The Dining Room at Kendall College
As its name suggests, the Almost Famous Chef Competition, sponsored by the sparkling-water company S. Pellegrino, is concerned with more than its contestants’ culinary prowess. They’re also evaluated for “potential star quality,” according to the program overview I received before judging a local round of the contest last month at Kendall College’s School of Culinary Arts in Evanston. The contest winner “will be coached by a public relations team on how to promote and conduct themselves with the media.” In other words, these contestants want to be more than good chefs; they want to be celebrity chefs like contest judges Charlie Palmer (Aureole), Susan Feniger and Mary Sue Milliken (hosts of Two Hot Tamales, a cooking show on the Food Network), and Roland Liccioni (Les Nomades and Le Lan). “We want somebody who can interact with people and get along,” says Manejah Morad Terzi, a PR rep for Pellegrino. “It adds a different twist to things; it’s not so square.”
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The contest, which is in its third year, takes place over three weeks. Out of 45 total contestants, 6–each representing a different culinary school–go on to the finals, held October 14-17 at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas. The winnings include a trip to Italy to participate in a yet-to-be-determined culinary program. But perhaps the most valuable prize is the connections the contestants can make. It’s not often that a culinary student gets his work critiqued by someone like Palmer or Liccioni. The winner from the first Almost Famous contest, Joncarl Lachman, went on to work at New York’s Inside restaurant with Anne Rosenzweig, and his recipes have appeared in Wine X magazine. Last year’s winner, Felicia Shallow Davis, a former Chicago cop, teaches at Kendall now. Her fame has been limited to stories about last year’s contest. But even “that kind of exposure is hard to come by,” says Terzi.
At station number two, Dan Grajdura, a food-and-beverage operations major, had stock simmering in one pot and onions sauteing in another. He popped a tray of grated Parmesan into the oven and set his timer. He was filleting a whole halibut when the timer went off. Out of the oven he pulled a completely charred pan of what were supposed to be cheese crisps. Sheepishly he slid the tray under his workstation, grabbed another pan, and tried again. Later, when his final dish came out for tasting, the cheese crisps were nowhere to be seen–the second pan had burned as well.
Finally the nine contestants gathered at the front of the school’s demonstration kitchen. Koetke thanked them for participating. Then he said, “And the one who’s off to Las Vegas next month is…Mark Newman.” Everyone cheered. “I never thought this was going to happen,” said Newman. “This is great.” (See? Star quality!)
