Sam Zien

Sam Zien I quit a job at a biotech company in 2001 to try to start a travel TV show. The fact that I had zero travel or even television experience didn't seem to matter. I felt I could be at least as bad as lousy people on TV - and maybe even better than others. But a month before a trip to shoot demo footage in Tokyo and Hong Kong, September 11th hit - and that changed everything. So I decided to stick with TV, but switched from travel to cooking. OK, still no experience but did it really matter at this point? I shot a demo and a couple months later ended up with a twice-weekly 2-minute cooking segment on a local morning news program. Sweet. Not paid, but still sweet. The segments caught on and grew into a 30-minute show appropriately named 'Sam the Cooking Guy' - an irreverent mix of humor and easy-to-replicate recipes that have won 15 Emmy awards. Then Discovery Health came along and I ended up producing 'Just Cook This' which featured my same offbeat style with more easy-to-prepare, great-tasting recipes that also happen to be healthy. It's true - healthy doesn't have to taste like crap. I'm still known for my 'big in taste and small in effort' style, and have proven that as a frequent guest on The Today Show (the NY Times called me a regular). In fact, my visit there with Kathie Lee Gifford has now been watched over 2,500,000 times on YouTube - and Howard Stern called me his 'hero' because of it. For the record I never told her to shut up. And now, with over 2 million subscribers on my YouTube channel - the delicious, fun nonsense continues. I have 3 previous cookbooks, and now am so happy to bring out #4. It’s so useable, fun and filled with a ton of great recipes. You’re gonna like it :)