Minnesota PBS has named chef Karyn Tomlinson and food storyteller Tiffany Alexandria as co-hosts of Relish Season 7, the first time the series has featured a dual-host format in its history. The season is set to premiere on Minnesota PBS in Spring 2027, with an episode lineup and exact premiere date to be confirmed at a later date.
The New Hosts
Tomlinson is the chef and owner of Myriel in St. Paul, a restaurant built around Midwestern ingredients, French technique, and Minnesota culinary heritage. Her work draws directly from the state's farms and food traditions, giving her an established platform within the regional foodservice community. Alexandria, based in Rochester, founded the Rochester Night Market, a recurring community event spotlighting local food, culture, and small businesses. Originally from Taiwan, she has used pop-up dinners, dumpling classes, and food photography to bridge cultural communities across the state — a profile that broadens the show's geographic and demographic reach beyond the Twin Cities metro.
Why It Matters for Food Media
The dual-host structure represents a deliberate editorial shift for a series that has built its audience around intimate, single-perspective food storytelling. For the broader food and beverage media landscape, the move reflects an industry-wide push to surface more culturally diverse narratives around regional cuisine — a trend visible across streaming platforms and food-focused publishers alike. Minnesota's food economy, anchored by major processors and a dense network of independent operators, provides ample material: the state hosts a significant immigrant-owned restaurant and specialty-food sector, and its farmers markets and night market circuits have expanded steadily over the past decade.
Public television food programming occupies a distinct niche in the foodservice content ecosystem, reaching audiences that skew older and more locally rooted than streaming competitors. For regional producers, farmers, and restaurant operators, placement in a series like Relish carries marketing value comparable to earned editorial coverage in regional trade and lifestyle outlets. The pairing of a fine-dining operator with a community-market organizer suggests the series intends to address both the chef-driven and grassroots ends of Minnesota's food culture in a single season.
What's Next
"Food tells us so much about who we are, where we come from, and what we value," Tomlinson said. "I'm looking forward to meeting the people who are shaping Minnesota's food culture and sharing those stories with viewers across the state." Alexandria added that she intends to bring viewers "beyond the places we already know" to uncover food stories in communities across the state.
Minnesota PBS, which has produced local food and culture content for nearly 70 years, distributes original programming nationally through PBS and other media platforms. The network has received Peabody Awards and national and regional Emmy Awards for its original productions. No sponsorship, underwriting, or distribution partners for Season 7 have been announced. Industry observers tracking food media and content trends will note that dual-host formats have gained traction across food television as producers seek to widen audience identification and narrative scope — a consideration relevant to the brands and regional food businesses that underwrite public television food programming. For operators and producers considering earned-media strategy, the series represents a continued outlet for regional foodservice storytelling with a statewide broadcast footprint.
Written by Michael Politz, Author of Guide to Restaurant Success: The Proven Process for Starting Any Restaurant Business From Scratch to Success (ISBN: 978-1-119-66896-1), Founder of Food & Beverage Magazine, the leading online magazine and resource in the industry. Designer of the Bluetooth logo and recognized in Entrepreneur Magazine's "Top 40 Under 40" for founding American Wholesale Floral, Politz is also the Co-founder of the Proof Awards and the CPG Awards and a partner in numerous consumer brands across the food and beverage sector.
