For all the food shows that actually make it onto TV, many obviously don't, which is too bad because a lot of them sound way, way better than Fat Chef: For example, check out the (not-embeddable) trailer for Biker Chef, which looks exactly as kick-ass as something called Biker Chef should look. It may make your day, weekend, or month depending on just how much awesome your heart can tolerate.

Biker Chef follows "one road warrior ... and a cat" who hit the road to discover "the tastier side of America." The pilot was shot in New Mexico maybe six years ago, and the road warrior in question is Christopher Coppola, a self-described "experimental cook and social alchemist" (the cat in question is Otto). (There's another amazing clip here.) The show is basically Guy Fieri's show meets Easy Rider meets Ghost Rider — plus a Burmese cat.

Oh, and speaking of Ghost Rider, it's no coincidence that Coppola's voice sounds a lot like Johnny Blaze's onscreen personage: Biker Chef's IMDb page reveals he's the brother of ... Nicolas Cage (née Nicolas Kim Coppola). What more do you want, Food Network?! Where else are you going to get someone who rolls up to an organic goat-cheese-maker's front door and says, while flipping his helmet visor like some goodwill version of the Terminator, "I'm Biker Chef. We're here to talk about cheese"?

Fortunately, there may yet be hope for Biker Chef: Coppola has been uploading all sorts of sizzle reels and digital projects to Vimeo during the last few days, all in advance of some kind of big new website launch that evidently takes place this evening. Please, please, please let it have something to do with forks, bikes, and cats.

Biker Chef Trailer [Vimeo]
Earlier: Meet Frank DiMattina, the Caterer and Reality-TV Hopeful Accused of Mob Ties, Intimidation

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Filed Under: the feeding tube, and a cat, biker chef, christopher coppola, video feed

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Formerly hidden Jbird closed its location inside XVI in December, and it's now roosting permanently on the Upper East Side. Cocktail guru Jason Littrell (Death & Co., the Randolph) designed the drinks list with Marshall Altier; their lineup roves through the classics, from sours to swizzles to fizzes, all served with the proper hand-cut or crushed ice — a boon for the proper-cocktails-starved UES. There's also a meaty food menu including a burger, bone marrow, and roasted pork shoulder — you can make a meal at the long communal table or perch at the bar for drinks and snacks. Scope it out in our slideshow and see the drinks menu below.

Cocktail Menu [PDF]

Jbird, 339 E. 75th St., nr. First Ave.; 212-288-8033

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Filed Under: nightlife, cocktails, jbird cocktails, openings, slideshow, upper east side

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In watching the Sundance screening of Shut Up and Play the Hits, the documentary of LCD Soundsystem's final show ever at Madison Square Garden, it is clear that James Murphy loves three things: music, his French bulldog, and coffee. He loves coffee with a passion unmatched by pretty much any somewhat famous person besides David Lynch, who has his own coffee line and has been known for putting rants about the virtues of coffee versus tea in movies like Inland Empire. In fact, when Stephen Colbert asked Murphy what he wanted to do now that he was retiring from rock stardom, he said, "I like to make coffee."

Much of the documentary's footage of Murphy at home has him crouched by an espresso machine, and the film's British directors, Dylan Southern and Will Lovelace, insist the portrayal is pretty accurate. "I make a lot of coffee," Murphy told us in an interview after the movie's premiere. "For my birthday, my girlfriend got me a training course with the world champion. That's what I'm going to do when I get back to London." Not only that, Murphy is working on his own espresso blend. He plans to "just go to a roaster who lives near me and start tweaking beans and temperatures." Why? "I thought it would be fun. I have beans that I like. I like this sometimes and that sometimes. Sometimes in the middle."

Murphy will only distribute this special blend at a single shop, but as for what shop and what particular beans, Murphy can't say. "I can't talk about that because I'm still in negotiations," he said, laughing. "I love that we're here and talking about a film, but I'm like, 'I can't really talk about the coffee.'"

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Filed Under: sundance dispatch, coffee buzz, james murphy

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The other week, rumors popped up that the latest, Texas-fried season of Top Chef would shoot its finale in Vancouver, British Columbia (nickname: the San Antonio of Canada), and now some tweets from the various TC judges confirm it. Gail Simmons tweets that it's the birthplace of Jason Priestley; Emeril points out that it's also the birthplace of Greenpeace; Padma says it's also where "the Chinese Buffet was founded." Guess the challenge will be an ecofriendly egg roll cook-off, guest-judged by Brandon Walsh?

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Filed Under: top chef, the feeding tube, top chef canada, top chef texas

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In a cute profile, The Wall Street Journal's magazine, WSJ., tries to nail down the finer points of the sometimes cranky, sometimes lovely, and usually innovative collaborative relationship between the chef David Chang and writer Peter Meehan. The collaborators on the fantastic 2009 book Momofuku and newfangled food magazine Lucky Peach first met, apparently, at a Hold Steady concert in Greenpoint. Recounting the origin story of their friendship, Meehan says they were both really drunk and Chang gave him a beer. "I do occasionally regret knowing David Chang," Meehan says, "but I do not regret taking the beer." [WSJ, Earlier]

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Filed Under: other magazines, david chang, lucky peach, momofuku, peter meehan

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Last night, designer Jason Wu launched his collaboration with Target at Skylight Soho. Even though the event was focused on shopping, it wasn't too tough to steer the conversations toward food: Emmy Rossum told us she's a big Top Chef fan, and that she's "big into lobster risotto right now." And Top Chef judge Gail Simmons was, of course, more than happy to chat about her ability to pick great apples at the store, her secret for great Super Bowl wings, and her feelings on that whole Paula Deen debacle you may have heard about.

This is a shopping event. Are you an aggressive shopper? Do you go to sample sales and fight over merchandise?
I would not say I’m an aggressive shopper. I want to be; I aspire to be an aggressive shopper. I am a meek, meek shopper … I’m not good at sifting; I like it laid out, I like to know exactly what I’m looking at. You know, I lose patience really easily; I’d rather shop in the grocery store than in the department store. I can pick an apple like nobody’s business.
 
So you won’t be grabbing that last dress out of somebody’s hands here tonight?
No, but I will be shopping tonight, because I do well with Target collaborations, and I always do well with Jason Wu.
 
Do you have Super Bowl plans? Are you making anything to eat while watching the game?
Yeah, I have plans to watch the Super Bowl. I’m from Canada, so I grew up not knowing a lot about football, but I’ve gotten into the swing of things, especially this year, being a New Yorker. And I also just became a fanatic of Friday Night Lights — a little late in the game — so I feel like I have finally learned the rules of the game of football, so I’m ready to cheer for the New York Giants.
 
Will you be whipping up anything special?
I will be cooking. I will be cooking for friends next Sunday. I have to decide the menu; there will probably be some super-hot sort of, um, Asian chicken wings, because I love chicken wings and I love spice. And probably, I don’t know, some chili. I’ve got to figure it out.
 
What’s your secret for making chili and Asian chicken wings?
Chili, the secret is low and slow; the chicken wings it’s using fresh chiles, and butter — a little bit of butter.
 
Speaking of butter, what do you think about Paula Deen being a spokesperson for a diabetes drug?
You know, I have mixed feelings about it. I can’t really comment on the spokesperson thing; it feels very transparent, it feels like she’s cheating her fans a little bit. But I don’t know the ramifications of that situation. But I do hope that she uses her voice and her power to be honest with the people who look up to her and who appreciate her, because she has a really powerful platform, and I think, as a food professional, you need to take responsibility for your health.
 
Emmy Rossum just told me she watches Top Chef.
Whoo hoo! I’ll seek her out. You know, I just did Andy Cohen’s Watch What Happens Live last night, and she did it, like, two hours before me for a show that’ll air Thursday — tonight — so I’ll have to chat with her about that.

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Filed Under: interviews, gail simmons, top chef

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With Shake Shack expanding to Brooklyn, you'd think other burger flippers in the borough would flee. But instead, a new spot that quietly opened on the corner of Smith Street and Baltic on Monday seems to be ready for a fight. Burgersmith, conceived by chefs Blessing Schuman-Strange and Kyle Huebbe, takes a secret blend of grass-fed beef, ground fresh daily at the nearby butcher Paisanos, and griddles them on cast-iron rather than a steel flattop or gas grill. The cast-iron gets you a better press on the patties so they come away a little crustier without overcooking, Schuman-Strange tells us.

There are close to two dozen topping options, or you can pick from nine combos on the menu, including the Trademark: Cheddar cheese and horseradish-chive aiïoli on a Portuguese muffin. This one is already a winner: It took top prize in 2009's Brooklyn Paper best burger contest and the Brooklyn Burger Bash of the same year.

Most items on the menu are local, sustainable, or organic, and anything that can be made in house is. But there are a few favorite items that the chefs can't live without that have to be shipped in. That includes green chilies from New Mexico where Schuman-Strange became addicted to them, and those Portuguese muffins that the pair have yet to find anywhere but Cape Cod. The beer list is bottles for now while a tap system is being installed. It's an impressive compilation of Northeast and Mid-Atlantic brews like McNeill's IPA — a small-production brewery in Vermont turning out old-world-style beers.

Some of the trappings of the Asian restaurant that previously occupied the space remain — cherry blossom mosaics and a portrait of Chairman Mao. But somehow these aren't discordant with the woven wood wall behind the bar and the antlers on the walls. Hours are 4 to 11 p.m. daily; see the menu below.

Menu [PDF]

Burgersmith, 209 Smith St., at Baltic St., Cobble Hill; 718-694-2277

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Filed Under: openings, burgers!, burgersmith, cobble hill

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Apparently twelve pizzas (including sausage- and pepperoni-topped ones) and as many cannoli were delivered to President Obama's hotel suite in Las Vegas on Wednesday, the Review-Journal reports. They came from the two-month-old Dom DeMarco’s Pizzeria & Bar, the Sin City outpost brought to you by the extended family of Midwood's sainted pizza man. DeMarco's says its pizzas are the same as Di Fara's — "carefully handcrafted using closely guarded recipes and quality imported ingredients" — so, you know, by extension, it's sort of like the president ate at Di Fara Pizza; take that, NYC DOH! [Las Vegas Review-Journal, Earlier]

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Filed Under: presidential pizza, di fara pizza, dom demarco, president obama

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Just days after bringing us the scathing news that Paula Deen's publicist recently quit, "Page Six" delves even deeper into the Deen family: According to "sources," Bobby and Jamie Deen were initially very unhappy with Paula's plans to endorse Victoza. So unhappy that they almost — almost &mdash met with other talent agents in an effort to move out from under their mom's shadow. But! Paula "put them both under a lot of pressure," and they ended up helping their mom after all. What, did she threaten to cut of their allowance? [Page Six/NYP, Earlier]

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Filed Under: family deen-amics, diabetes, paula deen

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Totally judging a book by its cover: We're going to guess that's not Martian soil or Cheetos dust on the just released cover of the Red Rooster chef's forthcoming memoir. The book's emphatic Yes, Chef title seems to be drawn in the African spice mix berbere, suggesting Samuelsson's self-described career path of "chasing flavors" was at least partially determined within his first three challenging years in Ethiopia before he and his sister were adopted by a family in Sweden. As such, the memoir's title echoes the sparse, melting serifs of Bill Buford's Heat before it, or the effective macaroni and rosary titles of Elizabeth Gilbert. Is Samuelsson cooking up a best seller? We're sure he won't have any problem finding opportunities to promote it. [Random House]

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Filed Under: bookshelf, aquavit, berbere, marcus samuelsson, red rooster, yes chef

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Meatball Shop owners Daniel Holzman and Michael Chernow continue on their shared path toward world domination. First, Elle just named them two of "America's Most Sizzling Chefs" (along with Fatty Crew's Corwin Kave, L.A.'s Jordan Kahn, and the Animal guys). Also on the Meatball guys' agenda: an appearance on Chelsea Lately last night. As you might guess, there were a lot of ball jokes. Check out the clip, straight ahead.

Hot in the Kitchen: America’s Most Sizzling Chefs [Elle]

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Filed Under: video feed, the meatball shop

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• The USDA's "Plant Hardiness Zone Map" for gardeners, which hadn't been updated since 1990, shows that warm zones have drifted northward. Cough, climate change, cough. [Salt/NPR]

• A U.K. teen who has subsisted solely on chicken nuggets since she was 2 years old was rushed to the hospital with all kinds of weird health issues. So, Twinkie Diet adherents shouldn't get any ideas. [HuffPo]

• Fast-food burger chains are proliferating in New York. Guess we can expect Mayor Bloomberg's next Subway ad campaign to address that. [NYP]

• A new Spanish study suggests that fried food is not inherently unhealthy. Yes! [Times of India]

• However, Burger King's new burger does not have the same distinction: The Smoked Bacon and Cheddar Double Angus packs more than 1,000 calories. [NYDN]

Filed Under: mediavore,

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