Iron Chef Episode 1-Who should have won?

[enrevanche]

mudbug writes:

It was not Alton who did not know the daikon radish, it was the guy "on the floor". Alton saved his a**.

Whoops, my bad.

In retrospect it seemed a little funny that Alton wouldn't know daikons and foie gras. I've seen a couple of his Food Network shows in passing and he seemed like a pretty knowledgeable guy. So that makes much more sense.

Thanks for correcting my wrong impression.

[sanguinella]

Please see that I state " slathered with flavourings", with the implication that these dry ingredients are used with a very heavy hand, so heavy as to bury the natural flavour of the food, rather than simply accentuate it.

Another thought: a tasting panel peopled by members from the audience as well as one of "point giving" judges. There would be a comparison and contrast then between how each group voted... Now that would be intriguing to see.

[ferdlisky]

I think Sakai blew it with the shark fin...........not PC.

Good battle, I thought.

Cakes

I know someone who knows someone (yeah, kinda pathetic) who was a judge on that episode and who said the Shark's Fin was the best dish Sakai did, so I don't think there was anything PC going on. Apparantly, Flay's food was incredible, and Sakai overcooked the fish in one of the courses (the fourth?). Also, no one could figure out just why you would make trout ice cream. apparantly it didn't taste like trout... tasted like vanilla. Which begsthe question: Why?

[Rachel Perlow]

In ICJ they have frequently pointed out that one chef or another has done his research so as to make his dishes to the tastes of the judges. I think Sakai did not do his homework. He made his dishes just like he would for an ICJ episode, not taking the American's tastes into account.

[Singapore]

In ICJ they have frequently pointed out that one chef or another has done his research so as to make his dishes to the tastes of the judges. I think Sakai did not do his homework. He made his dishes just like he would for an ICJ episode, not taking the American's tastes into account.

Maybe Chris can answer this question, but were the judges announced in time for the chefs to get dossiers on them?

[mags]

Actually, as much as I tend to dislike Bobby Flay -- and I do -- he got my armchair vote. First, I did think the trout ice cream was novelty for the sake of novelty. I mean, if it tasted like trout, it would have been revolting; if it didn't taste like trout, the dish would have failed to serve the purpose of the contest, which is to highlight the main ingredient. Reminded me of that place in Bar Harbor that makes disgusting lobster ice cream purely because they know that teenage boys will dare each other to order it, toss it after one lick, and then order a cone of fudge-ripple.

Second, I thought his use of "luxury" ingredients like caviar and -- wasn't there foie gras in something early on? --was almost insulting, in an odd way. "Oh, the moron Americans with their Teflon palates...I'll just heap on the caviar and the foie and that way they'll 'know' the stuff is good." I actually found the heavy hand with the caviar almost lazy, in a way.

I agree with Rachel that Sakai was not playing to U.S. tastes, but what I'm thinking of is American associations with trout. In my experience, we tend to think of trout as a sort of down-home fish; we eat it with bacon, or smoked, or pan-fried with cornmeal. So to our tastes, putting trout in, say, a spicy Chinese-style soup with shark-fin DOESN'T highlight the trout; it masks it. I am almost never a fan of Bobby Flay's food; he seems to put fruit (or honey) and chiles in everything, and even the recipes make me itch. But his dishes were the ones I wanted to try last night.

[Singapore]

I second that and I WAS THERE! Flays dishes were awesome, no disrespect to any of the other I.C's but the man can cook. Flay cooks for the American palate, he has tthe same advantage that the I.C's had in Japan...home field!

Sorry, Chris. I just can't, in my heart of hearts, accept Flay winning for fish tacos, and a cast iron skillet presentation that reminded me more of a meal at my local Cracker Barrel, or TGI Fridays. Not impressed at all.

[ferdlisky]

I'm fascinated by the anti-Flay position many people have taken. Is this based on his show? The food at his restaurant?

[ferdlisky]

Actually, as much as I tend to dislike Bobby Flay -- and I do -- he got my armchair vote. First, I did think the trout ice cream was novelty for the sake of novelty. I mean, if it tasted like trout, it would have been revolting; if it didn't taste like trout, the dish would have failed to serve the purpose of the contest, which is to highlight the main ingredient. Reminded me of that place in Bar Harbor that makes disgusting lobster ice cream purely because they know that teenage boys will dare each other to order it, toss it after one lick, and then order a cone of fudge-ripple.

Second, I thought his use of "luxury" ingredients like caviar and -- wasn't there foie gras in something early on? --was almost insulting, in an odd way. "Oh, the moron Americans with their Teflon palates...I'll just heap on the caviar and the foie and that way they'll 'know' the stuff is good." I actually found the heavy hand with the caviar almost lazy, in a way.

I agree with Rachel that Sakai was not playing to U.S. tastes, but what I'm thinking of is American associations with trout. In my experience, we tend to think of trout as a sort of down-home fish; we eat it with bacon, or smoked, or pan-fried with cornmeal. So to our tastes, putting trout in, say, a spicy Chinese-style soup with shark-fin DOESN'T highlight the trout; it masks it. I am almost never a fan of Bobby Flay's food; he seems to put fruit (or honey) and chiles in everything, and even the recipes make me itch. But his dishes were the ones I wanted to try last night.

mags, agree with you right down the line. I'm also puzzled by the anti-American cooking feeling that seems to be pervasive here. Because Flay presented in a cast iron skillet that is bad???? American flavors are not as good as Sakai's French inflected Asian flavors??? I'm not even an American and it's bugging me! It seems so knee jerk, and dare I say it, a little insecure...

[mongo_jones]

I suppose it's because I have tasted the Mesa approach and think of it as the way Wagner would cook. Personally, while I acknowledge the historical and musical impact of Wagner's works, and find some of his oevre palatable, on the whole, I think of it as bombastic, brassy, and without subtlety. Maybe melodious, but not harmonious. Sakai obviously is more of a Scarlati, and thus failed.

i have it on good authority that wagner was a staggeringly subtle cook

[mags]

I'm fascinated by the anti-Flay position many people have taken. Is this based on his show? The food at his restaurant?

I've only eaten at Mesa Grill once, and I was surprised to find that I liked the food; all of the recipes I've seen Bobby Flay demonstrate -- on those "I can't sleep and it's 3 in the morning, so I might as well watch Food TV" occasions -- have turned me off. I'm not a chili-head, and I actively dislike most (non-Asian) preparations tha pair meat and fruit (much less meat and honey), in which he seems to specialize. I don't think I've ever seen him cook anything that appealed to me.

More than that, though, I find his entire public persona hugely off-putting, along the lines of an overgrown frat boy. He comes across, to me, as arrogant, shallow, and fatuous, with an ego the size of a small midwestern city. He also doesn't seem to have any sense of humor about himself, which for me is a major, MAJOR strike.

Plus he's an old friend of someone I loathe.

[ExtraMSG]

Second, I thought his use of "luxury" ingredients like caviar and -- wasn't there foie gras in something early on? --was almost insulting, in an odd way. "Oh, the moron Americans with their Teflon palates...I'll just heap on the caviar and the foie and that way they'll 'know' the stuff is good." I actually found the heavy hand with the caviar almost lazy, in a way.

Mags, I agree with you except here. On the old show, Sakai often used luxury ingredients to excess. I can remember him using foie gras, truffles, and caviar all on the same show, maybe on the same dish.

[TrishCT]

Second, I thought his use of "luxury" ingredients like caviar and -- wasn't there foie gras in something early on? --was almost insulting, in an odd way. "Oh, the moron Americans with their Teflon palates...I'll just heap on the caviar and the foie and that way they'll 'know' the stuff is good." I actually found the heavy hand with the caviar almost lazy, in a way.

Mags, I agree with you except here. On the old show, Sakai often used luxury ingredients to excess. I can remember him using foie gras, truffles, and caviar all on the same show, maybe on the same dish.

Yep...and Sakai is a french chef after all....

[srhcb]

I'm fascinated by the anti-Flay position many people have taken. Is this based on his show? The food at his restaurant?

Flay gets the same flack on another food discussion board too. Maybe he's not Mr Congeniality, but he must have some kind of following if the Food Network keeps him on?

And did you see how neatly he split the coconuts?

[bleachboy]

As for myself, I truly enjoyed Iron Chef America, and look forward to the episodes to come. They nailed the chairman, and Alton Brown really does a great job as the replacement for Hattori.

I do agree with the poster that mentioned that they'd like to hear more comments from the Peanut Gallery -- that was often one of the most fun elements of the Japanese Iron Chef. Especially when you'd get a giggly actor girl who turned out to be a serious foodie and would start schooling Hattori on how the dishes would turn out.

I agreed with the judges in the Flay vs. Sakai battle, but I did not agree in the Batali vs. Morimoto battle. I won't post spoilers in case you haven't seen the battle yet, but I thought Morimoto's dishes looked just a tiny bit better than Batali's. In my opinion, the Batali/Morimoto matchup was a much closer call than Flay/Sakai.

As an aside, the dish that Sakai produced that was trout tartare in a ring mold surrounded by small, perfectly arranged cucumber slices -- is that a tradidional French dish? I have had the exact same dish at Daniel (NYC), but with tuna.

[Gul_Dekar]

I guess Sakai lost points for taste mostly because of the trout ice cream. From their body language, it seemed like the judges didnt really like it all that much but probably finished it anyway so as to not seem rude to Sakai. Personally I preferred Sakai's presentation over Flay's for most dishes, 'cept maybe just wrapping up the pot as a gift part. I mean if it was a gift, the gift wrapping wasnt done very nicely then. So basically it just seemed like a quick way for Sakai to plate one of his dishes.

What I think is that Sakai was mostly having fun on the show. On the ICJ, he was one of the permanent Iron Chefs, so losing was not an option. But on ICA, he seemed to take it a bit easier since he didnt have a reputation at stake (most people who watch the original know he's a great chef already!).

That's just what I think.

Edited April 25, 2004 by Gul_Dekar (log)

[mags]

Yep...and Sakai is a french chef after all....

Well, there's an awful lot of French cooking that doesn't involve foie gras and caviar. Maybe I'm reacting to the sense, that I mentioned earlier, that trout is inherently a down-home dish. I mean, I'd like to see what it's like to treat trout as a luxury ingredient; in one dish that would be interesting and creative, like somebody doing a high-end take on chitterlings or pigs' feet or sweet potatoes -- or some other ingredient that Americans typically associate with simple, inexpensive preparations. But when it's every dish, it reads to me like an attempt to cover up a fundamental lack of interest in that ingredient, along the lines of the theory that could could deep-fry (or pile caviar on) just about anything and it would taste good.

Re Mario v. Morimoto, I'm guessing Morimoto lost some serious points for Too Much Raw Lobster. Americans have become nicely conditioned to raw finfish, but we still tend to get real squicked by the notion of raw crustaceans. Morimoto seemed to be operating within a much more traditionally Japanese context than he used to on the old Japanese IC battles, and heaven knows Mario was channeling largely Italian traditions, so it became a showdown between Japanese and Italian food. And while Americans tend to respect Japanese food and can gobble sushi and tempura like maniacs, our comfort zone is a lot closer to Trieste than it is to Tokyo.

[Chris Cognac]

The Judges were all known in advance.

[ExtraMSG]

I really do wish they would break out the scoring, especially if some judges are choosing the "challenger". It'd make it feel like it wasn't a route.

I'm hoping Puck gets beat. I think it would look very suspicious if Morimoto loses two battles in a row. Afterall, he's a lot more familiar with the one hour format than Puck is. Batali, at least, has his half-hour show where he cooks and talks like a Tasmanian devil, plus he's working with his own chefs. Flay has done the show twice before. Puck, though....I don't get the sense he seriously cooks much in his restaurants anymore, plus he has a leisurely show, and he's never competed in the format.

[ronnie_suburban]

I'm with ExtraMSG and Mags here. While I thought Sakai's plating was marginally better, I was much more compelled by what Flay cooked. I watched the episode already knowing the outcome and when I saw the trout ice cream I said to my wife "that's how he lost it, the ice cream." It may have been original but it didn't look very appetizing.

=R=

[Chris Cognac]

I'm with ExtraMSG and Mags here. While I thought Sakai's plating was marginally better, I was much more compelled by what Flay cooked. I watched the episode already knowing the outcome and when I saw the trout ice cream I said to my wife "that's how he lost it, the ice cream." It may have been original but it didn't look very appetizing.

=R=

it is kinda funny, cause he told me that the Trout Ice Cream is something he plans on adding at his place in Japan!

[edsel]

I'm fascinated by the anti-Flay position many people have taken. Is this based on his show? The food at his restaurant?

For a better sense of why so many of us (myself included) find Flay to be obnoxious, check out this thread started by Chris Cognac prior to the new series taping.

In the pre-battle intro aired on Friday, Flay addressed the infamous cutting board incidents. He didn't apologize (far from it), but he did state that prior to the first incident he wasn't aware that the Japanese consider the cutting board to be somewhat "sacred". When he stood on the counter during his second appearance he tossed the cutting board aside - nice gesture, eh?

I'm also puzzled by the anti-American cooking feeling that seems to be pervasive here. Because Flay presented in a cast iron skillet that is bad???? American flavors are not as good as Sakai's French inflected Asian flavors??? I'm not even an American and it's bugging me! It seems so knee jerk, and dare I say it, a little insecure... 

I don't see anything anti-American here. Look around this site and you'll see enthusiastic discussions of many quintessentially American foods. I think that Flay is being bashed for his (previous) boorish behavior. If Flay produced the tastiest dishes that best expressed the theme ingredient, then he deserved to win.

If Sakai is the "Delacroix of French Cuisine", is Flay the "Kincaid of Southwestern cooking"?

[ronnie_suburban]

I'm with ExtraMSG and Mags here.  While I thought Sakai's plating was marginally better, I was much more compelled by what Flay cooked.  I watched the episode already knowing the outcome and when I saw the trout ice cream I said to my wife "that's how he lost it, the ice cream."  It may have been original but it didn't look very appetizing.

=R=

it is kinda funny, cause he told me that the Trout Ice Cream is something he plans on adding at his place in Japan!

...and it'll probably play there. I'm just a rube out here in flyover country

=R=

[Singapore]

mags, agree with you right down the line. I'm also puzzled by the anti-American cooking feeling that seems to be pervasive here. Because Flay presented in a cast iron skillet that is bad???? American flavors are not as good as Sakai's French inflected Asian flavors??? I'm not even an American and it's bugging me! It seems so knee jerk, and dare I say it, a little insecure...

Good heavens! Insecure?

For the record, I rather like Mr. Flay's cooking. But I didn't see anything truly original, or inspiring from him that night. Fish tacos? Look at Batali's performance during his battle-he took the ingredient and transformed it. He didn't just heat it up lumps of fish and pour sauce on it, or hide the taste under hot sauce.

That kind of performance I expect from Chili's or Friday's, not an Iron Chef. And, considering how common the cast iron skillet is used in presentation in mass market restaurants, it may not be bad, but I certainly wouldn't say it's exceptional or inspirational.

[Chris Cognac]

I'm with ExtraMSG and Mags here.  While I thought Sakai's plating was marginally better, I was much more compelled by what Flay cooked.  I watched the episode already knowing the outcome and when I saw the trout ice cream I said to my wife "that's how he lost it, the ice cream."  It may have been original but it didn't look very appetizing.

=R=

it is kinda funny, cause he told me that the Trout Ice Cream is something he plans on adding at his place in Japan!

...and it'll probably play there. I'm just a rube out here in flyover country

=R=

I asked that question to Yuki from Fuji today at the shoot....She said that she would enjoy the Trout Ice Cream...So I think its a palate thing..east vs west.