Haute Mess Cuisine?

Last night, I couldn't sleep so I ended up watching hours of Chopped, one of my favorite shows.  Four chefs compete for $10,000.  Many of these chefs are highly accomplished and either own their own businesses or are executive chefs at top restaurants.

If you are not familiar with the format of the show, there are 3 rounds - appetizer, entree and dessert. A basket of secret ingredients is opened at the top of each round by each chef.  Some of the more exotic ingredients have included rattle snake, eel and canned whole chicken.  I didn't even know that there was such a thing as canned whole chicken.  Each chef has only minutes to conceptualize, prepare and plate a course which must include the secret ingredients and then are judged by a panel of celebrity judges.  My favorites are Alex Guarnaschelli, Amanda Freitag, Marcus Samuelsson, Chris Santos, and Scott Conant.  Of course, I can't mention Chopped without mentioning, Ted Allen the wonderful host of this awesome show.

Because I watch the show so much, and given the frenetic pace of action in the Chopped kitchen, it is not unusual to watch a chef hack their finger like a stubborn piece of eel. Almost ALWAYS, they run away from their station, while the clock is still ticking, and will throw on a rubber glove or two and then run right back to preparing their course. Only one time have I ever witnessed the judges not eat food from one of these chefs because his injury was so bad that the glove could not contain the gush. Last night however, was different.  Over the course of 2 episodes, the grossness factor was elevated to a new level.  

It started in the first episode with one contestant who didn't actually injure himself. He was preparing a sauce which he proceeded to taste.  No problem there...this is common and expected.  However, instead of putting the spoon to the side, in the sink - or wherever those spoons go - the chef double-dipped the spoon and tasted AGAIN! When his dish came to the judges table, they commented on his double-dipping and clearly he had done it so mindlessly that he didn't even realize he had done it.  Despite this, he made it through to the next round with a promise to the judges that he would not do it again.  

As a finalist, he made it to the final course, dessert.  As he was preparing it, he made it through almost the entire preparation - plating his biscuit preparation, sprinkling chopped black olives over it and finalizing it by reaching for his limoncello sauce - but I guess under the stress of plating on time...what did he do?  HE DOUBLE-DIPPED AGAIN?!  

At this point, I am feeling so sorry for the judges.  Of course when it came time for judging, they tasted the biscuit with the black olives but would not touch the sauce because of the double-dipping again.  After tasting, and rightly so, they made a really big issue of his double-dipping.  

The judges clearly missed the part where he licked his fingers before sprinkling the black olives over the biscuit with his bare hand.

Now I know you are asking yourself, "okay....that was pretty gross but what does it have to do with bloody fingers?"  Well, my husband and I were sufficiently grossed out, but we moved on... to the next episode.

In this episode there was a caterer who made it to the second round - the entree.  As she was preparing her fried shrimp course, she was slicing something and nicked her finger.  As viewers, we didn't immediately see any blood and she minimized the injury as she was going over to get a glove to put on.  Of course, she did not dry her hands before attempting to put on this latex glove so naturally she couldn't get it on all the way.  Because time was ticking away, she attempted to continue preparation with this ill-fitting glove while still minimizing the injury in her commentary.  By this point there was also blood evident in the glove. She became so hindered and frustrated by the glove that she ripped it off...still minimizing the injury.  She continued preparing her course by hand tossing a salad to go with her lovely fried shrimp.

When her dish was presented to the judges they actually tasted the shrimp, which surprised me given that cross contamination is a huge concern in restaurant kitchens - especially to health inspectors.  They would not touch the salad since she had handled it with her naked, injured hand and they commented on her performance.

My husband and I like to eat out.  We eat at everything from dives to fine dining and of course there are expectations with every type of dining experience.  As I mentioned earlier, we have witnessed worse injuries than this but what really bothered me were her comments about the judges concerns about her handling the salad with her bloody nub.  To her it was no big deal.  NO BIG DEAL?  IS SHE KIDDING?  How is this possible?  She runs a catering business.  It made me so upset and concerned because if it was no big deal on national television, it makes me wonder what she does in the privacy and comfort of her kitchen.  Same holds true for licky-licky boy.  He obviously licks everything all the time, given that he did it so mindlessly on national television - not once but three times.

If I were a health inspector I would be all over these two before the last commercial break.  No matter how "bad" the diviest dive is that my husband and I have been to, there is a reasonable expectation that I will not be served such contaminated food.

"Side of fingers with your main course?  

You have a choice - bloody or licked"