America's Test Kitchen: The Next Generation

America's Test Kitchen has always been different and innovative. It stands out against the slew of other cooking shows. I was so looking forward to the Next Generation, hoping it would do the same. It is a carbon copy of 20 other cooking competition shows. Nothing different or new to speak of. Timers counting down, crazy challenges, and way to many "confessional" cutaways. The vegetarian contestant has to cook shrimp just to manufacture drama. I was so disappointed. The judges and host are the best part. There isn't a single contestant to root for, they are all so similar. The producers basically picked the same 3 types of contestants. I expected so much more.

It's really fun to see the inside of the America's Test Kitchen building and kitchens, which we don't get to see on the other shows. And I love watching the ATK hosts like Elle, Jack, and Dan give feedback in a new setting.

I'm a big fan of cooking competition shows, so this show is right up my alley. It doesn't have the borderline aggressive edge of a lot of current Food Network shows, but it's more aligned with that style than with The Great British Baking Show. The contestants are friendly with each other mostly because they're not cooking the same dishes side by side. There's a lot of creativity coming from the contestants themselves.

I love the ATK brand and everything that Julia and Bridget have done since the split with Chris, but this show is a disaster. The host is wrong on so many levels, she just does not embody the spirit of the brand. And the format of the show is so boringly predictable, I would have hoped for something more creative. Such a disappointment! There is a folksy, Everyman feel to ATK and Cook's Country, and that is absolutely missing in this awkward, forced production. I have to admit that I've only watched two episodes, but the contestants seem really weak. One person didn't know that you need to cut skirt steak across the grain!?! That's cooking 101!

This was a really disappointing show. As much as I love ATK and CC, this is an abomination. Most of the cooks are from either California or, to a lesser extent, Massachusetts. This is one more show that caters to the coasts and to hell with the rest of the country. I don't know or care who wins but I'll only see any of them when they get to ATK.

The level of inexperience for several of the contestants is laughable. On a dish that one cook mentioned he did in dedication to his Dad was horrible. Not only did he overcook the salmon that he said he has prepared many times but he failed to even get his rice done. How is it that you don't start the rice immediately - all of the rice cookers I am aware of can keep the rice warm until the protein is done. It all resulted in a plate that would have been better presented as salmon nachos - at least there wouldn't have been a nearly empty plate.

Others had their own set of afflictions. Bottom line, I watched through about 1/2 of the meal presentations and turnedd it off, not likely to ever watch again. I learned a great deal from ATK and CC and I feel lke this denigrates their "exalted" position in the cooking TV world. Sorry Elle, Julia, Dan, and Jack but this is beneath you!

This is the unfortunate work of ATK's new Vice President of Television, Video, and Podcasts: Mark Levine. His entire Food Network career was spent stacking the slate with competition cooking shows like "Worst Cooks in America", "The Great Food Truck Race" and "Cutthroat Kitchen". He also has the inglorious honor of being the guy that thought that putting little kids in dangerous, high pressure cooking situations for TV drama was an ethical idea.

So it's no surprise that this feels very much at home with the tired, cookie-cutter content he's been churning out for well over 10 years as part of Food Network's post-instructional era. You can even see the direct lineage and combinations of ideas, concepts, and presentation taken from his earlier works.

That said, even though this is a weird, uninspired mixture of his previous programs, namely "Food Network Star" & "Cutthroat Kitchen", it doesn't work with the talent that ATK possesses and their usual on-screen personas. He's making nearly every ATK personality come off as incredibly petty and condescending; qualities that wouldn't make me vie for a job at ATK.

The contestants themselves are making the best of a weird situation but each Cutthroat-esque twist thrown their way doesn't add to the drama, it just makes things awkward as they refuse to play along with the production. I applaud them, throwing people under the bus during a job interview is never a good idea. If only the producers understood that too.

To top it all off, the promised rewards at the end of the series are confusing and make it plain that whomever wins will probably have as much lasting impact at ATK as the average Food Network Star winner had on the channel over it's 14 seasons, which is to say nearly none.

Just to drive this home, during the various confession cam segments the contestants talk not about their dreams of working under the ATK brand but what independent ventures they hope to finance using the $100K prize. I wish them the same luck that ex-ATK personalities like J. Kenji Lopez-Alt or Christopher Kimball have had after escaping ATK's clutches. Maybe they'll actually be able to win a James Beard award! :P

My advice: Stick to instructional content based around exhaustive experimentation and tough-love hardware reviews; this show is a bad look that was tired well before Mark left Food Network.