I am a big fan of the show The Next Food Network Star and finally watched the season finale last week. Two of my favorites were Herb Mesa and Aarti Sequeira. I knew from early on that Aarti was going to win. She had that friendly and engaging demeanor that the Food Network loves. She also had that Indian cooking flair that would be new to the Food Network. There are already a few cooking shows on the Food Network with that Latin and Mexican flair which was Herb's focus, so Aarti's win was a shoe-in.
After seeing Aarti's win, I found an article on Gluten Freeville that mentioned Aarti went gluten-free a few months back. From there, I visited Aarti's blog, Aarti Party, and saw that in May she did indeed go gluten-free. As Aarti puts it bluntly "Gluten and I broke up last week." After her initial post, Aarti only mentions gluten-free cooking one other time when she uses Glutino pretzels in her salmon cakes.
I watched Aarti Party this weekend which was enjoyable. Unfortunately her main dish of the show was bread pudding, so as of now she isn't featuring an all gluten-free menu. Let's hope she does address her gluten-freeness over the next few episodes. It would be great for the Food Network community to learn more about gluten-free cooking through this new show.
Congratulations Aarti and good luck with your show!!
Labels: "Aarti Parti", "Food Network", "gluten free"
