Kristen Kish Names The Coolest Dish You'll See On Iron Chef: Quest For An Iron Legend - Exclusive
"Iron Chef" is not your regular cooking competition. There are no amateurs in Kitchen Stadium — only bona fide culinary champions and the extremely talented, often well-known challengers who have spent their careers perfecting their signature styles and techniques. As such, the level of cooking on the show is often unlike anything you've ever seen, especially when you consider that the chefs are usually only given an hour to deliver a multi-course meal.
With the newest Netflix iteration, "Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend," the skills, the stakes, and the showdowns are arguably even more intense. The final results are that much more jaw-dropping and mouthwatering at the same time (making for quite a hilarious, albeit accurate, visual). Mashed recently got the chance to talk all things "Iron Chef" with co-host Kristen Kish, who, alongside Alton Brown, acts as the viewers' guide to all the gastronomical goings-on in Kitchen Stadium.
She'll be the first to tell you just how masterful and mind-blowing the caliber of culinary creations is this season. In an exclusive interview with Mashed, Kish detailed one of the most impressive dishes created on this season of "Iron Chef" — and believe it or not, it has pretty much nothing to do with the actual food on the plate.
The coolest dish on Iron Chef is an actual dish, says Kristen Kish
Unlike some shows, the "Iron Chef" hosts actually get to taste all the dishes the chefs create during each Kitchen Stadium battle, so there's no doubt that Kristen Kish had her fill of unimaginably delectable foods over the course of the season. But she says one stood out to her above all the rest before even taking the first bite. It was part of an epic pastry battle against Iron Chef and force of French cuisine Dominique Crenn. The challenger? Chicago-based chef Curtis Duffy, whose restaurant, Ever, holds two Michelin stars.
Kish says she was blown away by the final dish he made — and by that, we mean the literal dish. "He was making a charcoal beeswax serving vessel, which I'm still in shock [about]," she told Mashed. Chef Duffy combined the two ingredients in liquid form and submerged the mixture in ice water, which immediately solidified the black beeswax into unique, whimsical, free-form bowls. Duffy used them to serve up decadent camel milk ice cream sandwiches and a chewy, caramelized coconut candy (with a boozy milkshake on the side to top it all off).
"I am in awe of the level of talent and creativity," Kish stated. She admitted it kind of takes a lot to stun her in the kitchen like that. "It's completely my job and it's my life to explore these things, and I do it out of pure pleasure, but every now and again, you see something and you're like, 'Wait a second. What's going on and how is it happening?'" she said, adding, "You'll never forget it, and then it makes you want to try it yourself."
"Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend" is now available to stream on Netflix.