I've become a bit of a foodie over the years, and I've only got one program to thank for that. In the Food Network's glory days, they played a bunch of good shows: Emeril Live, Good Eats, some program with Mario Batali, and then...this one.
It's the original Japanese version of "Iron Chef". Instead of doing things a normal fifth-grader at the time would (which, at this point, I still don't know what a normal fifth-grader would do), I religiously watched Iron Chef at--I think it was 10 pm on weekends? Somethin' like that--I remember it came on late (for a fifth-grader) at the time.
For those of you unfamiliar with the show, here's how it works:
"Both the Iron Chef and challenger have one hour to tackle the theme ingredient of the day; using all their senses, skills, creativity--they're to prepare artistic dishes never tasted before."
These dishes, then, are judged accordingly by a panel of discerning tongues, and the winner will receive the people's ovation and fame forever. No word on whatever happens to the loser, although some have returned for grudge matches on occasion.
A new version of Iron Chef debuted in the UK this past month, which is heavily derivative of the highly successful Iron Chef America that's been running strong since 2004. But to call this version "Iron Chef" is like calling Korean and Japanese the same language. It's really not.
At its very core, Iron Chef UK (as it's called across the pond) is still the same as its predecessors: an Iron Chef takes on a challenging chef, both of whom need to use a certain "theme ingredient" in each of their dishes. But here's where it differs the most (and, frankly, where it becomes difficult to follow): instead of just one challenger, the Iron Chef takes on a team of four. Each of these four prepares one dish each--two starters, two mains--while the Iron Chef makes all four in the same amount of time. In addition, the starters are judged halfway through the battle, leaving the mains for the end.
Rather than being judged on the meal as a whole, as is the case with the Japanese Iron Chef and its American counterpart, the chefs are evaluated dish-by-dish. This actually isn't a bad idea when the challengers are working as a team, because then you know exactly who to point the finger at when you lose. On the other hand, when it is a Friday Final (more on that in a minute), it's a terrible idea--one dish could, theoretically, take you completely down. At least if all your dishes are judged in one cohesive unit, you have a little less to lose if you totally screw up one dish.
That's not all: the team of challengers are also competing against each other. The chef who scores the highest on his or her dish is awarded a "Dish of the Day" star. After four battles, the one who has the most stars takes on the strongest Iron Chef from that week one-on-one for a £1,000 prize in what's called a "Friday Final". As of this writing, only one challenger has beaten an Iron Chef for the money.
Now here comes my little rant about it. The presentation, for which both the American and Japanese incarnations have become famous, is surprisingly lacking for a program that calls itself "Iron Chef". Kitchen Stadium UK is even more dark and uninviting than the American Stadium is, and the layout is...well, I would've said excessive, but as I think of it more it works better with their format. I was about to say, "They don't need that third kitchen," but actually, yeah they do...two for the challengers, one for the Iron Chef.
While we're on the subject of the format, I don't like it. It's not entirely clear how much time they actually have, and even though they make time calls, they're very inconsistent about it. In the premiere episode, the only time call I ever heard was the one saying that five minutes were gone. In another, they only counted down the last minute. How much time do the chefs actually have? The world may never know...
In addition, the judging presentation is rather sloppy. There are only two judges, and they both are standing (standing, mind you) at the table with announcer Olly Smith and the chef under the microscope. It's a little distracting, for one, to have them judge the starters while the battle isn't exactly over. And two, they both pick off the same plate! I don't know about you reading now, but something about that rubs me the wrong way. Usually the Chairman tastes along with them, but he's nowhere to be found until the end of the show! Isn't HE the one who is in pursuit of these new artistic creations? It's logical that he should be there, right?
A lot of the appeal of the original Iron Chef was seeing the qualifications of the challenger, what made him worthy to take on an Iron Chef, who was always hyped up as somewhat of a culinary god. Sometimes it even provided some relevant (and sometimes even hilarious) backstory--any battle involving Toshiro Kandagawa comes to mind here. But here on Iron Chef UK, the challengers' last names aren't even mentioned. The most biographical information we ever get out of them is a small little audio clip that plays at the very beginning, and even that doesn't reveal much. For all we know, these could be any old so-called chefs the talent coordinators pulled off the streets! So I'm not really compelled to root for any of the challengers.
As for the Iron Chefs, I will admit that they all look badass. I'm particularly afraid of Martin Blunos if only because of his shaggy long hair and his crazy mustache and beard. (Although when you later find out that he's the only Iron Chef that has lost, the intimidation factor goes down a bit.) So we've got, if we go by the original system of calling them "Iron Chef (nationality)"...
--Iron Chef Indian, Sanjay Dwivedi
--Iron Chef British, Tom Aikens
--Iron Chef Korean, Judy Joo
--Iron Chef Russian (/Latvian?), Martin Blunos
An interesting mix, to say the least. Two European, two Asian, as was the case on Iron Chef Japan. Of note--Judy Joo is only the second woman to hold the position of Iron Chef anywhere in the world. I wonder how she'd fare against Cat Cora, in the original format...
Olly Smith and Nick Nairn are your British equivalents of Fukui and Hattori from the Japanese show. Actually, Olly takes on a role hybridizing Fukui and Ohta, which I think gets a little distracting--not to mention he actually goes into the kitchen and interrogates! Not even Kevin Brauch does that. Olly in general hams things up way too much, to a point where it becomes too painful to listen to him. The Chairman's supposed to be the ham, not the announcer.
And speaking of the Chairman (one Eizo Tomita), he's terrible. At first I thought Mark Dacascos (the Chairman on Iron Chef America) was cringe-worthy, but now he's gotten to a point where his reveals are almost as hilarious as Chairman Kaga's. Chairman Tomita, on the other hand, lacks the punch that is necessary to present the program. His ingredient reveals sometimes make absolutely no sense (Battle Pork), are laughably bad (Battles Chicken and Squid), or are even offensive (Battle Cheese).
In short, consider yourself lucky if you haven't been subjected to this trainwreck that doesn't deserve the name of "Iron Chef". It's certainly an hour of your life you'll want, but never get, back.
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