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Today, we bring to you the second half of the 1997 Iron Chef World Cup. (Part 1 is here.)
Alain Passard vs. Koumei Nakamura in the final of the 1997 Iron Chef World Cup.
It starts with Michiba going on a visit with Nakamura. Michiba says, “Iron Chef Nakamura has lost his way.” It even sounded like he said something about his dishes not tasting good. Was he really knocking Nakamura that much? They visit a farmer who has been farming eggplants for 30 years. They cut a round eggplant off the stalk and take a bite from it while still out in the field.
Nakamura looks on as Michiba gives him a demonstration, concluding with a lesson about finding good flavors from different ingredient combinations. (Although it almost looked like Nakamura was just adding things for the sake of adding them.) Perhaps Michiba agrees because he tells him there is too much flavor. (or too many flavors?)
The last thing we see before the battle is the presentation of a hand-made knife to Nakamura. His name is carved into it by the knife maker himself. We know that Michiba personally chose Nakamura to be his replacement, but we really see the way he mentors him in this episode.
There were many special episodes of Iron Chef over the years. Despite the fact that the later FN show introduction mentioned and showed clips from some of these specials, most of them never aired on Food Network. (If anyone has any tapes of any of these specials, we will buy them from you. Contact us.)
The following episodes may be found by searching our video database: 415/416, 631, 802a, 802b, 901.
New in the database this week: New York Battle (802a/b), 21st Century Special (901)
We have several related videos in our Beyond Kitchen Stadium collection. Be sure to go check them out as well as the new episodes we have this week.
This journey Beyond Kitchen Stadium takes us to China. Enjoy the opening sequence from the Beijing Special that originally aired in 1996. This special never aired on Food Network.
This video, like all of the others in Beyond Kitchen Stadium, is available for download or viewing in our files section.