Food gets its close-up on ‘Iron Chef America’
As third season begins, the show trades spectacle for serious cooking
![]() Courtesy of Food Network Homaro Cantu of Chicago's Moto fills a balloon that will later be frozen with liquid nitrogen in a scene from “Iron Chef America,” which begins its third season Sunday. |
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Chefs often bring their favorite gadgets to Kitchen Stadium, which in reality is a windowless, surprisingly compact studio in the Food Network’s Manhattan studios, located in the hulking Chelsea Market building.
But Cantu, of Chicago’s Moto restaurant, has brought what resembles a high-school chemistry lab. Cantu has gained a certain notoriety for melding haute cuisine, high-tech wizardry and Dadaist design, and his best toys are on display — including a Class IV laser that sears edibles at a blistering 2,800 degrees F, and an ink-jet printer that prints photographs on soy-based edible paper. Both will get a workout before the day is done. Cantu fires up the laser to add a creme brulée accent ... to edible packing material.
“It's FDA approved and static-free, and you can flavor it to taste just like about anything,” he later explains.
From a nearby riser, host Alton Brown squints for a better look at Cantu’s kitchen lab.
“He’s got the largest tank of liquid nitrogen we’ve seen in a while,” Brown quips. “It’s going to be hard for me to see past the leftover props from ‘Real Genius’.”
Across the Stadium, Cantu's competitor, Masaharu Morimoto — the only Iron Chef to hold the title in both Japan and America — directs his helpers in a frenzy of chopping herbs and pureeing vegetables as he deftly cuts pieces of Wagyu beef.
Morimoto has some modern implements of his own, though, including a much smaller dose of liquid nitrogen, which will be used to insta-freeze whipped cream. But more curious is his tinkering with cloth and some bright-red juices, which he uses to tie-dye placemats for the judges’ table.
“This isn’t a culinary competition anymore, it’s a craft fair,” says Brown as he shakes his head at what he’ll later call “Iron Chef America's” most frenzied battle yet.
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Standing in the center of it all, Brown is the Food Network's resident nutty professor and the show's mile-a-minute narrative voice. While the original Japanese “Iron Chef” utilized a panel of studious commentators, the American incarnation relies on Brown to riff nonstop with minimal help. Standing in front of a bank of monitors, he relies on dense piles of research, an outline of possible menus, a detailed inventory of the chefs' pantries and some blindingly fast Google skills.
Brown's stream-of-consciousness commentary is a bit like Home Ec on speed. For food geeks, even for casual cooks, it is intoxicating.
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