I love the content of the show. It shines a light on southern cooking that has not often been seen. Vivian is an amazing and talented chef. However, she is not very likable. The way she treats her husband at times is particularly distateful, and she is somewhat narcissistic. I suppose that many chefs are this way.

There are a lot of cooking shows, some instructional, some merely exist as platforms to display contrived drama. This show is real. Warts and all. Learning anything about the cooking process or generic intricacies of the restaurant business is secondary.What allows this show to stand out in comparison to others is the lack of pretension. The interface of those on camera is fantastic and genuine. The viewer is being allowed a real glimpse into others' private lives. And Chef Vivian, via her narration, shares her personal thoughts and feeling as she displays a gamut of emotions, from happiness to sorrow.It's real. Very real. I highly recommend it.

True to the show's title, this series centers around the life of Chef Vivian Howard. Unfortunately for the viewer, Chef Howard is not a terribly endearing personality. Restaurant staff and Chef Howard's husband are subjected to a whole host of petty quibbles, nasty looks, and an overall moody temperament, none of which makes for terribly good television. In fact, it's quite distracting from what otherwise might be a good program. Likewise, Chef Howard's encounters with "the locals" seem rather contrived and the mutual lack of comfort ekes through more than the culinary and cultural content. Many of the locals seem take to Chef Howard about as well as former Confederates took to Carpetbaggers after the Civil War; it's terribly awkward. Overall, the show seems to lose itself in Chef Howard's uncanny inability to relate to her husband, coworkers, and community, rather than truly immersing itself in Carolina culture and "exploring the south one ingredient at a time."

An interesting little show about a couple running a restaurant in North Carolina. The better parts focus on southern ingredients and their preparation, the rest is about them rebuilding their restaurant after a fire. These sequences play as awkward portraits of a marriage on the rocks as they bicker and complain about each other to the camera. A lot of the scenes with locals seem forced and slightly uncomfortable, as it appears Vivian and her cameras annoy them. The film making is simple yet competent and the photography is nice to look at. I certainly appreciate the honesty of it. Chef Vivian definitely has some great recipes and cultural heritage to share but the emphasis on the stressed out relationship gets in the way.