In the old days, most cooking shows were just excuses for some overblown ego in a toque to lecture audiences on the one-hundred-and-one uses for sun-dried tomatoes, or worse, to produce dazzling meals that are impossible to reproduce at home. Now, however, more and more cooking programs are coming out that are so useful and quirky that they’re worth owning on tape to watch over and over again—shows that offer real entertainment value in and of themselves.