

10. Bobby Flay - Bobby Flay is pretty annoying too, plus he cheated on that chick from Law & Order: SVU. But he's less annoying than Guy Fieri, that's for sure. Plus his recipes are usually pretty solid. Although he puts corn in everything, which I suppose is the very definition of being a "southwestern-style" chef.  Want to be a southwestern-style chef? Take a recipe. Add corn. And you're done.

9. Duff Goldman - Who is this again? Oh right. The cake guy. I guess the cake guy is okay. I have no strong feelings about him one way or the other. And his show was the original "I design crazy cakes" show to get huge, which was then followed by a thousand other cake shows. Why did we need so many damn cake shows? 

8. Tyler Florence - Tyler Florence looks like a frat bro, honestly. But I have nothing negative to say about him. His shows are all watchable, even though I associate him more now with being a sort of "host" for competition shows rather than doing any cooking himself. 

7. Emeril Lagasse - This dude was a victim of his own success. Before Emeril, TV chefs were really more low-key Julia Childs-types who appeared on PBS. The shows were straightforward shows about learning to cook. Then Emeril added a big personality (with all those damn catchphrases) and got so huge that networks started throwing TV shows at him about his life. He became over-exposed and it all came crashing down. Still though, who doesn't like Cajun food? Morons, that's who. New Orleans is the best. Plus he gave us that character on Furtuama. 

2003 was a different era.

6. Rachael Ray -  A lot of people are really annoyed by her for some reason. I dunno. She seems okay to me. Maybe I'm just still thinking about that old FHM photo-shoot or something. Or how she puts on that wholesome, Oprah-style image but then stories come out about her and her husband being swingers or in an open relationship. You're a dirty girl, Rachael!


5. Jamie Oliver - I was honestly expected something a lot different when I heard there would be a show called "The Naked Chef," but I guess Jaime Oliver is okay. I inherently trust anyone with a british accent. Speaking of which...

4. Nigella Lawson - This is actual food porn. Her show should honestly be on Cinemax or something. It's 30 minutes of a buxom brunette, generally with her cleavage portrayed prominently, speaking in that hot, hot accent while making food. 

3. Giada De Laurentiis - Basically the lady version of Mario Batali in that she's an Italian chef, but she has the up side of not being a horrible human being.  She's pretty much on every single Food Network TV show, isn't she? I feel like if they need someone to host something or run a new show, she's an easy go-to. Also her grandfather is Dino De Laurentiis, whose production company distributed The Transformers: The Movie. That's got to be worth something, right?

2.  Sandra Lee - The concept of Sandra Lee's show is that you can easily make more healthy meals at home using fewer and prepackaged ingredients. While it's not as healthy and amazing as making everything from scratch - it's a pretty honest theme that reflects a busy, modern society where we can't stay at home all day to freshly bake a meal from scratch. And honestly, the "semi-homemade" meal is much more healthy than a totally pre-made meal or going out to eat. So Sandra's concept is solid. But what seals the deal on this show is that Sandra Lee is a raging fucking alcoholic who generally always pours a ton of alcohol into everything she makes. This escalates her from "Oh, good concept for a show" to "Awesome."

NERD. But also #1.

1. Alton Brown - This fucking nerd is the best. Personality-wise, he's seemingly the opposite of those outgoing, in-your-face celebrity chefs. He wants to be a technical nerd and talk about chemistry and the minutia of the cooking experience. Good Eats is an awesome show and still infinitely watchable in repeats. But you can't escape Alton elsewhere, as you'll also see him on Iron Chef America, Cutthroat Kitchen, Feasting on Asphalt, Next Food Network Star, Chopped, etc.  You cannot escape the vortex of power and authority that is Alton Brown.