Hooray for Chopped All Stars!

Hooray for Chopped All Stars!

Ever since my husband and I became addicted to the television cooking show Chopped last year, we’ve always thought that the judges should have to compete sometime. It would only be fair, right? Sometimes their judging is so caustic that you can’t help but feel sorry for the contestants. I know I wouldn’t be able to do what they do—especially in that amount of time!—and I’ve even cried over a contestant or two who was torn apart by judge comments (especially Geoffrey Zakarian, who seems to get especially mean sometimes—particularly when it seems like he doesn’t like someone).

So when we heard that Chopped was airing an All Stars series featuring five episodes of judges and Food Network stars competing as chefs, we were ecstatic! We both can’t wait to see these chefs battle it out, and to finally empathize with the contestants that they so regularly judge. We are really looking forward to seeing what kinds of amazing creations the chefs will come up with, too, which is always the most fun part of the show.

Sunday the first episode aired (spoilers ahead), and we were a bit disappointed to see not judges or Food Network stars, but former contestants from the Next Food Network Star program. Not only does this seem not fair—having these people compete in the final round against the much more seasoned judges and stars—but it was also just not what we expected. As much fun as it was to see Brad Sorenson again (we didn’t watch the other seasons of Next Food Network Star, where the other contestants were from), that wasn’t what we were looking forward to. We were looking forward to seeing Chopped judges understand the pressure their contestants usually go through—not these cooks get frazzled on the show. I walked away feeling sorry for them all again, even though they’re playing for charity. (And since these people aren’t stars or judges or anything, I think that the winner should have at least won the usual Chopped $10 grand, too!)

I’m hoping that next week will feature some more familiar faces—I can’t wait to see both Geoffrey and Scott Conant compete, if they do, since they always seem the hardest judges to please. And in the commercials I thought I saw Aaron Sanchez cry! I certainly hope he was just sweating, since he’s one of my favorite judges—along with Alex Guarnaschelli—and I’d love to see either of them win.

Of course, the charities are important to support, too. Sunday’s winner, Michael Proietti, is competing for a suicide help organization, which would be a completely worthy charity of the win.