PrintIron Cheffing and Judging Are Legit (If Imperfect)
Village Voice restaurant critic Robert Sietsema pulled back the curtain on the Food Network's Iron Chef America. Or did he? I think Sietsema is a fine critic and writer, and I have in fact eaten with him on a few occasions. That said, having judged Iron Chef America a number of times in the last couple of years, I feel compelled to point out a number of things about his supposedly sordid revelations.
While it is true that there are stand-ins for the Iron Chefs not participating in a given taping, I don't really see how that makes the show less real. Also, Iron Chef America is like every other reality-competition TV show; that is, it is television reality with the dramatic elements pumped up to make it more compelling. Read the fine print in the credits that follow every reality show, from Survivor to Top Chef, and you'll discover reality shows are not in fact 100 percent real.
While I have always been told that the competing chefs know that the secret ingredient will be chosen from a list of three they have been given beforehand so that they can, yes, rehearse it doesn't take anything away from how insanely difficult it is to produce five dishes in an hour in that kind of pressured environment. I have judged Mario Batali, Bobby Flay, and Cat Cora in action, and though they clearly know the drill, I can tell you they still sweat bullets and work their asses off because it is, in fact, a real competition and they don't want to be embarrassed in front of their peers, the judges, the audience in Kitchen Stadium, and the viewers at home.
As far as the judging itself is concerned, I can tell you that the fix is not in in any way, shape, or form. When it's time for the judges to score, they are not even allowed to consult with one another until they have handed their scorecards in. Each of the Iron Chefs has been beaten up pretty good on the show on occasion. Believe me, my friend Jeffrey Steingarten, the most frequent judge on the show, would never allow himself to be part of a sham competition.
Iron Chef America is far from perfect, but to suggest it is not legit because it conforms to certain reality television conventions is to miss the point of the show entirely. From my vantage point, it is as legitimate a competition reality show as any other out there.
For what it's worth, the snarky folks at Gawker agree with me: Investigation Finds "Iron Chef" Is a Television Show
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27 Comments:
This was all true even on the Japanese version. I find it amusing that he feels the need to "expose" what most fans of the series already knew, and what most viewers probably already suspected.
onalark at 1:24PM on 02/21/08
It's the VV. I love and respect their work, but the impetus and tone behind it is always one of the conspiracy theorist denouncing a cover up. Thank goodness they are around though, because everyone else in the media has a zero-questioning policy. Sometimes, the VV questions things that are obvious and don't need it. That just comes with the territory.
seyo at 1:44PM on 02/21/08
I was surprised that they were filmed that early in the morning. Also, any specifics on similarities with the japanese version with regard to how its produced? Ed, how much of the food do the judges actually eat on each dish? I imagine you don't want to fill up too early.
ChiefHDB at 2:00PM on 02/21/08
I've always considered it more sport and hype than anything. It seemed to be a program that attracted more men than women - like other sports. The only surprise to me was how long it actually took for the food to get to the judges. I thought that missing a garnish by 2 seconds was a serious mistake. Now it appears that other people are preparing the food for the judges consideration, and at a leisurely pace. Do the "celebrities" do any of the cooking that the judges are tasting? How is it possible to authenticate that the second dish is exactly the same?
PerkyMac at 2:21PM on 02/21/08
I find it a tad hypocritical that on the one hand Serious Eats has been gleefully basking in the schadenfreude glow of Robert Irvine's demise for being a phony, yet on the other hand labels the Village Voice as conspiracy kooks for pointing out another phony on the same network.
It is quite possible that not all of the Voice's readership are regular FN viewers, and an informational story, opinionated or not, helps provide a contextual background for not only ICA but for other not-quite-as-popular shows as well.
Providing news and information is what a newspaper does, so if you already know everything, which apparently you do, chances are you will find the contents boring and unnecessary.
jayfallon at 2:50PM on 02/21/08
Jay, very well said. And PerkyMac is right that it is a more than a bit bit off-putting that the food eaten by the judges is not the food that we see being cooked so athletically during the show, but rather, the same dishes cooked afterwards by the crew of sous chefs without the time constraints. So while the judges are critiquing the concept of the dish, the execution under pressure is not really a factor in the final product. This is quite misleading because it is specifically this pressure to perform that makes the show what it is.
seyo at 3:05PM on 02/21/08
Yeah.. I thought that the only new bit on info in Seitsema's article was that they use stand-in chefs, which would make sense because these guys have restaurants to run when they're not filming and such. There was actually a "behind-the-scenes" show on the Food Network where they describe the entire process, INCLUDING the fact that they only need to prepare one dish of each during the competition, and then they make the other dishes for the judges. And this period DOES have a time constraint, and is anything but easy. Nothing as earth-shattering as he makes it seem. I think he was just upset that the filming took so long, preventing him from reviewing some restaurant.
DanielJ at 3:35PM on 02/21/08
Say what you will Ed, but the general public is deceived into believing that these wondrous chefs only find out the secret ingredient when it unveiled dramatically at the top of the show.
Just another sign of our culture accepting "little white lies."
Whatta we tell our kids Ed - how will we spin this?
Livetotravel at 3:52PM on 02/21/08
I have to say that after reading the VV article, Iron Chef America is much more real than I suspected. I figured they all got the secret ingredient ahead of time, and also figured they don't even get to actually pick the Iron Chef they are challenging.
And who doesn't know Alton Brown? Perhaps my only watching FoodTV, HGTV, and my kids programs has put me out of touch with the average VV reader...
seadkdc at 4:02PM on 02/21/08
Holy cheese, what I wouldn't give to apply the passion spent on topics like this and the Robert Irving debacle (may I never see another post on him again) on issues like hunger and poor nutrition in school lunches! I read food news to get away from the TV (Food Network, esp.), and people only want to talk about the severity of supposed wrongdoings commited on/by TV shows. To make this comment relevant: I read the Sietsema piece, and it felt too much like an editorial (on long-broken news, even) dressed up as journalism for it to sit well with me. And while I agree that it would be ideal if the chef's dishes should go "kitchen to table" to be fairly judged, it probably isn't possible; the dishes are bound to get too cold or too warm, after all--you can't eat it all at once.
OneWallKitchen at 4:09PM on 02/21/08
I hope we don't come off as know-it-alls at Serious Eats, because that is obviously not our intent. I think there is a difference between what happens on Iron Chef and what is happening to Robert Irvine. Iron Chef is a reality television show, replete with reality show conventions and television sleight-of-hand. Robert Irvine fabricated huge chunks of his resume to help him get over. Maybe we've overcovered the Irvine story. We certainly didn't do so gleefully. We just thought it was something serious eaters would want to know about, so that they could make their own judgment.
Ed Levine at 4:23PM on 02/21/08
I'm confused as to why anyone would have ever thought the food made during the filming is the same as the food made for the judges to eat.
First clue, only one plate is prepared during filming, yet there are four plates for judging.
Second clue, would any chef really prepare food and just have it sit around waiting to be served. It could easily be over an hour from the time you finish until you server your last course.
arbeck at 4:33PM on 02/21/08
When I first heard about this programme, my first thought was 'HAH! The culinary universe now has its equivalent of professional wrestling'.
I think this is a reasonable analogy: professional wrestlers do put in legitimate and demanding performances. But the outcome is predetermined, and to a large extent so are the moves; to be appreciated, it has to be accepted as rather strenuous theatre. Unless Sietsema has actually misrepresented what he saw, then it seems reasonable to regard (and not have expectations beyond) 'Iron Chef America' as a labour-intensive, campy performance. Which, all things considered, isn't so bad.
mongoose at 4:47PM on 02/21/08
I have a suggestion:
Let's stop being TV critics and get back to the food.
jpolk at 5:06PM on 02/21/08
I think the tone of the Voice piece is more incriminating than any facts it presents. Thanks for providing another side of the story. I happen to enjoy watching Iron Chef because you sometimes see some very interesting ingredients and dishes. This most recent article doesn't diminish my enjoyment of the show at all! It was nothing I didn't already know.
Joy Manning at 5:07PM on 02/21/08
Actually, on the Japanese show, they DO NOT know the secret ingredient. This is form the official Iron Chef Japanese giude. Each chef is given a list of 5-6 item of what MAY be the ingredient, and then they cook! What isn't shown is they have about 15-20 minutes to pow-wow with their assistants before racing up to the stage.
Ahhh, the editing in TV
incantrix at 5:31PM on 02/21/08
Whether you like the show or not, I still see a double standard applied here.
Iron Chef, and by virtue the Food Network, are corporate entities, just like Robert Irvine, Inc. Both have used reality show conventions and television sleight-of-hand to get over on the public at large, yet for one excuses are offered and for the other its the yardarm and the piñata stick for three days.
The man hasn't been convicted of anything, yet by all accounts Serious Eats has aided and abetted in a week-long smear campaign while at the same time downplaying the unfortunate comments of someone who got a behind-the-scenes look of a show in which apparently there is a vested interest.
What happens in then end if all Irvine did, albeit on a grander scale, what most people do to their resumes?
jayfallon at 6:21PM on 02/21/08
Most people don't manufacture things out of whole cloth on their resume. What Irvine did is the definition of crossing the line when it comes to resume-stuffing. He fabricated significant chunks of his resume. I don't think we have aided and abetted a smear campaign at all. We merely reported on a developing story.
Ed Levine at 6:53PM on 02/21/08
You win, Ed, it's your blog.
All I'd ask that you provide the same factional expertise to the Irvine stories as you did to rebutting Sietsema's account.
jayfallon at 7:51PM on 02/21/08
"First clue, only one plate is prepared during filming"
Thats not true. Every time I watch the show I see the same dishes being plated in multiple servings.
seyo at 10:16PM on 02/21/08
This is sort of interesting - it was one of the videos related to the Gawker "pea-nis" video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LMzbwa6PvEE
dmorriso at 1:10AM on 02/22/08
@dmorriso.......there's no way to prove or disprove. If there was proof, I'd have plenty to say.
PerkyMac at 9:31AM on 02/22/08
If I remember correctly from FN own special, all the food needs to be cooked within the hour. So the food the judges eat are affected by the pressure of the time limit.
After the hour, then each contestant gets 45 minutes to plate and reheat dishes for judging. The original single dishes they plated during the hour are used for taking all those close-up shots shown before they present each dish to the judges. The plating needs to be the same. I imagine that this period is done such that there isn't an order bias where the person that goes first will have their food still hot while the person that goes later has to have their food just sit there.
This is why the filming takes several hours. Clearly it would be very boring to watch the entire process and make it "real". That's why introductions, cooking, plating, judging, etc. are all smooshed into less than an hour (to account for commercial breaks). Which is Ed's point. It's reality TV. I doubt Survivor would have worked if they showed every contestant 24/7. Or if we actually saw every single audition every season on American Idol. No one would watch these things then.
Final note, since the ICs have many competitions a year, they really can't prep and practice for the potential secret ingredients like the challengers. Which actually seems "rigged" in favor of the challengers.
wunami at 10:13AM on 02/22/08
It's not like professional wrestling. In professional wrestling the outcome is pre-determined. On Iron Chef the outcome is definitely not pre-determined.
The IC's do have an advantage as they have cooked in the kitchen many times before, and probably know the palates of the judges.
Seyo said, "Thats not true. Every time I watch the show I see the same dishes being plated in multiple servings."
I watched again last night and this is just not true. There are some circumstances where multiple servings are prepared (a whole roast carved table side, communal shabu shabu, etc), but 90% of the time they prepare exactly five plates.
arbeck at 12:09PM on 02/22/08
Here in Japan I eat lunch at a restaurant whose owner's son in law appeared as a challenger on the original Japanese Iron Chef. He told me that the participants were given a list of potential ingredients (either 3 or 5, can't remember now). So they did have the opportunity to do a bit of preparation, even though they couldn't be sure what the show's them would be.
He also said that the staff would give the challenger chefs advice if they were running short of time, such as letting them know they could skip the platting and serve the food to plates at the judging table.
marks at 12:00AM on 02/23/08
...the competing chefs know that the secret ingredient will be chosen from a list of three they have been given beforehand so that they can, yes, rehearse it doesn't take anything away from how insanely difficult it is to produce five dishes in an hour in that kind of pressured environment[emphasis mine]...
Well, of course it does. One of three is much easier than one of tens of thousands.
...it is as legitimate a competition reality show as any other out there.
Talk about damned with faint praise.
Don Luis at 10:57AM on 02/23/08
None of the arguments stating that the outcome is NOT predetermined hold much water, so I have to conclude that the probability IS that the results are 'fixed'. But neither this conclusion, nor my comparison to professional wresting is intended as disparagement, but is simply a way of describing the theatrical nature of the programme as entertainment.
mongoose at 10:02AM on 03/11/08