If you’ve ever tuned into a Chopped marathon or made an Ina Garten recipe, it’s safe to say you’re a Food Network fan. From Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives to Ace of Cakes, there’s no shortage of programs on this channel and a little something for everyone. So as an ode to the network that never fails to make our stomachs grumble, we give you the best Food Network shows of all time—in no particular order.
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$40 a Day
Rachael Ray taught us all how to dine on a budget with this show that took her on the road looking for the best food deals in the world. It lasted for four seasons, from 2002 to 2005. Her final stop was a trip to New York City.
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Food Network Star
Don’t get us wrong: We love Giada and Ina to pieces, but there’s something kind of thrilling about watching undiscovered talent turn into Food Network’s next big thing. Not everyone makes it to the big time, but the ones who do (cough, Guy, cough) become instant favorites.
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I Hart Food
Hannah Hart got her start on YouTube with a show all about cooking drunk. She’s totally sober on her Food Network show, but we love it all the same. Hart travels the country, learning about cities’ iconic foods, then breaks them down in her own kitchen.
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The Kitchen
The Kitchen is sort of like the adult version of Saturday morning cartoons. It’s on first thing in the morning, and is so predictable week-to-week (Jeff Mauro makes a dad joke! Katie Lee wears a great outfit!) that you can kind of zone out while watching. That said, there are still some pretty legit tips you can steal during the hour-long talk show.
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Barefoot Contessa
Ina Garten’s show is one of Food Network’s most popular ever, despite the fact that you’d be overcome with envy by the end of every episode, thinking: I want to be invited to Garten’s dinner parties, eating Garten’s complex French foods, giggling through a conversation with Jeffrey.
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The Pioneer Woman
After Paula Deen left the network, Ree Drummond — AKA the Pioneer Woman — led the charge of down-home comfort food. Her recipes are the ultimate guilty pleasures (think: pot pies, casseroles, and chicken-fried steak), and regularly call for multiple sticks of butter, but someone’s gotta do it, right?
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The Best Thing I Ever Ate
This show provided answers to “What’s your favorite meal you’ve ever had?!” before it was possible to just DM chefs the question. All the Food Network strongholds appeared on an episode at one point — Guy Fieri, Tyler Florence, Curtis Stone, Giada De Laurentiis. Over the course of six seasons, they ended up creating an unofficial food travel guide.
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30 Minute Meals
Before every magazine cover and website slapped this slogan on recipe collections, Rachael Ray made it famous. The chef did nearly everything from prep to plating in real-time, so the dishes seemed legitimately possible to make in half an hour.
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Everyday Italian
This was the show that gave everyone hope that they could eat pasta and still look like Giada De Laurentiis. That’s because even with all the cheese and carbs Italian food’s famous for, De Laurentiis kept her recipes light and refreshing — so you could actually eat them every day.
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Ace Of Cakes
Duff Goldman‘s inside look into his bustling Baltimore, MD, cake shop was one of the first shows of its kind. His creations were kind of mind-blowing, like a sugary replica of Radio City Music Hall and the Hubble Space Telescope, and his motley crew of wannabe rockstars was weirdly endearing.
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Sandwich King
Jeff Mauro found his niche riffing off the crew of misfit chefs on The Kitchen, but before his talk show days, there was Sandwich King. He made us realize that you can make a case for stuffing anything between two slices of bread, and it would sorta-kinda always work.
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Guy’s Grocery Games
Shopping in the Flavortown Market seems like a dream, honestly: Guy Fieri’s there, the store’s empty, and you’re out in mere minutes. Unlike other shows, the challenges on this one are highly probable, like having a budget or being out of an ingredient. Plus, we have it on the DL that Fieri’s a total softie behind the scenes.
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Taste
David Rosengarten, host of Taste, was like the original Alton Brown, in that he took a deep dive into a different food every episode. If you ever wanted a 30-minute look into the perfect BLT or oysters, this was it. At times, Rosengarten’s soothing-yet-unauthoritative voice seemed like it belonged to a member of Anchorman‘s news desk, but as part of the original Food Network line-up, viewers loved him.
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Too Hot Tamales
The two chefs who headlined this show were longtime friends off the set, and it showed: They had more fun than most other stand-and-stir television cooks while making modern Mexican recipes. Until a year ago, they even ran a California restaurant that fans could visit after the show ended.
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Iron Chef
Food Network brought Iron Chefover to America from Japan, and it became an instant hit. The greatness came less from the food and more from the theatrics: awkward English dubbing and random bursts of music were pillars of the show. It lasted for an entire 90 minutes, before people complained of the length and format — and it was never the same after that.
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Good Eats
Alton Brown once shared that his show was meant to be a Julia Child meets Mr. Wizard meets Monty Python mash-up, and once you hear that, you really can’t watch the show the same way again. It’s so spot-on: Classic recipes served up with a scientific spin and pithy humor. It lasted for more than a dozen years before ending in 2012 — the third-longest running series on Food Network — but Brown recently announced plans to reboot it on the web.
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Unwrapped
For people obnoxiously full of questions, this was the one show that could shut you up for 30 minutes. By the end, you’d have the answer to things like, Where do the tiny marshmallows in breakfast cereals come from?, Why does Mr. Potato head exist?, and How do you carve the ultimate ice sculpture?
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Semi-Homemade Cooking
The tablescapes — oh, the tablescapes. That’s how Sandra Lee referred to her table settings, themed to match the meal she just made. They looked like the result of a long, dark Pinterest binge — but before Pinterest was even a thing. The food was adored by soccer moms with no time, too: All of the recipes always include some pre-made ingredients that you could find at any grocery store.
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Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives
This was Guy Fieri’s second show, but first in the hearts of his fans. The catchphrases he spewed— crackalack, funkalicious, righteous — while visiting mom-and-pop restaurants across the country were almost as good as the down-home meals he’d spotlight weekly. Plus, he brought Smashmouth’s lead singer (AKA his doppelganger) out of hiding for a cameo. Bless.
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Cupcake Wars
Any show that can nab a magician — and then a member of the Mean Girls cast — as host is special. The cupcake-making competition is an hour respite from the real world, all sugar, a little spice (the losing bakers’ reactions are golden), and everything nice.
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Chopped
The premise here is simple — find mystery ingredients in a basket and cook with them — but it’s become one of Food Network’s most successful shows. Chopped is such a perennial favorite, it’s spawned nearly a dozen spinoffs: ones with teens, all-stars, grill masters, and celebrities. But nothing’s better than the original, which covers nearly all TV show categories — mystery, drama, comedy — in one.
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Restaurant: Impossible
This was the Food Network-HGTV crossover design-minded food-lovers freaked over. Robert Irvine and one of HGTV’s designers would take $10,000 to renovate a struggling restaurant, from the décor to the food. The drama was real, but the pair would always come through.
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Holiday Baking Championship
If you thrive off the holidays — and all the sugar that comes with ’em — this show is everything. Some of the challenges seem far-fetched just for the sake of being far-fetched (turn a mitten-shaped cookie into Santa’s sleigh!), but that’s what makes them so enjoyable. Judge Lorraine Pascale’s biting criticism seems too harsh for an amateur baking competition, but her accent lulls you into forgetting that.
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Throwdown with Bobby Flay
We all knew Bobby Flay could work a grill, but this was the show that solidified his status as “Best All-Around Chef.” He challenged so-called experts across the country, trying to make a dish better than them. The best part of each episode was when Flay would surprise his competitor — cue the happy tears.
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Worst Cooks In America
Food Network can sometimes lean more aspirational than inspirational. (Never gonna make that tarte tatin, Ina). But when Worst Cooks In America is on, we are one with the contestants. Actually, we’re more than one with them; we’re better than them — and that’s a rare thing to feel while watching the network.
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Emeril Live
When your motto is “Kick it up a notch,” your show better do the same. Emeril Live was so much better than his other shows (in our opinion!), because it was less stand-and-stir and more of an interactive talk show, with Emeril Lagasse inviting well-known chefs and famous celebrities on to create classic Creole and Cajun dishes.
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BBQ with Bobby Flay
On BBQ with Bobby Flay, the chef tapped into one of America’s favorite pastimes: eating BBQ. If you’re known for firing up the grill, you’ll love watching Flay as he travels across the country to find some of the best unknown BBQ joints and uncover their grilling secrets.
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Giada at Home
Even though Everyday Italian is hard to beat, there’s something so laid-back and effortless about Giada’s second show, in which she cooks easy and delicious recipes in her California kitchen.
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Beat Bobby Flay
Everyone loves rooting for the underdog, which is what makes Beat Bobby Flay a must-watch. Aspiring chefs go on the show to take down the one-and-only Bobby Flay, all for the sake of bragging rights.
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Dinner: Impossible
Ex-naval chef Robert Irvine serves up plenty of tough love on Restaurant: Impossible. Viewers liked it so much that the Food Network gave him a second show called Dinner: Impossible. Trust us, it’s just as entertaining.
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Kids Baking Championship
Hosted by Valerie Bertinelli and pastry chef Duff Goldman, Kids Baking Championship gives America’s young and passionate bakers the chance to compete for the champion title and $25,000.
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Girl Meets Farm
When Molly Yeh left New York City behind for a life on a beet farm in the Midwest, she brought a Food Network camera crew along for the ride. In Girl Meets Farm, viewers watch the chef cook up some delicious recipes with the backdrop of her idyllic farm lifestyle.
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Valerie’s Home Cooking
Actress Valerie Bertinelli proves you don’t have to go to culinary school to be a whiz in the kitchen—or land your own Food Network show. Every week, the self-taught foodie whips out recipes that you would be proud to serve to your family and friends.
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Rachael vs. Guy: Celebrity Cook Off
Food Network royalty Rachael Ray and Guy Fieri competed neck and neck as team captains in this cook-off competition show. Sadly, it’s no longer on the air.
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The Great Food Truck Race
Food trucks exploded onto the scene in 2010, which gave Tyler Florence the inspiration for this show. The basics: Eight teams compete in region-specific challenges until only one is left standing. The winning team is given a food truck of their own and $50,000 to grow their business.
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Guy’s Family Road Trip
Guy Fieri managed to build an empire thanks to his hit show Drive-Ins, Diners, and Dives. For this show, he took his family along for the ride. Cute is an understatement.
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Brunch at Bobby’s
Forget going out to eat for brunch—Bobby Flay teaches viewers how to make an impressive spread at home on this show. The chef is super passionate about this meal, and it’s impossible to turn it off mid-episode, so plan accordingly.
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Trisha’s Southern Cooking
Grammy Award-winning country singer Trisha Yearwood shows she’s got singing and cooking chops on Trisha’s Southern Kitchen. The singer teaches viewers how to make her favorite Southern recipes and, yes, it’s as adorable and entertaining as it sounds.
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