Boston Entrepreneur Launches Revolutionary Cooking Show; cooking videos optimized for iPods and mobile phones make learning to cook fun, fast and portable

BOSTON-- Kathy Maister launches the Boston-based startcooking.com videocast this month, a free series of on-demand video podcasts that revolutionize the concept of cooking shows. Kathy 's tech-savvy approach to cooking shows using cutting-edge video production and web2.0 distribution technologies makes it easy for busy people to learn the basics of cooking -- whenever and wherever they want.

Kathy Maister, startcooking.com's Founder, Host, and Editorial Director, teaches the absolute basics of cooking in the startcooking.com videos to help beginners get started in the kitchen and up the learning curve quickly. Each 2-minute video presents step-by-step instructions on how to cook a tasty meal using basic cooking techniques, which viewers can get more free help with in the 'Tips & Techniques' section of the startcooking.com website. The startcooking.com blog supplements the videos with a large collection of photo tutorial recipes.

“There are already so many really good celebrity chefs, gourmet cookbooks and foodie websites out there: let them do the exotic food” said Kathy. “My mission is to help people learn the absolute basics of cooking.”

startcooking.com is the realization of Kathy's personal dream to find a new way of getting people living on packaged food and fast food back into their kitchens and cooking for themselves. Born and raised in South Hadley, Massachusetts, Kathy's passion for food, cooking and teaching inspired her to major in Home Economics at the University of Massachusetts (Amherst), and then teacb Home Ec at Robert Gould Shaw School in West Roxbury, John D. Runkle School in Brookline, and Bigelow School in Newton. When budget cuts in the public school system wiped out Home Ec programs, Kathy thought her dream of teaching cooking was finished forever. But, years later, when she realized that Internet tools could help her reach out in a fresh new way to people who wanted learn how to cook, she rolled up her sleeves and tackled the world of blogs and online video as a 50-something woman web entrepreneur and startcooking.com was born.

“I've always wanted to inspire people who have never cooked before to say “I can do that!” said Kathy. “I'm excited about the potential of the startcooking.com videos to reach out to people and help them learn to cook for themselves.”

Kathy designed the startcooking.com videocast specifically for portable media players like iPod®s and mobile phones so you can learn “in-the-kitchen,” or take the videos with you to the store as your grocery list. The videos also feature a built-in list of ingredients that let your portable media player double as a grocery list.

The startcooking.com videos are created with a combination of cutting-edge digital tools and retro animation techniques. Kathy designs the recipes, records the voiceover and takes pictures for the videos with a digital camera, then a two-person editing team puts it all together with stop motion animation. The photographs are shot close-up to display cooking details clearly and look great on the small screens of hand-held media players.

Kathy distributes the startcooking.com videos using the best of modern on-demand delivery channels. Every Monday startcooking.com publishes a new episode in a standard video format suitable for most podcast players and mobile phones, and also in a proprietary Apple video format for iTunes and iPods. Viewers can play the videos on the startcooking.com website, download the files in their format of choice, subscribe to the videos in iTunes or subscribe to the syndicated video feed.

The brand new startcooking.com series is already making a splash in the blog and online video world. iTunes has featured the startcooking.com videocast as a 'New and Notable' podcast, and the startcooking.com blog has been invited to join the 9rules Network, a community of the world's best weblogs. The editorial group of cell phone manufacturer Nokia has chosen to feature startcooking.com in their video podcast directory preloaded on the new N-series phones, alongside elite videocasts including Ricky Gervais, Rocketboom, and Ask a Ninja.

Website: http://startcooking.com