It’s damned intimidating to step into the shoes of Mike Farley on one of his food-related blog shows, given his long and profound history in writing up the adventures of Gordon Ramsey for Premium Hollywood, but the man has more than earned himself a vacation (as has his wife, for that matter), which is why I’m more than willing to blog both this series and “Hell’s Kitchen” for him in his absence.
First, however, an admission: not only did I miss the premiere episode of this, the fourth season of “The Next Food Network Star,” but I’d also missed every episode of the preceding three seasons. Or, to be more precise, I didn’t even know there was such a show as “The Next Food Network Star.” Fortunately, however, my wife and I are easily suckered into these things if we just sit down and give them a chance, so it was easy to convince her to join me on this viewing experience.
This week’s challenge found Robert Irvine (“Dinner Impossible”) waking the contestants up at 3 AM and sending them on a quest for ingredients at various specialty food shops while testing their culinary knowledge. The guys and gals were divided into three teams of three…
Blue Team: Lisa, Nipa, and Shane
Green Team: Jeffrey, Kelsey, and Kevin
Gray Team: Aaron, Adam, and Jennifer
…and instructed to go on a quest for their ingredients. At each stop – one for bread, one for meat, one for cheese – they would be asked a question, and if they got the question right, they’d be able to pick their ingredient and head off to their next stop. If they got it wrong, however, a member of the team had to earn their ingredient by doing some sort of food prep. So, okay, the delay is is painful, but at least it’s educational, right? Plus, this is a really important challenge because the winner gets to appear in a piece in USA Today’s Weekend Edition.
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