Iron Chef
airs 7 and 10 pm Friday and Saturday and 4 pm Sunday on the
Food Network.
A Little History...
So what is this Iron Chef of which we speak? Tetsujin
(literally, "cooking iron man"), as it's known in Japan,
is produced by Fuji International TV. It started airing
in 1993 and is a raging hit in the land of wasabi.
Each show starts off with Kaga Takeshi, a sort of Prince-meets-Phil
Spector-meets-Dracula figure who oversees the proceedings.
Kaga's backstory, as it were, is that he's a possessed gourmand
who keeps a posse of Iron Chefs with him at his castle (oh
yes, those Japanese can be kinky like no others). The kept
men who are Iron Chefs represent the top cooks in the country
for Japanese, Chinese, French and Italian cuisine.
Each week Kaga chooses a challenger chef to "do battle"
against his lovely Iron Chefs, who are each suited in their
own specific superhero outfits.
Kaga, after prancing into the room and taking a bite of
his trademark yellow pepper, presents a theme ingredient,
which is dramatically lowered from the ceiling. Each chef
must then prepare a multicourse meal using the theme ingredient
in each course. The chefs have one hour to cook. Then Kaga
and a cluster of celebrity judges taste the food and pronounce
a winner.
Our Version...
While there is a deep sense of fiction
pervading this piece in both the creation of the Miss Dish/Kaga
character and the fact that there was no actual competition
in which chefs actually cooked against each other, please
be advised that all chefs were actually consulted: Their
comments and offered menus are completely real. We presented
each of our Iron Chefs with the secret ingredient and asked
them to come up with a dish or two. They were given a day
or so to think about it and give us their submission. No
cooks, animals or reporters were harmed in the making of
this story.
Let the Show Begin...
Deep in her resplendent Airstream
lair, Miss Dish concocted her Dream Team. True, she was
a bit foggy, feeling the narcotic effects of one too many
Beaverton Bakery eclairs, but the time was now. There was
no stopping incoming competition from abroad--hadn't those
Japanese Iron Chefs already conquered New York?--so she
knew this was the moment to call her chefs to come and share
the special La-Z-Boy hideaway bed in her mobile home. Once
ensconced, she would prepare them for battle in the best
possible way--by turning them against each other. Here are
the results:
The chefs, after a long night of watching Cinemax and playing
Vegetable Pictionary, were ready for battle. Miss Dish drove
in on her prized rototiller and presented the Secret Ingredient.
The Iron Chefs went into fighting mode when they learned
that their new best friend was BEETS. Knowing that
beets take longer to cook than many of our other cooking
substances, Miss Dish allowed them to go over the hour
cooking time.
Battle Beets
The Iron Chefs...
Vitaly Paley of Paley's Place
(1204 NW 21st Ave., 243-2403) representing French-Northwest
melange.
Caprial Pence of Caprial's Bistro (7015 SE Milwaukie
Ave., 236-6457) and that highly uncompetitive television
show, representing the world of eclectic dishes with Asian
flair.
Bo Kline of Typhoon! (2310 NW Everett St., 243-7557,
and 400 SW Broadway, 224-8285) representing Thai cuisine.
Cathy Whims of Genoa Restaurant (2832 SE Belmont
St., 238-1464), representing Italian cornerstone cuisine.
Matthew Young of Oritalia
(750 SW Alder St. in the Westin Hotel, 295-0680), representing
fusion cooking.
Eric Blegen and Matthew Melendez of Counter Culture
(3000 NE Killingsworth St., 249-3799), representing
vegan cuisine.
Iron Chef Vitaly Paley
Paley reaches into his Eastern
European heritage, surely a strength when it comes to this
specific battle. "I grew up in Russia as a kid, where beets
are a staple," Paley says. "My mother made everything from
beet vinaigrette to borscht on a daily basis."
Paley calls roasted beets with horseradish vinaigrette
"ambrosia" and says he can't imagine life without this pulled-from-the-ground
treat. As a chef, he admires the root veggie's makeup. "Beets
have a very strong sugar content. If you roast them with
sea salt and olive oil and then mix with pears and bitter
greens and tangy vinaigrette, it's pretty yummy," he says.
His entry in the battle: "Spiced Grilled Beef Tenderloin
with Organic Beets, Chanterelles, Baby Spinach and a Horseradish
Vinaigrette." Here Paley is bravely attempting a Northwest-Eastern
European spin on the blood-hued veggie. He also has a version
of this dish at the restaurant.
How does Paley see his chances in the competition? "If
somebody doesn't like beets, then no matter how you present
them it's difficult to get them to try them."
Iron Chef Caprial Pence
At least Pence is honest
about beets--she can't even stand the smell of them. "I've
never been the one to suggest putting beets on the menu,
let's put it that way," she confesses.
Still, the savvy PBS babe understands the melting-pot ideal.
Chef Mark Dower from her restaurant is a beet lover, and
Caprial's Bistro gets fresh beets four out of the five days
that it's open. And the fighting Pence knows how to look
competition dead on: "I bet if I loved beets more I'd fare
a little better," she says. "But I think I'd probably do
OK because I'm really good at thinking on my feet, so thrown
into a situation like that I'd do really well. I'm good
at coming up with stuff quickly. I teach and do so many
demos that that comes easy to me and I wouldn't crack under
the pressure." Let's see if that's just talk.
Pence starts with a beet salad in which the root veggie
is lightly brushed with flour and deep-fried--the beets
aren't as thin as chips, more crunchy on the outside and
soft in the center. They're served on top of arugula with
nice soft slices of fontina cheese and roasted hazelnuts
for texture. Next comes a roasted beet stew with merlot,
paired with blue-cheese parsley dumplings, "just like your
Grandma used to make." And yowza! Little Miss Cookbook Queen
throws in a dessert! The fans are out of their seats! Try
roasted-beet chocolate crème brûlée
on for size, all you sweet-toothers. "You get a little bit
of the beet taste, which is very sweet, and fold in the
chocolate. It's traditional to put beets in chocolate cake
to add weight, so I thought that might work for this as
well. It will be a dark russet color, really fruity up front
with a rich finish from the chocolate," says the creative
challenger.
Iron Chef Bo Kline
Kline, who just opened up another Typhoon! in Seattle,
gets extra points for not only accepting the Iron Chef challenge
and thinking up a crazy new beet recipe, but actually
holding a kitchenwide beet fest with her staff to come up
with different recipes and then making the new dish herself.
Strike One: "I gave it some thought and realized that the
dish would not be the classic ethnic cuisine from Thailand.
At first I was going to make Chor Muang, steamed
dumplings shaped as flowers with petals, a royal dish in
Thailand served in sophisticated restaurants. I researched
and found the tools I would need (like little pinchers to
make little flower petals). Now that I'm in Seattle, I have
more room to do things like that. But I think it would be
tremendously difficult."
Kline instead opted for the whimsically titled Curry with
a Beat. This dish, a Kline original, is made with wonton
skins and looks like ravioli but is stuffed with beets and
topped with light green curry sauce. The pockets are triangular
with red touches and topped with the light green. Kline
says the beets toned down the strong flavor of curry. On
her helpers: "My kids [her kitchen staff] are great, they
all came up with different dishes, but they think too much.
I like simplicity."
Kline was happy working with beets. "I'm glad the ingredient
wasn't eel or something," she says.
Iron Chef Cathy Whims
"I don't want to cheat or anything,"
Cathy Whims says. The Genoa chef is very concerned that
some of her dishes might take more time than allotted. Luckily,
due to the hypothetical nature of our Iron Chef challenge,
she is still allowed to continue, docked hypothetical points,
of course.
Dishes: "My first thought was a bunch of pastas I wanted
to do--beet ravioli filled with roast beets: I would take
boiled beets, purée and add them to an egg pasta.
Rolling that out, I'd make ravioli and fill them with roast
beets, mascarpone cheese, Parmesan and a little egg. It's
stunning with the red filling and the red ravioli. The pasta
is really a brilliant magenta. Then I'd sauce it with browned
butter and poppy seed with Parmesan." Whims wisely conserves
time by using the same beet pasta in her second dish, a
square-cut spaghetti with sautéed strips of prosciutto
di Parma, black oil-cured olives, basil and garlic and olive
oil and top it with some Pecorino Romano. She also offers
two beet soups, a yellow and a red. "I'd kind of yin/yang
them in the same bowl and decorate it with crème
fraîche," she says.
According to Whims, Italians eat a lot of beets. She says
one of the most common dishes is a beet and beet green salad,
tossed in red wine vinegar and extra virgin olive oil. Another
real traditional pasta from southern Italy is made with
dried spaghetti mixed with cubes of roasted beets, garlic
and olive oil--it's called pasta with rubies. "They also
have beet ravioli in northeastern Italy where there's an
Austrian influence," Whims says.
Her ode to beets: "They have such a beautiful color that
they make everything else look
stunning."
Iron Chefs Eric Blegen and Matthew Melendez
Undertaking
the Iron Chef challenge was a little bit of old and new
for the vegan kings at Counter Culture. "We're a little
strange here; we eat raw beets as snacks," Melendez says.
"Because we're vegan, we know how to use beets and what
you want to run away from."
Melendez claims that the sweet caramel flavors that come
out by roasting or baking beets will temper their mustiness
and make it so you don't feel like you're eating mold, and
he believes that organic beets have a more floral flair
than others.
Another tip is to watch your sautés: "Beets sautéed
in a sweet solution turn this awful baby-poop yellow," he
says. "But an alkaline lemon juice or vinegar make them
violet. After all, you eat with your eyes."
Beet Lesson No. 2: The key to cooking beets well is cooking
them slowly. Otherwise, you concentrate the bitter flavors.
It's good to pair them with chanterelles, which have a woody
flavor. And it's always great to serve beets with a great
Oregon pinot noir. "That really transmutes their earthy
flavor," he says. Their submission? Baked beets with roasted
garlic and shallots dressed with balsamic vinegar; next,
gingered beet and barley risotto with wilted beet greens,
chanterelles and caramelized sweet onions with a dollop
of fresh marjoram pesto. And yowza--another dessert--port
wine and beet sorbet spiced with roasted anise seeds.
Iron Chef Matthew Young
Pre-game bravado: "Beets,
no problem. I've always loved beets. Right now, we've got
beets with blue cheese and walnuts here at the restaurant.
I love things that are really earthy in flavor, and beets
are the best." The chef who plays for both teams (Mediterranean
and Asian) first offers up an Oregon smoked salmon napoleon--smoked
salmon mousse, light cheese mascarpone and thin-sliced beets
in crispy phyllo dough with a little herb vinaigrette. Next,
a roasted beet salad, with a warm blue cheese dressing,
toasted walnuts, fresh greens and blue cheese crumbles.
And for the entree, Young offers beet risotto with Maine
lobster. "I'd purée beets with a fumet of fish stock
and make a nice rich red-colored risotto, then sauté
up lobster tail to go with it." Young comes clean about
his beet addiction: "I've been using beets for years; Oregon
has a good selection. A beet sorbet with a nice zinfandel
is good too, especially with fresh Oregon raspberries. As
long as it's from the Northwest."
The winner? Miss Dish is proud of her Iron Chefs. In
her time in the Airstream with them, she has come to love
them all and respect their courageous hearts. At this
time she declines to select a winner, knowing full well
that when the winds blow correctly from Asia, the true cold
reality of brutal chef-vs.-chef competition will saturate
their realities. Until then, let the training continue....
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