TV is the New Reading

Reality bites

A peek at what I’ve been watching

You could file this under “learn something new every day,” but my favorite reality shows have stepped up the talent pool so much that apart from wowing the heck out of me, they’re actually imparting knowledge.

Not “Project Runway,” of course. While I’ve thought of different clothes it might be fun to be able to make I’m sufficiently self-aware to know I’d have trouble making a curtain.

Hell's Kitchen

But my personal faves have been doing well all year. In “Hell’s Kitchen,” which closed a month ago, my guy Dave won the final head-to-head challenge.

It was closer than I’d thought it would be. I hadn’t seen much from his final competitor, Kevin, in terms of actual creativity. When he put his final menu together it was a spread of such elegance I … I really had no idea where that came from. Caramelized scallops, coffee-cured beef tenderloin and a trio of crème brulee – that was outstanding! And if he’d only had to make one, he might’ve won. In that he had to make 50, the dinner started going a bit pear-shaped on him. His dishes were so elegant and well-crafted they were simply unavailable for mass production.

Dave, with his instincts for classic flavor – and, I suspect, a better sense of what’s available in Whistler, British Columbia, in Canada – chose to present simple, rustic fare with a mushroom risotto, roast loin of venison and a dark chocolate mousse. It wasn’t exactly lunchroom plop and slop – the presentation was charming – but it wasn’t an attempt at the most complicated and difficult and fiddly dish possible when you’re trying to win a competition.

The flavors were good, the instinct was good and really, about eight weeks out Dave was standing out to me because he barely mentioned his injury, didn’t blame it everytime something went wrong and this may or may not be the case, but my impression was that he talked the least crap about his fellow chefs in the confessionals. I’d maybe identified him as an underdog because he seemed so young, but indeed he came in as an executive chef from somewhere, so I guess it shouldn’t have been a huge surprise that he won.

What I’d like to see in future Hell’s Kitchens is I’d like a little time spent on the chefs’ downtime. We see them cooking, but we don’t really see them eating, and I think it would be interesting to see them cooking for each other, and listening to the squawk from a first-hand perspective. If it felt like they were always on, well, your fellow competitors are only slightly less scary and certainly less demanding than Gordon Ramsay and on their own, they can’t send you home. And it would be nice occasionally to hear them say nice things about each other's work.

So, I dunno, the two who aren’t eliminated have to cook for everyone and clean up the kitchen? That’s of course a huge amount of pressure on top of a certain amount of resentment, and of course it’s a great opportunity to poison everyone, so … yeah, maybe that’s not such a great idea.

Project Runway

On Project Runway, Irina won, and honestly for me it has for quite a long time been between her, Althea and Nicholas. Irina sent a sea of black down the runway with some strange headgear and blew the judges away. It didn’t blow me away because I live in the Midwest and I’ll go for a long, long time between seeing anyone dressed like Miss Janet if you’re nasty, but I’ve been pulling for her to win for awhile. But Althea absolutely has an eye for clothes that have a real shot at commercial success. Both of them turned in amazing work and while Carol Hannah was charming, I saw her as the anti-Althea.

Starting a couple months ago I was identifying winners and hangers on and it seemed to me that Shirin was sort of shadowing Irina, Carol Hannah was shadowing Althea and, well, Nicholas was kicked off first, but that Logan was shadowing Nicholas a bit. Throughout I thought they kept not eliminating Christopher because he’d be really a really easy elimination choice to make late in the show (sending Christina Aguilera out in something that was too dated for Pat Benetar? Come on, man!) and until then he got to compete against impossibly talented people that grated his self-esteem like cheese. It’s true, Nicholas made a misstep or two but he was a tough contender for Bryant Park I thought. All the same, his sheer talent and ability should help him rise in the industry, and certainly Project Runway gave him a forum to prove himself.

And in fact as it turns out Irina was being shadowed by Althea a little bit. The dropped sleeves they sent out in as their first look reminded me of each other, and Althea picked up some of Irina’s looks as the competition wore on, to the point where even the judges were noticing how suggestible she was. Irina might have been mean, but at least she was 100 percent original. So … another reason for her to be named the winner.

I like these kinds of shows because there’s so much pressure to do something creative day in and day out and it’s similar to my own work, facing four or five blank feature pages every week and the opportunity to do something eye-catching with whatever is at hand. Sometimes it works well, and sometimes it works less well, but I can absolutely relate to wanting to do the best you can with what you’ve got.

Top Chef

For Top Chef, they’re practically down to the wire and I haven’t identified anyone I’d care if they win or not. Probably Eli was the closest and that was because he seemed to keep his ego in check and he also seemed to thrive in adversity. In that he’s been eliminated, I don’t really have a horse in this race, but I’m enjoying Kevin’s attitude in all of this. Last season I was pushing for my little Carla bird to win and she made it very nearly to the end. This year it should probaly be the Voltaggio brothers and they can fight with each other every year over who actually won. Either way they should open a restaurant together. It would be a commercial slam dunk.

But I appreciated Top Chef because I recently received a gift of excellent pheasant breast and it was wonderful, but it had been brined beyond all flavor. I remembered a tip from the Top Chef competition where cream can be used to cut salt, so I seared the meat, then put it together with some brown rice and super low-sodium cream of mushroom soup and baked it for an hour at 350 degrees. Lo and behold the pheasant, while salty, was no longer too salty and the rest of the dish was seasoned beautifully. So this tip saved about three or four mealtimes. Thanks Top Chef!

Top Chef is still seeking a winner Wednesdays at 10/9c on Bravo, although not this week – happy Thanksgiving! It’ll be up and running again the following week. Until then, happy holidays.

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