Stealing Their Fame: The Bobby Flay Story

Hat tip to A Full Belly for pointing out this post: Throw Down.

Read it.

Being where I am, I don’t have the luxury of watching the Food Network so I wasn’t aware of this show until seeing those posts. Because I can’t watch the show, I’m not going to put too much judgment down. However, reading the description on the official site and various blogs, I think the concept is pretty clear.

From the Food Network:

Chef Bobby Flay is on a secret mission to challenge the absolute masters in one kind of cooking–award winning barbecuers, bakers, pizza makers and more–some with a roomful of trophies to show for it. In each episode, one of these cooks is made to believe that Food Network is shooting their profile for a show. What they don’t know is that Bobby is going to drop in for a surprise visit and challenge them to an unexpected cook-off .

Why am I posting this here? Well because something like this came up the other day. Not related to cooking an asado mind you. Basically, I know some old school cooking grandmas through my mother-in-law. You know the types. They sit around and drink tea on Sundays. Play some bridge or canasta. Each one brings a snack or dessert to nibble on while they talk and play some cards. If they wanted to toss down some beers and play poker, I might join them but that’s not the case. The point is that each one has a signature dish that they bring most of the time. These are their specialties and neither of them infringe upon the other. They may criticize each other on the outcome but none of them tries to out do the other on their specialty. For example, one is known for her tarta de manzana, or apple pie, and another is known for her scones. Before I tried them I was flooded with comments about how good they were, “She makes the best this, or she makes the best that! Try them!” When I tried them and said “Ohhh that’s good!”, they just beamed with joy.

Now, on some of these foods I know I could create some impressions. Not that my versions would be any better just that they would be different. Like for example, the tarta de manzana that many prepare here have nothing to do with the version many people eat in the U.S. Maybe they would like the typical U.S. version, maybe not. However, I would never think about preparing one of them and then all of a sudden appear at their card game and say “Try this! You’ll definitely have different thoughts on Marta’s tarta after this!” That, in my opinion, is what Bobby Flay is doing. I can just imagine poor Marta’s feelings after I serve out my pie and everyone asks for seconds while hers just sits there with hardly a slice taken out of it. The ideal way, if you want to gain some points would be to throw a dinner party and prepare the dish your way without a word or sign that you are trying to out cook the other.

Anyways, like I said, I never watched the show so who knows. Maybe most of these people like the challenge but why take the chance of ruining someone’s happiness at knowing that their dish is, or was, the best of the bunch.