\jeff{krimmel}

Bobby Flay and the Doughnut Guy

Before I even get this started, is it “doughnut” or “donut”? Shipley, a donut place near and dear to my family, comes down in favor of “donut”. That’s good enough for me.

In the past couple of months I’ve started watching a lot of the Food Network. I have to say my favorite Food Network personality is Bobby Flay. Alton Brown comes in second, and whoever comes in third is a distant third. Bobby Flay has a few shows in which he participates: Boy Meets Grill, Iron Chef America, Throwdown with Bobby Flay, BBQ with Bobby Flay, and Food Nation with Bobby Flay are the ones of which I am aware.

My favorite of that bunch is Throwdown with Bobby Flay (with Boy Meets Grill a close second). Mr. Flay is a highly regarded chef and is the owner and executive chef of five restaurants from New York City to Atlantic City to Las Vegas. His specialty is southwestern American style cooking, and as you may be able tell from the title of one of his shows, he’s highly skilled with the grill. He’s my kind of chef.

The premise of Throwdown with Bobby Flay is the Food Network pretends to do a profile of some award-winning chef from somewhere in America. This chef is known for a particular signature dish. An arrangement is made where this chef is going to be involved in throwing a party for some occasion, and at this party they’re going to prepare their signature dish.

Bobby Flay knows all of this in advance. He makes a surprise visit to this party and challenges the other chef to a throwdown. Bobby will make his own version of that chef’s signature dish, and the two chefs will prepare a sample to be taste-tested by some appropriately qualified official of the Food Network’s choosing. This official then determines which of the two offerings he or she prefers, and that chef wins the throwdown.

Usually the whole routine is a lot of fun, and while it’s competitive, everyone seems to have a good time. I watched an episode tonight, one where Bobby Flay challenges a guy who makes these amazing donuts, and it just didn’t go down that way. The donut guy, at least the way the show was edited, appeared to almost resent the whole arrangement. I think he felt betrayed that the Food Network said they were doing a profile that they weren’t actually doing. So the few times he and Bobby Flay interact, the donut guy is just rude and cold. It’s somewhat awkward to see.

But that’s not why I wanted to write this post. What I noticed about it was that Bobby Flay handled it in a totally classy manner and without getting upset, at least openly, or confrontational in return. Now, Bobby might know that it’s a huge thing to spring on some chef that they’re not doing a Food Network profile and instead are being challenged to a competition against one of the most well recognized and well decorated chefs in the country. Maybe I’d get a little frustrated in that situation too.

But Bobby Flay is a chef. He’s not an entertainer. All of his training is in the culinary arts. As far as I know, his only training in front of the camera has come with his experience in being on these various television shows. That’s the thing I like most about the Food Network. There are probably thousands of chefs across the country you could put on one of their shows to make interesting dishes. It’s hard to do, but plenty of culinary artists are out there that are capable of doing that. I don’t think there’s a ton of culinary artists that have the charisma that is necessary to carry a television show that is meant even more for entertainment than it is for the transfer of the knowledge of foot preparation.

That’s why I like Bobby Flay and Alton Brown. They seem to know exactly what they’re doing in the kitchen, and they play well in front of a camera. That seems to me to be a hard combination to find.