I love Food Network Challenge when it's about cakes. But, tonight's episode is going to feature moms of child beauty pageant contestants. I don't like those contests where little girls are made up to look like 20 year olds with all their makeup and sleazy outfits. But, again, I do want to see the cakes. Hmmmmmm .... what to do, what to do? Should I be a hypocrite and watch FNC tonight anyway?

Be a hypocrite and watch. And I don't think that really counts. Your really there for the cakes and techniques.

you should watch it. remeber its all about the cakes and not who or why the cake is being constructed. besides not all pageant girls are made to look so fake. my daughter actually does natural beauty pageants and has won many scholarships to college from them. I hope that the girls featured will not be the glitz pageants wich i assume you are talking about..

Definitely watch! I don't really care for the whole pageant thing either but its not about the pageant its about the cake!

I delivered a cake to a hotel where one of "those" pagents was being conducted. OMG. There were more fake tans, hairpieces and rhinestone earrings than I'd ever seen in one place. And those were the girls who appeared to be 8 or younger.

I think I'll watch, though. Love the CAKES.

Oh watch! AND make fun of the moms!

I actually like watching "Toddlers and Tiaras". My Dh thinks I'm nuts, but he doesn't realize I'm silently criticizing all the adults.

The crowns! Oh, the crowns! Anyone else think the crowns they give those girls are ridiculous? Some are bigger than the girls!

I am now boycotting FN. As the mother to a young daughter, to me it is the principle of the thing. If another one of my favorite networks supported a show with racial stereotypes, animal abuse, or any other cause I am passionate about, I'd boycott that too.

This is my opinion... Beauty pageants are wrong on so many levels... but parents involved in it, will never (want) to see that. I feel very bad for children made to feel looks are what will determine their self worth. I don't buy the whole "talent" aspect. I've never seen a talented
"average looking" child win one. Adult pageants...whatever, they're adults.

It's like cattle at an auction... sorry, but it is. I'm done with FN.

It's just the "glitz" pagents that are bad*. There are natural ones out there. They just don't get as much attention because they aren't controversial. All the glitz pagents really are is a money making scheme. Did you know for each individual category you have to pay a separate enterance fee on top of the pagent entrance fee? Only the children whose parent paid to enter them into those categories are eligible. In some pagents, a girl wins simply because she's the only one paid for that category.

Have you seen the airbrushing that gets done to the photos these pagent moms use of their daughters for "Miss photogenic"? The photos do NOT look human! They look like dolls -- completely soulless. They're flat out creepy.

*By this I mean completely altering the way a child looks with spray-on tan, tons of make-up, flippers, artificial eyelashes, artificial hair, artificial nails, etc and really being more about how much did the parents spend than about any inherent beauty or talent in the child.

You know I got my kids to bed early tonight, just in time to watch and actually turned it off once I saw what the episode was about. While I do love to see the cakes (and will probably turn it on with about 10 minutes to go to see the final products) I just don't have much interest in the drama. Pretty much the same reason I don't watch Cake Boss.

A big ol' hearty "AMEN!" to all of you.

My mother was a swimsuit model for JC Penney and Sears in the 1970's, I was just a little kid. She tried for years to get me interested in modeling, it's not my thing... I didn't want to be looked at that way.
This may be why I'm so against kids being put on display.

I've boycotted networks for less... I boycotted WE for 2 years because they stopped playing 'MacLeod's Daughters'.

Well, I was a hypocrite and did watch the show, but now I regret it! It really was all about the drama and very little about the cake. I told my husband that, if I'm a very novice cake decorator and I didn't learn ONE thing or see ONE new technique that intrigued me, then FNC's gone over to the dark side. Now, it's all about the drama.

Oh, and I sure hope the mom of the little girl who told the male baker, "I'll throw a cake in your face!" took her to taske for that comment and that it was just edited out!

Unfortunately, FN is less and less about food and more and more about "reality tv". The sad thing is, a cake show that actually was about cake and took you through the steps to create a single cake every episode would have huge ratings, but the executives wouldn't ever put one on the schedule. If you look at Ace of Cakes, there is less and less of the actual decorating being shown every season. At one time, you saw quite a bit of what went into each cake. Now, it's pretty much, we're going to make this cake, a bunch of craziness, here's the cake we made. At least it's better than Cake Boss (which I cannot watch, it's too painful to my ears) where everyone's just yelling at each other all the time and the playing to the camera and unreality of it all is so obvious. I stopped watching [i[Amazing Wedding Cakes[/i], which is the one of the 3 that tends to show the most cake decorating (but still shows very little), because I found the folks from the Merci Beaucoup to be annoying AND I repeatedly saw flaws in their cakes that should NOT have been on cakes that went out the door.

Just finished watching the show (I had it dvr'd).

When the girls came out, I thought the same things I always think when I see girls "glitzed": They look fake and the way they move looks stilted, awkward, and unnatural (who holds their arms like that?).

Anyone else wish FN would stop doing challenges pairing professionals with people w/ no experience?

I think the producers encouraged that little girl to act bratty, for the drama of it. I think the cake decorator showed great grace and restraint in not telling that little girl that she was being a brat.

OMG, the money fan. Big whoop. You weren't the first to come up with fanning money lady.

The cake that won did have the best crown, but I think the luggage cake was the best executed.

Does the cake decorator have to split the money with the pagent mom?

The BBQ challenge that was on before hand was a lot better.

FN sucks, go to PBS saturdays. OMG the cooking shows are so much better. They actually have Chefs instead of personalities.

How many darn "dinner for ten dollars" shows do we need?

Mike

Oh, we DVR the PBS Sat morning shows, too. Hubby esp loves Steve Raichlin.

Pretty much the ONLY thing we watch on FN any more is Good Eats. Fortunately, Alton Brown is still awesome.

AB is awesome, and kinda cute

Kinda? He's damn sexy! Only 2 men off the telly ever show up in my dreams, and they are Hugh Laurie (rawr!) and Alton Brown (geeky IS sexy!). Johnny Depp? Orlando Bloom? Christian Bale? Yeah, they're cute, but my unconcious mind knows who the REAL studs are!

I guess I'm alone when I thought the interaction with the bratty girl and Jason was funny.
"I don't like boys."
"Well, I don't like kids. So, we're even."
I literally laughed out loud every time they showed it (because they did like, 3 previews of it before they actually showed it ).

Yeah, all the rest of it was annoying and out of line. But, that part was golden ha!

I didn't watch the show, but I do remember how FN loves to create drama and contraversy... much like every other lame reality TV show.

My guess is that said "brat" was prompted/encouraged to say those lines...

Now it sounds like the bratty girl didn't bother me or do any wrong in my eyes. That's not the case at all. She was totally out of line and I, too, blame no one but the mother. Just wanted to clear that up!

I also agree that it's the parent's responsibility to teach children respect. Sadly enough, I know children who have such sarcastic, sardonic parents that they naturally respond the same way. The children are rude, however the parent's show them no respect and expect them to be polite. Tone of voice is EVERYTHING... You have to give respect to get respect...it's earned. People forget that.

I get frustrated as a parent, but I never use sarcasm with my child because to me it's demeaning. The sarcasm I often hear used with children has such a cutting tone.. Parent's need to discipline children, definitely... I just wish some would discipline themselves too.

I think I got off topic... carried away, sorry if I did.

I'm a sucker for the cake challenges. I watch every one I see. But you're right... I get so tired of all the ploys they come up with to make the shows more interesting.

HELLLLOOOOO! They were interesting without all the stupidity added.

(Although I would love the chance to be one of those non-professionals paired with the professionals, but at least I have some interest in cake decorating... I don't think most of the ones they use will ever do anything else with what they learned)

And FN quit showing the shows I looked forward to all year (the Sugar Arts Show and the gingerbread challenge - which may be part of the Sugar Arts show, but they did a whole show focused on that), and instead gave us endless iterations of X food network star cooks a holiday something or other with Y food network star. They have a WHOLE series to themselves... if they want to have holiday episodes of THEIR shows (and invite each other onto them), I don't care... but don't use those stupid things to replace the specials I love (and I tried sending in a comment on their website to that effect, only to get an error message... and there's no other way listed to contact them... ARGH!).

[/rant]

- Leisel