[Deathwatch] Jeff Smith, the "Frugal Gourmet", 65

[Deathwatch Central <cdw@slick.org>]

'Frugal Gourmet' Chef Jeff Smith Dies

Thanks to a reader - Ed.

SEATTLE - Jeff Smith, a white-bearded minister who became public
television's popular "Frugal Gourmet" before a sex scandal ruined his
career, has died, his business manager said Friday. He was 65.

Smith died in his sleep Wednesday, Jim Paddleford said. He had long
suffered from heart disease and had a valve replaced in 1981.

In the 1960s, Smith, a United Methodist minister, began teaching a
course at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma titled "Food as
Sacrament and Celebration."

Eventually he got his own program on the local PBS affiliate ? "Cooking
Fish Creatively" ? and his career took off with an appearance on Phil
Donahue's talk show.

"The Frugal Gourmet" became the nation's most-watched cooking show, and
a series of accompanying cookbooks broke sales records for the
category.

But in 1997, seven men filed a lawsuit alleging they had been sexually
abused by Smith as youths. Six said the abuse occurred while they
worked for him at the Chaplain's Pantry, a restaurant he operated in
Tacoma in the 1970s. The seventh alleged Smith abused him after picking
him up as a hitchhiker in 1992.

Smith was soon off the air.

Smith denied the allegations and was never charged with a crime. He and
his insurance companies paid an undisclosed sum to settle the lawsuit.

Smith is survived by his wife, Patricia, and two sons.