The five-minute segment opened with the now-expected shot of the the bronze Fonz as Anthony Bourdain's "No Reservations" tour of the American "heartland" stopped ever so briefly in Milwaukee.
Monday night's installment of Bourdain's food-travel show offered a broad definition of the American "heartland," including Austin, Texas, a town that he clearly enjoyed more than most of his other stops.
Bourdain's Milwaukee visit centered on Bacchus and its chef, Adam Siegel. Some of his suppliers -- the Spice House, Larry's Market (for cheese), Strauss Veal and Sprecher Brewery -- all got shout-outs and a bit of screen time.
The idea behind the show is that places like Milwaukee (and Columbus, Ohio, and Minneapolis) -- all of which happened to be stops on Bourdain's live tour -- had great, innovative food.
Frankly, the episode looked like a concept designed merely to piggy-back off that live tour. But it did make Milwaukee look appetizing, even if that Bronze Fonz opening shot has already become something of a cliche.
The episode repeats at 8 p.m. Thursday, and midnight that night. Milwaukee comes about 45 minutes into the one-hour show.
The Travel Channel Web site features a bit more, including a video of a visit to Solly's for a good old butter burger, a three-minute segment that didn't make it into Monday night's show.
"The Bachelorette" goes to Green Bay: Monday's two-hour installment of ABC's "Bachelorette" on Channel 12 featured a visit to Titletown with Ali Fedotowsky meeting wannabe beau Kirk DeWindt's divorced parents.
After a harrowing visit to DeWindt's dad's taxidermy workshop, she had a heart-to-heart talk with him and proclaimed him "a warm, kind, caring guy."
Then it was over to mom's, where she learned that mom was warm, kind and caring.
After the visit, the 27-year-old DeWindt told the camera "I am ten times more confident in what Ali and I have today than before she met my family."
Still, DeWindt was sent home at the end of the episode.
On TV: The fifth edition of Journal Broadcast Group's "Morning Blend" has debuted on Las Vegas' KTNV-TV. The first of the five started on Milwaukee's Channel 4 in September 2006 in the 9 a.m. weekday slot. Versions of the locally-produced blend of advertising, entertainment and information also air on Journal-owned stations in Ft. Myers/Naples, Fla.; Omaha; and Tucson.
- Nielsen Media Research counted 24.3 million U.S. viewers for Sunday' World Cup Final win by Spain over the Netherlands, making it the most-watched soccer game ever on U.S. TV.
- Melina Kanakaredes says she's leaving CBS' "CSI: NY." There's talk Sela Ward will replace her.
- After only three episodes, ABC has ordered a second season of "Rookie Blue." Production is supposed to start later this summer in Toronto.
The return of Barbara Walters: The ladies of ABC's "View" welcomed Barbara Walters home, via Skype, Monday, two months after she left the airwaves for heart surgery.
For the record, she resumed her weekly Sirius XM satellite radio show this week as well. It airs Mondays at 5 p.m. on Sirius Channel 102/XM Channel 155.
Here's video from "The View":
Tim Cuprisin is the media columnist for OnMilwaukee.com. He's been a journalist for 30 years, starting in 1979 as a police reporter at the old City News Bureau of Chicago, a legendary wire service that's the reputed source of the journalistic maxim "if your mother says she loves you, check it out." He spent a couple years in the mean streets of his native Chicago, and then moved on to the Green Bay Press-Gazette and USA Today, before coming to the Milwaukee Journal in 1986.
A general assignment reporter, Cuprisin traveled Eastern Europe on several projects, starting with a look at Poland after five years of martial law, and a tour of six countries in the region after the Berlin Wall opened and Communism fell. He spent six weeks traversing the lands of the former Yugoslavia in 1994, linking Milwaukee Serbs, Croats and Bosnians with their war-torn homeland.
In the fall of 1994, a lifetime of serious television viewing earned him a daily column in the Milwaukee Journal (and, later the Journal Sentinel) focusing on TV and radio. For 15 years, he has chronicled the changes rocking broadcasting, both nationally and in Milwaukee, an effort he continues at OnMilwaukee.com.
When he's not watching TV, Cuprisin enjoys tending to his vegetable garden in the backyard of his home in Whitefish Bay, cooking and traveling.
