Foodie to Audition for Food Network

When "Food Network Star" directors host an open casting call in St. Louis this Saturday for the program's eighth season, local food enthusiast, Maddie Marshall, plans to be there.

Marshall, 25, is a 2004 graduate whose family still lives in Wildwood but who now lives in downtown St. Louis after graduating from Stephens College in Columbia, MO.

"I grew up cooking with my nana, and my mom said I always had this sick obsession with food—baking, cooking, eating it," she said.

"Food Network Star" auditions will be held from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday at the Sheraton St. Louis City Center, 400 S. 14th St.

Organizers indicated hopeful participants must deliver a completed application from the official Food Network Star casting website and two recent photos of themselves. The show formerly was known as the Next Food Network Star.

Marshall said the application is 11 pages long, with mostly crazy questions. "It asks things like:  If you could be an ingredient, what would you be and why?"

She said the show's topics and direction combine several of her passions. In college, she was in the film department. She now works as the director of first impressions at 90 Degrees West, a media creation studio in Lafayette Square. She also works part-time at a Plaza Frontenac home products store to get her self-professed fix with kitchen gadgets.

Marshall said she would like to go to culinary school, especially pastry school. She also blogs about food.

She said she does not think any cooking will be involved for this first audition, and so far, the casting materials have not asked for recipes. "The application does require us to list the original cooking techniques we know."

Online information highlights that the casting team is looking for the following attributes in a potential Food Network star:

• Strong culinary skills
• Personality that pops
• Passion for cooking
• Extensive food knowledge
• Lots of energy and enthusiasm

"I don't know what to really expect, so I'm just going to be myself and have fun with the audition," she said.

Oh, and by the way, Marshall's answer to the application question is that she would choose to be the ingredient 'vanilla,' because "it's the one ingredient that can make or break a dish."