July 23, 2001 – Three local food purveyors are getting national exposure this week and will again in mid-August as the Food Network, also known as Food TV, focuses on the Virgin Islands in its "Food Finds" feature.
Cheryl Miller of Taste of Paradise, Sandra Marie Davis of Grandma Sandy's Island Cookie Co, and Jacquel Dawson of The Bush Tea Project share the program in footage taped in the Virgin Islands in March.
The episode featuring the Virgin Islands was scheduled to air Monday at 10 p.m. and then three hours later, at 1 a.m. Tuesday. However, it will be back again on Monday, Aug. 13, at 1 p.m. and Saturday, Aug. 18, at 1 p.m., according to Miller, who sent out e-mail advisories over the weekend to be sure friends and associates on the mainland wouldn't miss the show, which features not only her but her red pepper puppet Hot Lips.
The Food Network "filmed 10 hours of Hot Lips and me in the kitchen cooking Caribbean Sunburn hot sauce and hot Mango Momma Jam," she said. "Now they are airing the best six minutes on your local Food Network cable channel — same one as Emeril's on."
However, while the Food Network is carried by Innovative Cable on St. Croix as Channel 57, it does not air on St. Thomas and St. John. "So we will not be able to watch it here," Miller said in her e-mail. "I await a taped copy. Now, you all enjoy and laugh for me!"
The network site's promo for the Food Finds – Virgin Islands show reads: "First stop is on the island of St. John, to meet Cheryl Miller, best known for her fiery champion hot sauce, Caribbean Sunburn Hotter Sauce. On St. Thomas, Grandma Sandy bakes homemade cookies and we visit Bush Tea."
When the location filming was being planned, a Food TV researcher had said the Virgin Islands program would air "toward the end of April."
"Food Finds," now in its second season, "tracks down your long-lost favorites" with host Sandra Pinckney visiting "small-town shops, mom-and-pop stores and local vendors that take pride in making specialty foods the old-fashioned way." The program features food enterprises that have web sites, as all three of the Virgin Islands women's businesses do. In connection with the airing of the segments, information from the sites is posted on the Food TV site.
At the start of this year, the researcher said, Food Network was reaching more than 54 million cable subscriber households, in the United States, Canada, Australia, Korea, Thailand and the Philippines. The Food TV web site generated more than 43 million page views last year, more than double the preceding year.
For background on the three entrepreneurs, see the earlier Source story, For background on the three entrepreneurs, see the earlier Source story, "Three cable network 'Food Finds' are in the V.I."
