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Viewers who tuned into last week's premiere of Food Network's Thursday competition series "Food Truck Face Off " were treated to an intense battle between teams of culinary entrepreneurs vying for what could be a career-changing prize, a customized food truck. Host Jesse Palmer, on the other hand, was treated to, well, dinner. "I ate very well this offseason doing the show," says Palmer, a former pro quarterback whose day job is as a college football analyst for ESPN. "I actually wasn't allowed to eat any of the food on camera, but off camera I was literally wolfing it and inhaling it down. ... A lot of the food was just delicious. It was great." Each of the 13 first-season episodes of "Food Truck Face Off " is a two-tiered competition that took place in various cities across the U.S. and Canada. In the first, four teams present their unique food-truck concepts to a panel of judges that includes TV personality Steak Shapiro, restaurateur Alpana Singh and rotating guest judges. From there, two teams are selected to go head-to-head in an intense two-day competition. The team that earns the most in that time span will win the use of a customized food truck for one year. Some competitors were professionals with culinary training, others home amateurs. And the fare, Palmer indicates, was all over the map, ranging from American and Mexican to Caribbean and Asian, pleasing vegan and meat lovers' palates. "It would have been very hard to be a judge on a lot of these different episodes," Palmer says. "It was probably a lot tougher than even the judges had anticipated. They did a phenomenal job casting the show and they found some unbelievable cooks with some real culinary skills from all around the United States and Canada to compete on this show. "So hosting it was the easy part, I can say that," he says. "Being a judge would have been very, very difficult." And among the competitors, winning the one-year lease on a customized truck was no small deal, Palmer explains. "There was a lot of emotion that came through on the show," he says, "way more so than I had anticipated going in and doing it. There were some very heavy moments; there were some amazingly light-hearted moments. But I think getting to share that with these people – they were just very real. "Some of the challenges these teams had to go through were ... very mentally and emotionally strenuous and challenging as well. These teams, especially the ones that won, they really earned it and they put everything on the line. "And I think for me, that was probably the most rewarding thing just as a host sitting back and watching, because it was an incredible competition. It was very well thought out. It was very, very challenging, and I really felt like the teams that won, it's just really something that's really going to change their lives." Jesse Palmer BY GEORGE DICKIE Food truck foodies 'Face Off' on Food Network BEST SITCOMS STARRING COMICS "The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show" (CBS, 1950-58) By the time this show hit the air in 1950, Burns and Allen were stars in their own right thanks to their 1920s vaudeville act and a 1930s-40s radio show. The catalyst for much of the comedy came from daffy Allen's misadventures with neighbor Blanche (Bea Benaderet), which annoyed Blanche's husband, Harry (played by several actors), but provided Burns with fodder to philosophize in asides to the camera. The show was still popular when it ended in 1958 thanks to Allen's decision to retire. "The Cosby Show" (NBC, 1984-92) Bill Cosby's riffs and theories on parenthood and child-rearing were at the center of this family sitcom that provided plenty of laughs for the adults in the audience. He starred as Dr. Cliff Huxtable, an obstetrician practicing out of his Manhattan brownstone, which he shared with wife Clair (Phylicia Rashad) and five children (Sabrina Le Beauf, Lisa Bonet, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Tempestt Bledsoe and Keshia Knight Pulliam). The show kicked off NBC's "Must-See TV" Thursday nights that were a ratings juggernaut for the better part of two decades. "Seinfeld" (NBC, 1990-98) A no-brainer and undoubtedly the definitive sitcom of the 1990s. Jerry Seinfeld brought his stand-up act to television as a comedian named Jerry Seinfeld, who plied his trade in New York clubs while hanging out with a group of quirky friends (Jason Alexander, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Michael Richards). If the show's 10 Emmys and long life in syndication isn't testament enough to the show's greatness, the endurance of such catchphrases as "no soup for you," "master of my domain" and "spongeworthy" is. "The Drew Carey Show" (ABC, 1995-2004) Crew-cutted comic Carey was co-creator and star of this sitcom set in his hometown of Cleveland, in which he played himself as a downtrodden department-store employee whose pastimes included drinking beer with friends (Deidrich Bader, Ryan Stiles, Christa Miller), fighting with a cartoonish co- worker (Kathy Kinney) and striking out with the opposite sex. It also featured future talk-show host Craig Ferguson as Drew's boss and, in earlier seasons, a memorable opening credits sequence set to the Vogues' "Five O'Clock World." BY GEORGE DICKIE Jerry Seinfeld George Burns Bill Cosby 8 The Goshen News • TV Spotlight • October 6 - 12, 2014

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