Tiger of the Week: Daphne Oz '08

Daphne Oz ’08 got an early start in her career as a healthy-eating expert: She published her first book, The Dorm Room Diet, before starting her junior year at Princeton. Now, at age 25, she is expanding her reach to national television as a cast member on “The Chew,” ABC’s new food-themed daytime talk show, which premiered Sept. 26.

 

While promoting The Dorm Room Diet, Oz, the daughter of cardiologist, author, and TV host Mehmet Oz, realized that she enjoyed television and began to consider it as a career path.

 

In an interview with the Bergen Record this week, Oz conceded that she was lucky to have a father who could share his knowledge about health and wellness at the dinner table – not to mention lessons from the media world. “At the same time, I have such huge shoes to fill,” she said. “[He]’s quite the role model to live up to.”

 

After its first day on the air, “The Chew” drew mixed reviews. David Hinkley of the New York Daily News said the show “felt overstuffed,” and Sandra Gonzalez of Entertainment Weekly’s PopWatch wrote that “while it certainly made me hungry, I’m not sure I’ll be lunching with this show every day.” But Joe Crea, TV critic for the Cleveland Plain Dealer, had a more positive take on the debut’s ambitious menu: “Americans love to cook, or at least eat, but they want their information, quick, light and in easy-to-digest morsels,” Crea wrote. “On that level (and at least on the first go around) ‘The Chew’ delivered a smorgasbord of small, tasty bites.”