Chopped Star Power Tournament Features Alan Thicke (Who Passed Away In December)

Photo - Food Network

Tonight at 10pm ET/PT on Food Network is the start of the Chopped Star Power Tournament which features sixteen celebrities competing for $50,000 to donate to charity.  There are four groups of celebrities that will compete with the winner of each episode moving onto the finale.

The following celebrities will compete:

• Internet Sensations (March 28th) - Josh Elkin, Hilah Johnson, iJustine, Lazarus Lynch
• Athletes (April 4) - Dorothy Hamill, Paige VanZant, LaMarr Woodley, Mariel Zagunis
• Comedians (April 11) - Illeana Douglas, Ron Funches, Jonathan Sadowski, Julie White
• Film and Television Actors (April 18) - Rick Fox, Jodi Lyn O'Keefe, Alysia Reiner, Alan Thicke

Alan Thicke, who will appear on the April 18th episode, passed away at the age of 69 in December 2016 after collapsing while playing hockey with his son.  He could also appear on the April 25th episode if he wins the episode that he competes on.

I guess this may be Alan's last new television appearance which could have been promoted, but it appears Food Network makes no mention of it in their press release.  It will be interesting to see if Chopped puts "In Memory of Alan Thicke" or something like that at the end of the episode.

Alan also previously appeared on Chopped Jr. as a judge.  When news of his passing began circulating, Chopped host Ted Allen tweeted, "We were privileged to have @Alan_Thicke on #Chopped set for two days—he was beyond delightful. Our hearts are with his family."

The press release about Chopped Star Power Tournament is below:

Giada De Laurentiis Nude Photos Might Leak

You may remember a few years ago hackers were able to gain access to celebrities' personal photos stored on their phones and posted these images online.  There were many celebrities that were hacked and had nude photos leaked online, but the most notable were Jennifer Lawrence, Kaley Cuoco and Kate Upton.

The release of these photos by the hackers on social media sites was nicknamed "The Fappening."  Ryan Collins, one of the hackers responsible for releasing the photos, plead guilty to felony computer hacking and did so on March 15, 2016.  Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of his guilty plea and hackers started releasing photos of more celebrities that have supposedly been hacked.  Many people are calling this "The Fappening 2.0"

Emma Watson and Amanda Seyfried are two of the celebrities that have already had photos released in "The Fappening 2.0."  Emma Watson's photos are of her trying on bathing suits while Amanda Seyfried had very private and intimate photos leaked.  Both have said the photos were obtained illegally and their lawyers have demanded that websites take them down.

Hackers have also said they have photos of other celebrities that they plan to release and on the supposed list is Food Network's Giada De Laurentiis.  The sites that have Giada De Laurentiis being on the list of "The Fappening 2.0" celebrity photo leak include ohnotheydidnt and ibtimes.  

As of now, it appears Giada's photos have not been released, so who knows if any actually exist or if they will be released.  I will update this post if there are any updates regarding the supposed photo leaks of Giada De Laurentiis.

UPDATE - As of 3/18, no pictures of Giada have been released.
UPDATE - Still nothing as of 3/29, so it looks like the rumor was false or they just weren't released.

Worst Cooks In America Winner - Season 10

Photo - Food Network

Tonight on Food Network is the Worst Cooks In America finale where the winner will receive $25,000.  The final two recruits are Ann Odogwu representing Rachael Ray and Daniel Mar representing Anne Burrell.

On tonight's episode Daniel and Ann each have "to prepare a three-course, restaurant-quality meal for a panel of culinary experts. Anne Burrell and Rachael Ray will help coach their recruits, but ultimately it is each recruit's final chance to show how much they have improved since week one. The culinary experts will pick a winner based on a blind tasting, and the winning recruit will walk away with $25,000."

I will update this post with the winner after the episode airs.  UPDATE - After the three-course meal, the judges determined that Daniel Mar cooked the best meal.  Daniel goes home with $25,000 and Anne Burrell goes home with bragging rights.

This years ratings for Worst Cooks in America were pretty high and had a 36 percent increase from last season's numbers according to Scripps.  With it being one of the higher rated shows on Food Network, there will probably be more seasons to come.

Iron Chef Gauntlet To Premiere April 16th on Food Network

Photo - Multivu

We knew Iron Chef was coming back as Iron Chef Gauntlet and now we know a little bit more about the show.  Iron Chef Gauntlet is set to premiere on Food Network Sunday, April 16th at 9pm ET/PT.  It will be a six-episode series and seven chefs will be competing for a chance to become an Iron Chef.  They will compete against each other for five episodes until there is one chef remaining.  Then in the final episode the remaining chef will go up against Iron Chefs Bobby Flay, Masaharu Morimoto and Michael Symon in three rapid-succession secret ingredient battles.  The chef will only become an Iron Chef if their total score beats the total score of the three current Iron Chefs.

The chefs competing to be an Iron Chef are below and include a lot of previous Top Chef (Bravo) competitors:

• Nyesha Arrington (Los Angeles, California – Executive Chef/Owner, Leona) 
• Jason Dady (San Antonio, Texas – Executive Chef/Owner, Tre Trattoria)
• Sarah Grueneberg (Chicago, Illinois – Executive Chef/Owner,Monteverde)
• Michael Gulotta (New Orleans, Louisiana – Executive Chef/Owner, MOPHO)
• Stephanie Izard (Chicago, Illinois - Executive Chef/Owner, Girl & the Goat)
• Shota Nakajima (Seattle, Washington – Executive Chef/Owner, Adana)
• Jonathon Sawyer (Cleveland, Ohio – Executive Chef/Owner, The Greenhouse Tavern).

The full press release about the show from multivu is below:

Food Network's March 2017 Programming Highlights

Here are some of the highlights of the Food Network programming scheduled to air on the channel in March:

Photo - Food Network

• The season finale of Worst Cooks in America on Sunday, March 5th at 9pm with the winner getting $25,000
• The Kids Baking Championship Finale on March 6th where the winner will take home $25,000.
• A Chopped Junior: Make Me a Judge tournament where the kid winners win $10,000 and get to judge Chopped judges Amanda Freitag, Alex Guarnaschelli, Marcus Samuelsson and Chris Santos as they compete for charity.
• A Chopped: Star Power Tournament which has 16 celebrity contestants over five episodes. The categories are web stars, star athletes, funny actors, and famous faces of film. There are no names listed yet and the winners will compete against each other in the finale. 
• Guy’s Grocery Games: Supermarket Masters Tournament where 16 previous winners return to compete again. 
• New primetime episodes of Chopped, Cake Wars, Cake Wars: Champs, Diners, Drive Ins and Dives, Bakers vs. Fakers, Beat Bobby Flay, Cooks vs. Cons, and Spring Baking Championship. 
• New daytime episodes of The Kitchen, The Pioneer Woman, Trisha’s Southern Kitchen and Valerie’s Home Cooking

The full press release with air dates and episode descriptions is below: