Queer Eye, the early 2000s makeover show that changed the TV landscape forever, is back in action with a fresh cast and new home on Netflix. Antoni Porowski is the Fab Five’s new food guru, a slot that was previously held by Ted Allen, pre-Chopped fame. Porowski’s job is to help the makeover subjects — who the Fab Five members refer to as “heroes” — embrace cooking and entertaining, while expanding their culinary horizons. It’s arguably the trickiest position on the show, but Porowski seems more than down for the challenge. Here’s everything you need to know about the Netflix show’s food and drink expert.
He brings years of restaurant experience into the home kitchen. Before joining Queer Eye, Antoni says that he worked as a waiter, sommelier, general manager, and “even a food consultant” in New York City, but his real passion lies in home cooking. “I have to admit that out of 10 meals, nine I have at home,” Porowski remarks. “I love to cook, I love to entertain.” True to these words, his Instagram page is full of photos of gorgeous home-cooked meals.
He wasn’t a Queer Eye superfan during its original run. “I was in Canada at the time, and my older sister loved the show — she was super obsessed with it,” Antoni says. “I used to watch it secretly, or I would walk by in the living room and sort of watch her looking at certain segments, and then sometimes on my own. I don’t think I knew that I was gay at the time, but I felt like there was something mysterious and taboo-ish about it, even though I wasn’t even raised in a homophobic household.”
Ted Allen personally recommended Antoni for the show. When the new Fab Five cast was announced back in December, Queer Eye creator David Collins told Entertainment Weekly, “Ted sent him our way and we couldn’t be happier.” As the story goes, Porowski and Allen were strangers who lived across the street from each other in Brooklyn, and one day Antoni’s friend suggested that he introduce himself to the TV star at an event. That interaction lead to some work cooking for the perpetually busy Chopped host, and their friendship bloomed from there. “He invites me for dinner where he demands that I cook, but not in a professional capacity,” Antoni recently told Grub Street. “We actually still do a lot of dinners whenever we can.“
Antoni is a kitchen sleuth. The “de-straightening” processes that begins each episode of Queer Eye involves Porowoski poking around the kitchen to learn as much as possible about the makeover subjects before brainstorming suggestions on how to switch the style up. “I have the luxury of going into the pantry and seeing what their eating habits are like and asking them questions and figuring out how much they know or don’t know about the kitchen,” Porowski says.
The culinary makeover is all about empowerment. “It goes back to just doing the detective work and figuring out what they need,” Antoni says. “Is it about eating healthier, and figuring out how to shop in a small, rural town? Or for somebody else, it was about how to entertain — one of the heroes was coming out of years of depression and social anxiety and cutting his friends out, and not having them over in this beautiful apartment that had been neglected. It was about using entertaining as a catalyst to bring his friends back into his life.”
All eight new episodes of Queer Eye are now available to stream on Netflix.
• Queer Eye [Netflix]
• Netflix’s ‘Queer Eye for the Straight Guy’ Reboot Has Found Its Food Expert [E]
• All Pop Culture Coverage [E]