Inqlings: Philly pretzels vs. Food Network

Truth in labeling?

The Food Network will do anything for a show - even dupe one of Philly's major universities.

Producers had asked Drexel University to demonstrate pretzel baking for a new show called

Snack Attack

. They also rang up the Pretzel Boy's - not to point out the errant apostrophe but to showcase the nine-unit suburban Philly franchise.

Cameras rolled last Sunday in the Drexel Hill store. Pretzel Boy's

John Howe

and

Tim Dever

were dispatched the next day to Drexel's culinary school for an hour of shooting in front of about 50 hospitality and culinary students and faculty.

Then

Bobby Flay

walked in.

Snack Attack

?

No, sneak attack.

Flay challenged the Boy's boys to a pretzel-making contest for his Food Network series

Throwdown!

- just as he did a year ago at Reading Terminal Market with Philly mac-and-cheese whiz

Delilah Winder

. (Flay won that one.)

Philadelphia Weekly writer

Kirsten Henri

, who had been asked to appear as a "pretzel expert" on the fake

Snack Attack

, and Drexel's

Adrienne Hall

were drafted as judges.

Flay's pretzels were of the sweet, buttery, Pennsylvania Dutch variety, while the Pretzel Boy'ses' twists were regulation.

Sampling and assessing took some time, Hall says: "We ad-libbed it till we got it right." Outcome will await the show, scheduled for 10 p.m. March 30.

On a more aboveboard food-TV note: WHYY TV12 has drafted Fox29's

Sue Serio

to host

The Philly Food Show

, a documentary executive-produced by

Ed Cunningham

. She'll shoot this month; the show is to debut in March. Serio, by the way, worked at WHYY years ago with husband and current Fox29 sports guy

Bill Vargus

.

Aaron McKie

, an assistant coach for the 76ers, has put his spread in Penn Valley on the market for $2,349,999 as he's building anew. The house, built in 2001, has a wet bar with a fish tank in the wall, a pool table, an arcade, a card table and a theater section. The house also has an au pair suite above the garage, the listing says. Eight-foot doorways throughout. He's 6-foot-5. Philly-bred McKie, 35, spends much spare time with his AM8 Foundation, a nonprofit that runs educational and recreational programming out of the Belfield Recreation Center.

Philly will get a red-carpet screening, if not the premiere, of

Cover

- a drama directed by

Bill Duke

that features

Mya

,

Patti LaBelle

,

Vivica A. Fox

and

Louis Gossett Jr.

and was filmed here last winter. Producers

Warren Kohler

and

Corey Redmond

say the film will open in L.A., New York, D.C., Atlanta and Philly on Feb. 22. The Philly screening, expected to draw Duke, Kohler, Redmond, LaBelle and star

Aunjanue Ellis

, will be Feb. 16. Kohler and Redmond hope to be back in the city in late spring or early summer with Fox to film

Fulfillment

, a drama about a research scientist forced into a shady deal; it had been penciled in for last summer.

Upper Bucks is being scouted for a farmhouse to be featured in

Marley & Me

, the Fox 2000 flick based on the bestseller by former Inquirer columnist

John Grogan

. It's unclear how much of the

Owen Wilson

-

Jennifer Aniston

starrer will be shot in the Philly area, though crews are expected here in part of March and some of May.

Alan Arkin

has been booked to play Grogan's editor, but Grogan writes on his blog that those scenes will be based on the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, his pre-Philly newspaper.

"Swiss Pastries" opened Jan. 7 in the 19th Street storefront that for 80-plus years was the Swiss Pastry Shoppe before its sudden closing a week before Christmas as the building was sold. But in the bakery's second week, it was reflagged "Hausman's." The building's previous owner,

Marvin "Moishe" Novick

, complained about the Swiss connection to his lawyer, who reached out to

Jim Hausman

, the new bakery's owner. Hausman has said he opened there because he hated to see the old shoppe gone. Neither he nor Novick would comment on the name.

Top restaurant in the region: Philadelphia Mag's February issue, out next week, says it's Osteria, the Italian newcomer on North Broad from

Marc Vetri

,

Jeff Benjamin

and

Jeff Michaud

. The mag loves Vetri, all right; he was one of its people to watch in January's issue.

Paranoia in the TV news game? CBS3 won't take any chances in advertising new meteorologist

Doug Kammerer

. A noncompete clause in his old deal with NBC10 puts his CBS3 debut at Feb. 18, and not a day before. CBS3 will soon start promos that seem to show Kammerer but not his face. But, I hear, the station employed a body double for the spots in case NBC10 lawyers decide to get technical.

NBC10 has hired

Michelle Grossman

, a vet of NBC's Weather Plus and onetime intern, to do the weather on weekend mornings, starting soon. But there's a baby in the forecast, as the former Bucks Countian and her husband are expecting in July. The station also promoted

Michelle Bradsher

to executive-produce the 11 p.m. news.

NBC10 chief meteorologist

Glenn "Hurricane" Schwartz

will talk about online dating - he is seeking a warm front on Match.com, as "INQlings" readers learned last week - on

Anthony Mazzarelli's

WPHT show,

1210 Tonight

, at 8 p.m. Tuesday. After the interview, Dr. Mazz will stage a version of

The Dating Game

: WPHT weekend host

Chuck Williams

will get in the hot seat as three women compete for a night on the town with him.

Angelo Cataldi

of WIP (610) will return to his old stomping grounds tomorrow. He'll be part of Comcast SportsNet's season finale of

Monday Night Live

, shown at 7 p.m. from an open house at Chickie's & Pete's in South Philadelphia.

John DeBella

of WMGK (102.9) is at the Sundance Film Festival, and so is his skiing equipment. DeBella shipped his gear ahead by FedEx on Monday, expecting delivery Friday, his day of arrival. But when he tracked the shipment, he learned that the package would arrive tomorrow. After ranting about it on the air - threatening to ski naked - a listener with FedEx ties got busy and spared skiers that sight.