Author: Mike Farley (Page 47 of 117)

The Next Iron Chef: Asian re-creation

Last night on Food Network’s “The Next Iron Chef,” the contestants were asked to re-create a few different Asian dishes that were the signatures of various hot spots in the Los Angeles area. The chairman hand-picked these restaurants and dishes, and since chef Mullen won the previous challenge, he was allowed to pick his teammate and the other teams, as well as choose which of the four cuisines/dishes they would be re-creating.

He chose chef Appleman as his teammate, and the two of them had to re-invent a Korean hot pot dish, which has all sorts of meat and vegetables over rice. Chefs Trevino and Farmerie were paired up and had to make two kinds of Chinese dumplings–pork, and vegetable. Garces and Crenn were assigned to remake Vietnamese pho soup. And Mehta and Freitag had to make Thai green curry with fish balls (heh heh, I said fish balls).

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Top Chef Las Vegas: can we fast forward?

Last night’s “Top Chef Las Vegas” on Bravo began with Eli talking about how he, at 25, still lives with his parents–and he’s kind of proud of it. Okay. Then they showed he and Robin bickering in the kitchen of the house they are all living at, and Eli telling Robin “You’re not my mom!” Nice. Anyway, it seems like Robin, who is 15-20 years older than most of the other chefs, is a bit out of place here. She’s also clearly not as talented.

The quick fire challenge featured chef Charlie Palmer, who the brothers Voltaggio have both worked for, as the guest judge. The challenge was to create a dish paired with snack food, namely the new Alexia snacks (which are awesome, by the way)….Palmer judged each one and his least favorites were Robin’s jalapeno and sweet corn custard, Ash’s chilled cucumber soup and barbecue snacks, and Jennifer’s pork chops, which dried out significantly before Palmer tasted them.

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The Biggest Loser: producers are this week’s big losers

Okay, if it wasn’t enough that the producers of NBC’s “The Biggest Loser” decided to go back to blue vs. black, Bob vs. Jillian, and two big teams instead of seven or eight little ones, they then decided to mess with the outcome. And for that, I call bullshit. We can all see the manipulation for ratings a mile away, and it’s reached epic proportions this season already. Here is how it went down last night…

Host Alison Sweeney started by giving her “so tonight, the game is going to change” speech that she gives three or four times every season. So it would be blue vs. black, but first the contestants would spin a giant roulette wheel. Under each dome was either a high calorie snack, cash, or a golden ticket that would allow one person to control the game by choosing the teams. Alison did not require everyone to play, but they all did with the exception of Abby. The first four went–Rudy, Rebecca, Allen and Danny, and each had a high calorie snack, including Rudy’s piece of cake that was (gulp) 1000 calories. Then it was Tracey’s turn, the person who collapsed in the first episode yet has managed to totally control the game to this point and make enemies everywhere. So guess what she got? The dang golden ticket. Come on people. Do you really think she spun that on her own? I think the producers stopped rolling tape, inserted golden tickets under every dome and told all the contestants to shut up. I mean, what were the chances? Something like 1 in 50? No freaking way do I believe that. But more on the evil producers in a bit.

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Hell’s Kitchen: bang bang, we’re done

Did anyone else know that the season finale of FOX’s “Hell’s Kitchen” was last night? I didn’t until Mrs. Mike read the TV listings to me, and suddenly I was stressed that I had to watch four hours of TV (more like 3, thank you TiVo) for blogs this morning about this show and “The Biggest Loser.” Will Harris, I have more respect for you at this moment than ever. But I made it through and now HK is done for a while as FOX turns its attention to the baseball playoffs. Anyway, we have a season finale to discuss, but it was really two back to back episodes, and they shortened the finale episode considerably compared to previous seasons (thank you FOX, seriously).

The first episode began with Gordon Ramsay having the three semi-finalists, Ariel, Dave and Kevin, make a dish out of a cuisine chosen from under a dome. Ariel went first and drew Chinese; Dave drew Indian and then moaned and groaned; and Kevin had Mexican. They would be judged by Ramsay and three celebrity judges that specialize in those cuisines.

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The Next Iron Chef: making more with less

The theme was a bit different on “The Next Iron Chef” yesterday than it was last week. Last week, you’ll remember, the chefs had to create meals with some, you know, delicacies. Yesterday’s episode featured the idea of making more with less–simplicity. And that’s a theme that a really great chef can do a lot with.

For the initial challenge, each chef had to make something with a cooking vessel that they might not necessarily use normally–tagines, steamer pots, Mongolian hot pot, etc. With what they chose (they had a mad scramble to the table), the chefs could make anything they wanted–the traditional dish for that vessel, or something else unique.

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