Alton Brown | |
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.JPG) Brown in 2015 | |
| Born | Alton Crawford Brown Jr. (1962-07-30)July 30, 1962 (age 63) Los Angeles,California, U.S. |
| Education | University of Georgia (BA) New England Culinary Institute |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 1 |
| Culinary career | |
| Cooking style | |
Alton Crawford Brown Jr.[1] (born July 30, 1962) is an American television personality, food show presenter, author, voice actor, andcinematographer. He is the creator and host of theFood Network television showGood Eats that ran for 16 seasons, host of the miniseriesFeasting on Asphalt andFeasting on Waves, and host and main commentator onIron Chef America andCutthroat Kitchen. Brown is a best-selling author of several books on food and cooking. A recap series titledGood Eats Reloaded aired onCooking Channel, and a true sequel series,Good Eats: The Return, ran from 2019 to 2021 on Food Network.[2][3]
Alton Brown was born July 30, 1962, in Los Angeles, California.[4][5] His father, Alton Crawford Brown, was a media executive inCleveland, Georgia; owner of radio station WRWH; and publisher of the newspaperWhite County News.[6][7] He died on Alton's last day of sixth grade from an apparent suicide.[8]
Brown studied film at theUniversity of Georgia in the early 1980s.[9][10] He left the university in 1985 only onecredit hour short of completing hisbachelor's degree. He eventually received it in 2004 after learning that the university's Department of Theatre and Film had since reduced the number of required credits.[11]
Brown got his start in television in the 1980s as a cinematographer formusic videos, working on videos such asR.E.M.'s "The One I Love". In the 1990s, he became dissatisfied with the quality of cooking shows airing on American television[citation needed], so he set out to produce his own show. In preparation, Brown enrolled in theNew England Culinary Institute, graduating in 1997.[12][13] He says[14] that he was a poor science student in high school and college, but Brown focused on the subject to understand the underlying processes of cooking. He is outspoken in his shows[15] about his dislike of single-purposekitchen utensils and equipment such asgarlic presses andmargarita machines, although Brown adapts a few traditionally single-purpose devices, such asrice cookers andmelon ballers, into multipurpose tools.[16]
The pilot forGood Eats first aired in July 1998 on thePBS member TV stationWTTW in Chicago.Food Network picked up the show in July 1999. Many of theGood Eats episodes[17] feature Brown building makeshift cooking devices in order to point out that many of the devices sold at conventional "cooking" stores are simply fancified hardware store items.Good Eats was nominated for the Best TVFood Journalism Award by theJames Beard Foundation in 2000.[18] The show was also awarded a 2006Peabody Award.[19] In May 2011, Alton Brown announced an end toGood Eats after 14 seasons.[20] The final episode, "Turn on the Dark", aired February 10, 2012.
On Alton's 2017 book tour, he stated thatGood Eats would have a sequel[21] and that it would be released to the internet in 2018. This was changed in late 2018 when Brown made arrangements with The Cooking Channel to air "revised" versions of several episodes with new recipes titledGood Eats Reloaded, in which he stated new episodes ofGood Eats are also in the works. Thirteen episodes ofGood Eats Reloaded aired in late winter and early spring 2019, and were added to theGood Eats reruns on The Cooking Channel. It was announced on June 5, 2019, that the new show would be calledGood Eats Returns; it premiered on the Food Network with the slightly revised titleGood Eats: The Return on Sunday, August 25.[22]
Brown relaunched the show in two versions: asGood Eats Reloaded on Cooking Channel (which updates, reworks and adds to originalGood Eats episodes), and on Food Network asGood Eats: The Return in August 2019 (all-new episodes). New episodes ofReloaded premiered in April 2020. NewReturn episodes were in the writing process and planned to be filming over the summer of 2020, but were delayed due to theCOVID-19 pandemic.[23][failed verification] These episodes eventually saw release, initially as an exclusive on the newDiscovery+ streaming service. In June 2021, the episodes premiered on Food Network as a companion to theChopped: Alton's Maniacal Baskets tournament.[24] On July 13, 2021, Brown announced thatGood Eats: The Return would not be returning for a third season.[25] A third planned season ofGood Eats Reloaded was also cancelled, but the recipes planned for the series were included as part of Brown's"Good Eats 4: The Final Years" cookbook.
In 2004, Brown appeared onIron Chef America: Battle of the Masters. This was the second attempt to adapt the Japanese cooking showIron Chef to American television (the first beingUPN'sIron Chef USA, which featuredWilliam Shatner). Brown served as the expert commentator, a modified version of the role played by Dr.Yukio Hattori in the original show. When the show became a series, Brown began serving as the play-by-play announcer, withKevin Brauch as kitchen reporter. Brown also served as the host for all five seasons of the spin-offThe Next Iron Chef.
Brown's third series,Feasting on Asphalt, explores the history of eating on the move. Brown and his crew traveled around the United States via motorcycle in a four-partminiseries about the history of road food. Brown samples food all along his travel route. He includes a "history of food" segment documenting famous road trips and interviews many of thefoodies he meets en route.
The series premiered on Food Network on July 29, 2006. The miniseries was picked up for a second run,Feasting on Asphalt 2: The River Run, in 2007. Six episodes were filmed between April and May 2007. The episodes trace the majority of the length of theMississippi River through Brown's travels. The second run of episodes began airing onFood Network on August 4, 2007. The third season uses the titleFeasting on Waves and has Brown traveling theCaribbean by boat in search of local cuisine.[citation needed]
In 2013, Brown began hosting the cooking competition seriesCutthroat Kitchen on the Food Network. In each episode, four chefs are each given $25,000 with which to bid on items that can be used to hinder their opponents' cooking, such as confiscating ingredients or forcing them to use unorthodox tools and equipment. Three chefs are eliminated one by one, and the winner keeps their unspent money as the day's prize. The series premiered on August 11, 2013.[26]
In 2018, Brown hosted Season 18 ofWorst Cooks in America as the blue team mentor. The season debuted on January 5, 2020.
In 2022, Netflix rebootedIron Chef America asIron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend, signing Brown as co-host withKristen Kish.[27]
In October 2013, Brown launched Alton Brown Live: The Edible Inevitable Tour, his first national tour visiting 46 cities through March 2014. The show included stand-up comedy, talk show antics, a multimedia lecture, live music, and "extreme" food experimentation.[28] After a hiatus of several months while Brown worked on hisFood Network shows, the tour resumed in October 2014 and concluded on April 4, 2015, in Houston, Texas, after visiting more than 60 cities.[29]
Brown mounted a second tour show, Alton Brown Live: Eat Your Science, in 2016. The show toured through the fall of 2017. All totaled, Brown's shows have played over 225 dates including Broadway. Both his tours have included "large, unusual and probably dangerous" food demonstrations, audience participation, and even food songs performed by Brown and his combo. Brown has been quoted as saying his final tour will launch in the fall of 2020.[30]
Brown's third tour titled Alton Brown Live: Beyond the Eats was announced on his Twitter page in March 2021.[31] The tour began in October 2021 and had several "legs" or overall tour runs, the last of which (done with added "holiday" materials) ran from November to December 2024.
Brown is the recipient of two James Beard Awards. He won the Best Book award in 2003 for his first book,I'm Just Here for the Food, and the Broadcast Media Award in 2011 for TV Food Personality/Host. He has also been nominated four additional times.[32]
Brown served as a mentor on Season 8 ofThe Next Food Network Star alongsideBobby Flay andGiada De Laurentiis. During Season 8, each mentor selected and mentored a team of five finalists. Alton's finalist,Justin Warner, was the Season 8 winner; however, Brown will not be producing Warner's show.[33]
Brown guest-starred in an episode ofSpongeBob SquarePants titled "House Fancy" where he provides the voice ofNicholas Withers, the host of the titular show.
Brown appeared on theTravel Channel showThe Layover withAnthony Bourdain which focused on the city ofAtlanta in 2013. In the episode Bourdain takes Brown to theClermont Lounge.[34]
Brown guest starred as the "GuestBailiff" and "Expert Witness" inJohn Hodgman's comedy/court showpodcastJudge John Hodgman.[35][36]
In October 2017, Brown was featured on theFood Network television showChopped in afive-part series called "Alton Brown's Challenge".
Brown voiced Yum Labouché inBig Hero 6: The Series. The character is a judge for an underground cooking competition.[37]
Brown appeared onepisode 196 ofMythBusters titled "Food Fables".
In June 2022, he appeared on the web seriesGood Mythical Morning episode "Match the Flavor to the Doritos".[38] He was originally scheduled to appear in a summer 2020 episode, as he revealed in a livestream in March 2020,[39] however did not happen due to theCOVID-19 pandemic.
Brown has done commercial work forGeneral Electric products,[40] including fiveinfomercials touting the benefits of GE refrigerators, washers and dryers, water purifiers,Trivection ovens, and dishwashers.[41] The infomercials are produced in theGood Eats style, employing the use of unusual camera angles, informational text, props, visual aids, scientific explanations, and the same method of delivery. These infomercials are distributed to wholesale distributors of appliances/plumbing devices.
Brown has also aided GE in developing a new type of oven. He was initially called by GE to help their engineers learn more about the effects of heat on food;[42] that grew into an active cooperation to develop GE'sTrivection oven.[43]
Brown has promotedColgate toothpaste,[44]Dannonyogurt,Welch's,Shunknives, andHeifer International.[citation needed] In 2010, he endorsedkosher salt use in a campaign forCargill.[45] In 2020, he began doing commercials forHealthy Choice's line of low-fat, low-calorie, vegetable-based "Power Dressings",[46]
In 2022, Brown began appearing in commercials and marketing campaigns for the supplementNeuriva.[47][48]
In 2012, Brown gained popularity by pioneering the use of humorous "Analog Tweets", wherein he posts pictures ofhand-written or drawn Twitter responses onPost-it Notes which he has stuck to his computer monitor.[49]
On June 28, 2013, Alton Brown joined theNerdist Podcast Network with his podcastThe Alton Browncast, covering food news, men's style, music and other topics.[50] As of February 15, 2017, 68 episodes were produced.[51] As of 13 December 2025, not more episodes were produced.[52]
With theCOVID-19 quarantine in 2020 and the subsequent delays in production on Season 16 ofGood Eats (Season 2 of "The Return"), Alton took toYouTube to make two new online cooking series.
Pantry Raid was a series of once-weekly shorts (usually released on Fridays or Saturdays) for making palatable foods while staying safe at home. The episodes were filmed in theGood Eats test kitchens at Brain Food Productions and consisted of Alton and a cameraman as the only personnel onsite.[53]
Quarantine Quitchen [aka "QQ"] started as a singlelivestream titled "The Browns Make Dinner", referring to Alton and his wife Elizabeth making dinner at their loft apartment in Georgia. After the success of the first such "episode", the once-weekly series was released live every Tuesday. The series continued off and on while the Browns went on tour in 2022, and only appeared sporadically in 2023.[54] The last episode was live-streamed on July 25, 2023.[55]
Brown lives inMarietta, Georgia. He has been married two times. He and his first wife DeAnna, anexecutive producer onGood Eats, divorced in 2015.[56] They have one daughter, who was born in 1999.[57] A few members of hisextended family appeared onGood Eats (such as his late grandmother, his mother, and daughter, who is known on the show as "Alton's Spawn"), but most of his "family" portrayed on the series were actors or members of the show's production crew.[58][59]
Brown and Atlanta restaurant designer Elizabeth Ingram became engaged in 2018.[60] Brown posted in September 2018 that he and Ingram had married on a boat in Charleston, South Carolina.[61]
Brown was once amotorcycling enthusiast,[43] although he no longer owns one. Brown is also an airplanepilot and was featured in the aviation magazineAOPA Flight Training.[62] He owned two planes, aCessna 206 and aCessna 414.[63]
Brown likes vintage watches and wears a different watch for every season ofGood Eats; this was used in production to quickly identify which season a clip is from. Once, his watch broke midseason, and Brown continued to wear it for the rest of the season to maintain this system. Twenty years after theOmega Seamaster watch his father left him was stolen, Brown bought it from an eBay seller and had it restored.[64]
Brown changed his eating habits in 2009 in order to lose weight and become healthier, losing 50 pounds (23 kg) over the course of nine months.[65]
Brown discussed his Christian beliefs in a 2010 interview withEater. He said at the time:
I'm not a spooky snake handler because I live in Georgia and I'm Christian [...] that I believe in the Bible, that I travel with the Bible, that I read the Bible every day. I'm still me. I'm still a guy doing a job. I find, actually, that people ask me a lot about it. I don't hit people over the head with the Bible [...] I still feel a funny little tinge in my stomach when I'm out to dinner with my wife and daughter in New York. We'll go to dinner and we'll be sitting around the table and we'll saygrace. You know what? People are going to stare at you. I used to feel really self-conscious. But I've gotten to a point where I think, nah, I'm not going to feel bad about that. I'm not going to apologize about that.[66]
Brown said in a December 2014 interview inTime that he "could no longer abide theSouthern Baptist Convention's indoctrination of children and its anti-gay stance" adding that he is now "searching for a new belief system."[67]
In November 2020, Brown declared on Twitter that he has almost always voted Republican, but that the 2016 United States Presidential Election was the first time he considered voting for a Democrat sinceMichael Dukakis in 1988. Brown supportedJoe Biden in the2020 U.S. Presidential Election, as well as Democrats running in U.S. Senate races in Georgia.[68]
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