Jackie Tranchida is a food nerd, roaming gnome and host of the Grill Iron on the Cooking Channel.  The James Beard-nominated show blends the tailgating traditions at some of the country’s biggest college football schools with the slow food and soul of their local chefs.

Her culinary zeal began young.  Growing up with a Jewish mother and an Italian father, someone was always telling her she needed to eat.  It’s her no filter, girl next door, try anything once approach to food and life that make her a standout.

After graduating from Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism, Jax made Chicago her home.  The two time Emmy Award-winning personality began her career on the Windy City’s daily entertainment show “Metromix,” then she hit New York to host 1st Look on NBC, and finally moved West to Los Angeles to launch AXStv, anchoring six hours of live television… in heels.

Work has taken her from cattle auctions in South Dakota and cabbage fields in South Korea, to a mountaintop market at the Food & Wine Classic in Aspen.  These days you’ll find her traveling the country for another season of Tastemade’s Grill Iron and chatting with the likes of Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz for Spotlight on Spike TV.

With your seatback gently reclined, you may have seen Jax hosting Delta’s Cabin Pressure Cookoff  for Food & Wine… or caught her lifestyle adventures in the back of an NYC taxi.  She has also worked for Yahoo, CBS.com, Travel & Leisure, WEtv, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Better Show, MTV, Better Homes & Gardens.  And if you look closely, you’ll find her in a few episodes of FX’s Louie.

A native of South Florida… Jackie now lives, bakes, dances and dines in Silverlake, Los Angeles.