To say that Eva Longoria likes to keep busy is an understatement. Though she made her name as an actress, Longoria also moves seamlessly between producing, directing, hosting and activism — sometimes, simultaneously. At the time of this interview, she’s sitting in a Las Vegas hotel room during a break from directing the upcoming Netflix comedy The Fifth Wheel, starring Kim Kardashian, Nikki Glaser, Fortune Feimster and Brenda Song. In an hour or so, it will be time to record an episode of Hungry for History, the podcast on which she and cohost Maite Gomez-Rejón trace the origins of breakfast cereal, discuss cooking techniques and sort out the differences between arepas and gorditas. But right now, she is talking via Zoom about her CNN Original series, Eva Longoria: Searching for France. Over the course of eight episodes, Longoria shares lightly poached Quiberon Bay oysters with legendary chef Alain Ducasse, samples soft-rind cheese handcrafted by Cistercian-Trappist monks in Burgundy and joins a pair of scruffily handsome fisherman as they catch rare blue lobsters in Brittany.
“This is a dream job,” she says. “Everybody’s so jealous, because I’m like, ‘Sorry, guys, I have to film tonight on top of the Eiffel Tower while having champagne and caviar.’” As she speaks, her hand keeps flying up to the top of her head, her fingers pinching and tugging at something. This turns out to be further proof of her ability to do many things at once. “I’m trying to get this extension out of my hair while we’re talking,” she explains. “I’m multitasking.”
A spinoff of Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy, a culinary-travel series on CNN in which Tucci sought to learn more about his heritage by eating and drinking his way through Italy’s many regions, Longoria’s first two Searching seasons hewed to the tracing-my-lineage format. Longoria, who is Mexican American, focused on her personal ties to Mexico, followed by a season in Spain, the country that her ancestors left 400 years ago for the New World. Though Longoria categorizes herself as a hardcore Francophile — “I’m pretty sure that in a past life I was French” — she still sees Searching for France as the first step in broadening the scope of her series to make way for future globe-trotting. "This time I’m not really searching for my roots,” she says. “It’s evolved into me exploring different cultures and being the lens for viewers.”
As it happens, she is conversant in French, something she picked up during her three years of marriage to Tony Parker, the former NBA point guard and French national from whom she split in 2010. Because she grew up in an English-speaking household, she didn’t learn Spanish until she was 39. Now she’s on a roll. “They say your third language is the easiest to learn,” Longoria says. “Your fourth is supposed to be even easier. So, I’m working on Italian.”
Eva Longoria between the vines at Bordeaux’s Chateau Palmer in Searching for France.
According to Searching showrunner and executive producer Shauna Minoprio, who also worked on the Tucci-led version, Longoria gave her show its own feel from the start. “She has a different way of connecting with contributors, a different energy than Stanley,” Minoprio says. “Stanley’s very charming and has a dry sense of humor. Eva is very warm and develops chemistry and connection with people very, very quickly. She likes to laugh and have fun, and that’s infectious.”
“She’s somebody who basically hugs everybody — and, you know, they’re mostly all strangers,” says Amy Entelis, executive vice president of talent for CNN Originals and creative development for CNN Worldwide. (She famously developed Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown as well as Searching.) She explains why Longoria is a good fit for the network when it comes to headlining a CNN show that isn’t hard news: “The host [has to be] completely and utterly passionate about the subject. Eva’s really a wonderful listener, and she’s eager to hear their stories. An authenticity comes from her. To me, that’s a quintessential host.”
Naturally, the presenter of a food show had better be up for trying anything. “I wasn’t a fan of escargot, I will tell you that,” Longoria says, referring to episode six, wherein she visited a twentysomething female snail farmer in Flavigny-sur-Ozerain who peeled fat, wriggling gastropods off wooden boards and cooked them traditionally in stock and garlic-herb butter. She assured Longoria, “I take very good care to deslime the snail.” Spoiler alert: An escargot convert was born. “I don’t know if it’s because they were fresher or what,” Longoria says, “but I was like, ‘Wow, this is … this is really good.’”
Although the installment devoted entirely to Paris bakeries might be a confectionery enthusiast’s dream come true — a pastry crawl of macarons, croissants and what Longoria categorizes as “the Instagrammable stuff: the thing that looks like a mango, but it’s a cake” — she’s not eager to repeat the experience. “Let me tell you, I barely survived the patisserie episode,” she says. “I’m not a sugar person.”
As much as a year before a season of Searching begins production, teams of culinary scouts set off on research missions that involve not just evaluating dishes but interviewing potential subjects and checking out locations. When it’s Longoria’s turn, she heads off for three months of shooting with a relatively small crew in tow — a trio of camera people, a field producer and a couple of fixers. Also along for the ride — and the occasional on-camera cameo — is Santiago, her 7-year-old son (with Mexican businessman Jose “Pepe” Bastón, her husband of 10 years).
During filming for Searching for France, Longoria’s mornings often began with what she calls “a refresher course”: A producer helped get her up to speed with French kitchen terminology. “It’s very specific,” she says. “Like, you know how when you take something out of the oven, and it has to rest? How do you say that? Obviously, it’s not ‘to sleep.’ I don’t say, ‘Do you sleep the chicken?’ There’s still a lot I don’t know. That’s the kind of stuff we go over.”
To keep all of her first-bite senses fully engaged, she challenged herself to skip meals in her downtime and dig in only when the cameras were rolling — even though her crew takes regular lunch breaks. “I only eat on camera so I can really be present and experience [the food],” she says. Even so, doesn’t all that butter, red wine and heavy cream eventually take its toll? “I lose weight every time I’m in Europe,” she says. “I don’t know what it is, because I drink every day, and I eat a lot. Maybe it’s a testament to really good products with no preservatives. It’s just clean eating.”
Eva Longoria: Searching for France is executive-produced by Eva Longoria, Cris Abrego, Rachelle Mendez and Shauna Minoprio for Hyphenate Media Group; Eve Kay for Dragonfly; and Amy Entelis and Lyle Gamm for CNN Original Series.
The complete version of this article originally appeared in emmy Magazine, issue #7, 2026, under the title, "Taste Maker."
