FN Dish – Food Network Blog: Go behind-the-scenes at Food Network featuring your favorite chefs, shows, recipes, events and more.

We’ve spent all day testing an early version of our new Wii game — rough job, but someone’s got to do it. (BTW, check out the developers’ blog here.)

Rupa Bhattacharya, Culinary Writer

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- Submit Questions to Susie
- Read Episode 6 Viewer Questions

- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 1
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 2
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 3
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 4
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 5

Susie’s vlog response to your Episode 7 questions is now posted! Go to: Susie’s Answers – Episode 7

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Want to know what Susie really thought about The Next Food Network Star, Episode 7? Now you can ask her!

Susie will pick a few of the best questions entered in the comment section of this post and answer you directly via vlog next Friday, July 24.

- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 1
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 2
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 3
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 4
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 5
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 6
- Watch Susie’s Answers – Episode 7

It’s road trip time! We happened to get our paws on some tickets and hotel accommodations to The Food Network Southern Food & Wine Festival at Gaylord Opryland in Nashville, TN. So enter our “Photo Caption This” contest here on FNDish.com, and get together a road trip for July 31/August 1 (or if you live in or around Nashville, TN then you’re already good to go)!

Photo Caption THIS:

Here’s how you play:
Take a long, hard look at the picture above. Write an original and creative photo caption for the image, and enter it in the comments section of this post. A little humor doesn’t hurt either! We’ll pick one (1) winner next Thursday, July 23 (at which point we’ll ask you to fill out an entry form). You are eligible if you: a) can travel to Nashville, TN on either July 31st or August 1st AND b) are 21 years of age or older. (See full contest rules here).

Here’s the PRIZE PACKAGE:
One (1) night accommodations (double occupancy) at Gaylord Opryland Resort in Nashville, TN, on July 31 or August 1, 2009
Two (2) tickets to a cooking seminar with Bobby and Jamie Deen (Friday, 7/31) or The Neelys (Saturday, 8/1)
Two (2) tickets to the festival exhibit hall featuring food and wine vendors, food samplings, cooking competitions, kids’ area, wine tastings and more!

By submitting a comment on this post you agree to these contest rules.

Dave Mechlowicz, Culinary Purchasing Manager

Oh, Otto, you’ve done it again:

[via]

Rupa Bhattacharya, Culinary Writer

Year after year, cucumbers have been the most dependable and prolific plants in my garden, making them an easy sell for me each spring. This year, I got so carried away with tomatoes and peppers, I almost forgot them, until my friends from Teich Garden Systems (who build our Good Food Gardens) gave me an heirloom pickling cucumber plant. I almost forgot them again until this morning, when I found the plant cleverly creeping up the legs of an old-cast-iron trellis, with two chubby cucumbers hanging heavily from its vines. These first cucumbers mark the glorious beginning of weeks upon weeks of green, as well as meals and menus inspired by their vibrant green skin.

Best picked when evenly green, firm and crisp, cucumbers should be eaten as soon after picking as possible, when their cells are bursting with water. It’s that crisp edge that makes them so refreshing raw, dipped in hummus, tossed into a Greek salad, or sliced (any size, skin on) with lemons in ice water, a spa trick that’s easy to adopt at home.

They are also the inspiration behind three of my favorite summer foods: chilled cucumber soup; pickles; and tzatziki, a garlicky yogurt-based cucumber dip that’s perfect with pita and as a topping for lamb burgers, gyros, or kebabs.

And if you happen to have a garden bursting with green, or a good farmers’ market nearby, take the color and run with it with a summer supper made of tzatziki with grilled flatbread, pesto stuffed into grilled arctic char, a summer squash carpaccio, and a peppermint and lime herb refresher. Bon Appetit!

Sarah Copeland, Recipe Developer and Good Food Gardens spokesperson

P.S. If you didn’t get your cucumber plants in yet, it’s okay to plant some now for a fall harvest. Cucumbers grow quickly and like lots of space, sun, and water, so give them room to grow either out (at least two feet apart) or up (they work well when trellised or allowed to creep up a link fence) and keep the soil moist.

You guys really went all out for our Bobby Flay limerick contest! We recieved over 300 entries on FNDish.com and Facebook.com/FoodNetwork. It was a hard choice, but below are the three submissions that stood out to us:

#1 – Jeremy found our FN Dish contest on Facebook and submitted this witty limerick:

There once was a cow who was stricken
With the need to make us eat more chicken
But one fateful day
The cow met Bobby Flay
And now she thinks beef’s finger-lickin’!

#2 – We felt that Karen captured the soul of Bobby’s burger outlook:

“A burgers just a burger” you’ll say
Until you’ve found Bobby Flay.
The meat you’ll be grilling
And the fixins’ make them thrilling
“A burgers just a burger? – Not Today!”

#3 – Ah, the Sherwood family. Their full-family participation (mother, father and daughter) really impressed us. Here are four of the twenty limericks they submitted, starting with Sherwood Father, Terry, after he apparently realized his wife was spending all day coming up with limericks for our contest:

There once was a blogger named Rose,
Who obsessively tried to compose,
Five limericks a day
About Bobby Flay,
Will she win only Food Network knows!
-Terry

My husband thinks he’s the grill master,
But Bobby Flay cooks so much faster.
He grills meat with heat
And his burgers are treats.
My spouse is becoming a true bastard.
-Rose

There once was a husband and wife
Who sat up all night in strife.
With no time to play,
It was limericks All Day!
Obviously, they had no life.
- Laira (Sherwood Daughter)

Thank you FN for all of the fun.
We’ve played the game and had a good run.
It’s Bobby’s last wish
That we should finish.
Flay’s burgers have certainly won!
- Terry and Rose

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Hope everyone had as much fun writing these limericks as we did reading them. Should we do more contests like this? Shout out your suggestions!

In promos, sometimes our chefs share the spotlight with surprising co-stars: the graphics. The Viva Daisy! spot is no exception, as we’re hoping you’ve already seen on-air. I casually stalked Senior Designer Christopher Clarke and Writer/Producer Steve Tardio paparazzi-style from start to finish as they collaborated and created this promotional piece. Now I am excited to share my roomy front-row seat with you…

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Christopher and Steve first brainstorm graphics ideas while reading over the script. The overall concept they developed highlights Daisy’s “spice” and “flourish” through the dynamic movement of the camera, as it twists and turns through Daisy’s world. Christopher creates the graphics portion of the promo, and Steve pulls show footage from Viva Daisy! to incorporate into the spot.

CONTINUE READING

Between this video from the NYTimes (embedding is needlessly difficult, but I promise it’s worth the click-through) and the ongoing confirmation hearings, I’m starting to realize that Otto von Bismarck was right.

Then again, the last time that happened, things didn’t end terribly well…

Rupa Bhattacharya, Culinary Writer