Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend (2022) s01e04 Episode Script
Battle Medieval
1
[men chant]Yah ♪
[drum beats]
Rah ♪
[plays long note]
Yah ♪
I have blown the bugle of battle!
Rah ♪
[cheering and applause]
Hear ye, hear ye!
I'm, uh, Alton Brown, a mere page,
and my Lord, The Chairman,
has decreed that this arena
is hereby open for battle.
And I'm Lady Kristen Kish,
and soon brave combatants
will clash here in Kitchen Stadium.
Now, look, yonder cometh The Chairman.
I am the king of this kitchen,
and I decree
there shall be no challenger today.
The Chairman requires a battle
amongst his Iron Chefs
to further test and assess their skills
with a battle of epic proportion
as teams!
[Alton] Wow. Um, so an unexpected twist.
The Chairman has
summoned only his Iron Chefs today
for an extra-special battle.
First up, it will be
Iron Chefs Dominique Crenn
and Iron Chef Curtis Stone!
[cheering and applause]
Being an Iron Chef,
your food really has to speak for itself.
I grew up cooking in French restaurants,
so my style of cooking is very European.
I've worked in some of the best kitchens
in the world, so
I'm not easily intimidated.
Atelier Crenn is my restaurant
in San Francisco.
This is where I share with the world
the beauty of cooking.
I am the first female in the United States
who's received three Michelin stars.
So make no mistake, I'm here to win.
[dramatic music plays, audience cheers]
Versus Iron Chefs Gabriela Cámara
and Marcus Samuelsson.
My career has been defined
by farm-to-table Mexican food
using extraordinary produce.
I have opened 15 restaurants
around the world.
I'm excited to be competing
against two other Iron Chefs.
Competitiveness is what makes you
do things well.
Who doesn't love winning?
I'm chef-owner of Red Rooster Harlem,
and I've opened restaurants
all over the world.
My culinary style is very unique to me.
Being Swede-iopian means Nordic techniques
with African ingredients.
No one does what I do,
and I know I'm not
going to let The Chairman down.
Four Iron Chefs stand before me.
Two unbeatable teams.
Let us prepare for the biggest battle
this kitchen has ever seen.
I hope you are prepared to go back in time
to the origins of culinary combat.
For this battle, we will feast in
medieval times!
-What?!
-Oh!
Your medieval menu
must feature three secret ingredients,
but there are a labyrinth of surprises
in store for this battle.
Because you are all Iron Chefs,
you will not learn
of all the secret ingredients at once.
[chuckles]
The first secret ingredient
for you to get medieval with is
game birds!
The two additional secret ingredients
I will bestow unto thee during battle,
when the time is ripe.
Iron Chefs,
you will have just 60 minutes
to make an extravagant medieval menu,
a feast to be remembered!
Each Iron Chef team
will prepare four dishes
highlighting our secret ingredients.
Okay.
So now with an open heart
and empty stomach,
I say unto you in the words of my uncle
[plays long note]
Allez cuisine!
[Alton] And Battle Medieval is on
here in Kitchen Stadium,
and four Iron Chefs run for their fowl.
[Gabriela] What do we do? Where do
[Alton] Lot of birds consumed
during the medieval period.
[Kristen] Game birds
are one of those things
that really does test
the quality and the skill of the chef,
because it's not like
cooking a big rib eye.
They are very delicate in flavor
Because there's no fat in them.
No intramuscular fat.
[Kristen] You have to balance
with other ingredients.
-[Marcus] Nice squab.
-[Alton] We got squab.
-[Alton] Basically baby pigeons.
-[Curtis] I'll get you some pigeon.
[Alton] We have quail.
Whoa!
[Alton] I believe
I see a goose up there,
and I think that we have
got a couple of turkeys.
[Gabriela] Shoo! Shoo! [chuckles]
Okay, so maybe I'm gonna
In medieval time they ate a lot of pies.
Yeah.
Maybe I'll make a pie,
with the squab maybe?
-[Gabriela] Ready?
-Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[Alton] Looking around,
nobody came down with a turkey.
We've got squab and quail
on both sides of the kitchen.
-I'm gonna butcher the quail
-Yeah.
just so that the meat is clean,
I'm gonna marinate it, make a tamal.
-Tamal, nice!
-Yeah.
So medieval was always
about, like, a show.
We're gonna have
a lot of things happening.
[Marcus] We're gonna do the squab.
I'm gonna butcher that.
I'm gonna take out the liver.
Medieval is all about soft food, right?
They didn't want to use their teeth,
because they were bad.
Okay, we need
to do something with the bone,
make a stock with quail,
and then just layering flavors.
Then we see
what the other ingredients are.
We don't know what the other
Okay, let's get a start right now.
Yeah, we do. You start the stock.
-I'll make the pie dough.
-Yeah.
[Curtis] Let's go!Allez, allez!
Before things get all medieval
in this kitchen,
let's say hello to our own lords
and ladies of judging,
Nilou Motamed, Andrew Zimmern
and our special guest judge,
master of magic, comedian and host,
Justin Willman.
[Kristen chuckles]
[Alton] Ah. Okay. So thank you, judges.
-I have port wine for you here.
-Thank you, Chef.
[Alton] Chef Cámara breaking down
I thought that was squab. It's not.
it's a little quail, isn't it? Quail are
a little bit smaller than pigeons.
Of course, their meat's not as red.
All right, the Iron Chefs
are going to be busy today
cooking without any sous-chefs.
Each team must work together
to get everything done in time.
Knowing these chefs,
what do you think we're gonna see?
Over on Iron Chef Stone
and Iron Chef Crenn's side,
I imagine we're gonna see
very heavy French technique.
Then on Iron Chef Samuelsson
and Cámara's side,
their food will span the globe.
Iron Chef Samuelsson's Swedish background
has medieval influences,
but I'm curious to see
if he'll incorporate anything medieval
from Ethiopia.
Yes, and I really wanna
see medieval Mexico.
Iron Chef Cámara's mostly
focusing on quail.
She is so well known for tortillas,
for masa preparations, for tamals.
I'll be really surprised
if we don't see something like that.
All right, Iron Chef Stone
at this very moment,
that looks like squab being taken apart.
Squab is a fancy word for "pigeon"?
-Yes, it is. Yes.
-Same thing.
-Yes.
-It's a branding shift.
"Just us pigeons."
-"You don't wanna eat us."
-Exactly.
I'm a big fan of pigeon.
You know, it has similarities
to dark chicken meat,
but with an earthier, gamier flavor.
Currently over on the Stone-Crenn
side of the world,
Iron Chef Stone sautéing pigeon
or squab breasts.
Iron Chef, what is that going to become?
Back in medieval time,
they ate lot of pies.
I've always loved eating it.
I love cooking it.
It's a delicious thing. Why not?
I can confit the legs,
pan-roast the breasts.
I wanna get a nice amount of color
on the skin.
I'm gonna cook 'em
nearly the whole way through that way,
make the dough, rest of the dough,
make the mix, line the pastry.
Normally a pie would take
two and a half hours start to finish.
We don't have a lot of time,
but I'm very fast, so you just never know.
Chef Crenn, if I roast some spices,
do you think you'd have time to grind it?
Yeah. Look at that, baby.
Can you hear singing the bird?
Iron Chef Crenn, she is cocky and spicy.
-Isn't she, though?
-Both.
Because she's arguably
the best chef in the world today.
No question.
Ah, this is so good!
Iron Chef Crenn loves
to play on senses and theatrics.
[Alton] Right now,
she's got a lot of something bubbly.
We'll call it Champagne. She's French.
It's not Champagne. That's cider.
[Alton] Not Champagne. It was apple cider.
Looking down into that pot,
that's got a bunch of the quail in it.
Looks like part of an apple.
It looks like a bird stock, with quail.
Ah, this is so good!
Clearly this would have been,
in actual medieval times,
we're cooking for rich folks here,
because the poor did not get fresh meat.
They got offal, they got leftovers.
But Iron Chef Samuelsson
has, I believe, some livers.
[Alton] Ah, okay. Look at that.
All of that liver and all of that butter
together in one place
over there, marinating,
I'm going to guess, pâté, right?
I'm going to make a squab
and chicken-liver mousse.
During the medieval time,
it was all about soft food,
and this is an opportunity to do that.
Interesting. Let's see what else
he's gonna do with the squab.
[Kristen] I see some squab legs
cooking in their own fat.
We're just gonna
confit a little bit of squab.
-[Kristen] Confit squab leg.
-[Alton] How can he do that in this time?
-It takes three days to do that.
-Well, they're little baby legs.
Confit and the method
of cooking meat in fat.
-Which is called fat poaching.
-Fat
Confiting would require
curing in salt and herbs.
-You have to take out the moisture.
-Call it confit if you want.
[Kristen] Then go tell him that.
[Alton] No. He does whatever he wants.
-How are you doing, Marcus?
-[Marcus] Doing good, Chef.
-I think it's a good fit, you know?
-[Gabriela] Yes!
I am making a quail tamal.
Quail is good for it,
because the meat is gonna be very tender.
You don't necessarily think of Africa
or America when you think of medieval,
and I just wanna make sure
that I highlight a little bit
of my Mexican culture, as usual.
This is from the Mayan culture
in the south of Mexico.
Okay. Use the achiote.
[Alton] And now she is taking
a little bit of achiote paste,
a light, nutty flavor.
[Gabriela] It's a paste
that comes from a seed
that I am very fond of.
[Alton] And citrus is being added.
[Dominique] How we doing here?
We are doing a tamal. I'm making a tamal.
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah,
so you need that cut right?
Oh, thank you! Isn't she lovely?
Hey, you're on my team, Dominique!
Leave them alone.
-[Dominique] Just trying to help.
-Thank you!
[Alton] Iron Chef Crenn
went for a visit, on walkabout.
Stay on your side, Chef!
What are you doing?
She's so sure of her game
that she can help me.
[Alton] So Iron Chef Cámara,
she added her quail to that achiote paste.
Oh. Let's see what The Chairman
has brought to bear.
[plays bugle]
What's going on?
Behold, it is time to learn
of thy second secret ingredient.
Mushrooms!
Mushrooms?
Oh my goodness.
Ohhh! That is great.
Each Iron Chef team will have to feature
magnificent medieval mushrooms
in their menu!
[Curtis] Oh my goodness.
Yes, I love mushrooms!
Chef, get the porcini, get the porcini!
[Alton] Of course, during medieval times,
a lot of mushrooms were consumed,
but half of the people that ate them died.
-[Gabriela] What do we get?
-Trumpets.
-Yeah.
-Okay.
Okay, let's go.
-Trumpets, and then what else?
-Get some porcini!
[Kristen] Chef Samuelsson
went for one of absolute my favorites,
the king trumpet.
[Curtis] You're so greedy!
You're so greedy.
-You took everything.
-You can get some.
[Dominique]Allez!
[Alton] I see the biggest matsutakes
I've ever seen.
[Kristen] Those are amazing.
Mushrooms will go here.
Look at this beautiful deer. More porcini.
[Alton] Chef Cámara
has the matsutakes there,
some oysters, shiitakes,
and more of the king trumpets.
On the Crenn side,
we've got the chanterelles,
we've got shiitakes,
king trumpets are over there as well.
[Kristen] Mushrooms you just rattled off
are low in moisture content,
which will yield
a more concentrated caramelized flavor
without too many other steps.
[Alton] We're gonna probably see
a lot of sautéing, broths.
[Curtis] I have to think of another dish.
Chef, what if I do, like
I'm gonna do a dish in your honor.
-Medieval France.
-Whoo!
-The forest floor.
-Yes, yes, I love that!
Hey, I'm going to do medieval France
with Paul Bocuse in mind.
-Ooh!
-What do you think about this?
[Alton] Great idea, Iron Chef.
Paul Bocuse, of course,
one of the most prominent French chefs.
[Kristen] Maybe she'll make
one of Paul Bocuse's soups.
Mushroom, quail stock.
[Alton] Yes.
-[Gabriela] Marcus?
-Yes.
What do you think of doing
something with mushrooms and seafood?
-I love that.
-Just like the hint of seafood. Right?
-What do you want?
-Trumpet.
Let's do something with scallop.
-Did you see nice scallops
-Yeah.
-In the pantry? Perfect.
-Scallops. There's seafood there.
-Yeah.
-Mm, lovely.
[Dominique] Mm! Mm!
[Alton] So, we've still got
one secret ingredient left
from The Chairman.
Remember, each team of Iron Chefs
must prepare four courses
andincorporate
every secret ingredient at least once.
Iron Chef Samuelsson and Cámara
have three courses in play,
two with game birds
and mushrooms with scallops.
This is the base of the pie.
Get my stock in there.
Iron Chefs Crenn and Stone
have a game-bird pie in progress.
Iron Chef Stone
making pie dough of some type.
He's got a mixture of goose fat
and flour have gone in there.
[Curtis] Okay.
[Alton] We've got dough.
It's being rolled out by Iron Chef Crenn.
I think that's puff pastry.
[Dominique in exaggerated French accent]
La puff pastry!
[Alton] The dough gives it away.
She has to be making
Paul Bocuse's famous truffle soup
where puff pastry is baked
on top of the serving vessel.
What are you working on, first of all?
'Cause I see eight different
You know, in medieval time,
they would like pie.
And you know what?
Bocuse, kind of like,
you know when you do that puff pastry?
-Yeah.
-He didn't invent that.
They were doing that in medieval time.
That's what I'm gonna do.
[Kristen] All right. Thank you.
It's very French.
I gotta make my country proud, you know?
[Alton] Yes, so over
on Iron Chef Crenn's workstation,
a very large cast-iron pan
loaded full of various types of mushrooms.
She's gonna make a soup
out of that and the quail stock.
Yeah, I see you.
Is that just a truffle
hanging outta your mouth? [laughs]
I just felt medieval.
[Alton] Okay!
Over on Iron Chef Cámara's side,
she's gonna make tamales.
She's got the masa over there,
that's in a stand mixer. Very medieval!
In fact, some historians say
steamed corn preparations
have been around
for more than 10,000 years.
[Gabriela] Okay.
[Alton] She's got
the marinating pieces of quail.
Um, now she's got the banana leaf out.
Something to steam it in.
[Kristen] Iron Chef Samuelsson
has Ethiopian green coffee.
It's not roasted,
so it's lighter in color.
[Alton] Not something I would've
imagined for a medieval battle.
Iron Chef Samuelsson, what are you using
the coffee beans for?
I'm roasting Ethiopian coffee.
One of the oldest things of value.
-I'm gonna make a vinaigrette
-[Kristen] A vinaigrette.
with my squab dish.
[Alton] There's also some cracked wheat
that he has added some oil to and stock.
Maybe that's gonna go with mushrooms,
which, by the way,
is very true to the theme.
A lot of grains in medieval food.
[Kristen] Iron Chef Stone,
I saw him working a blond roux.
That roux is equal parts fat and flour,
usually used to thicken something.
[Alton] It's got to be
the filling for his pie.
[Kristen] I'm gonna go find out.
-Iron Chef Stone?
-Oui.
-Is this a filling?
-This is the beginning of a pie.
I love medieval.
You know, I'm quite a Neanderthal.
I mean, look at me. You can tell, right?
So, the whole idea of doing
something very primal and primitive,
it's how I like to cook anyway.
Okay, great pie. Look at this.
-Ah!
-[Kristen chuckles]
[Dominique] So good!
[Kristen] Approved.
She is one of the most unbelievable chefs
I've ever worked with.
We're gonna have each other's back
the whole way through.
-Thank you.
-You got it.
[Alton] We can see Iron Chef Samuelsson.
He's working with so many components
for his squab course.
Um, there's a lot of squab in a pan,
what appears to be its legs.
He's gonna be roasting those,
and also confiting squab in herbs.
Let's see, we also see a blender.
He's working,
adding that liver mousse mixture,
and it's also, I think, got some port wine
and a fair amount of shallot.
There's also a little bit of quail leg
going into it.
A port-wine mead.
Very medieval ingredients in here.
[Alton] The mead, of course,
is basically hooch made out of honey.
Can be delicious, but man, the headache.
Iron Chef Stone
just flamed some livers there.
He just flamed mead.
It's pretty interesting
that we do have liver and mead
on both sides of the kitchen.
They used a lot of wine in medieval time.
[Alton] That's true. Okay.
Back over to Iron Chef Samuelsson.
The liver mixture that he made earlier,
the liver, and all of that butter
going into small little buttered tins.
I would bet
that they're going to bake those
and call it a liver flan instead,
since a flan is baked and a mousse is not.
All right, we can see Iron Chef Cámara.
Right now, she's using the heat
from the range
to just loosen up her banana leaves
so she will be able to wrap
her masa and quail filling inside them.
I gotta keep up with my tamales
because I'm a little bit late.
[Alton] Making tamales is time-consuming.
If those banana leaves
aren't the right texture,
her tamale will fall apart when it cooks.
Back over, Iron Chef Crenn
is working with a lot of mushrooms.
Rosemary has been
added to the sautéing mushrooms,
kind of a mélange of mushrooms.
That's for the soup.
[Dominique]Ouah!
Yes, baby. Whoo! How are you doing?
All I'm focusing on right now
is exactly what's in front of me.
-[Alton] Chef Stone, what are you cutting?
-These are those beautiful porcinis.
I'm gonna go ahead and cook 'em in butter,
get 'em nice and brown,
my current plan.
Doing a bit of a re-creation
of the French landscape in medieval times.
A lot of people were foraging.
[Alton] So Iron Chef Stone
is going to turn his mushrooms
into a medieval scene.
I look forward to seeing that.
Back over Oh, our Chairman
-[plays bugle]
-[Dominique whoops] What's going on?
Oh my goodness.
At last, it is time
to learn the third secret ingredient
to work into thy menus.
Grapes!
Grapes.
Okay, I'm gonna go get them.
-Whoo!
-A fruit fit for royalty!
Make grapes great!
Whoo! There was grape on the floor, Chef.
How 'bout I just take these?
[Alton] At this point in the battle,
they better think fast
if they're going
to get a grape dish done in time.
We've got the red seedless,
green seedless,
some I think called black beauties,
which is a dark-skinned-seedless hybrid,
and concord grapes.
Speaking of grapes,
Iron Chef Crenn with a pinot noir.
[Curtis] Nice job, Chef.
[Dominique] I got some red grape seedless.
Very sweet.
I think they are the best right now.
[Alton] In the pinot noir,
maybe they're cooking those.
Do we want medieval? I'm gonna
poach them in red wine right now.
[Curtis] Right.
Then what should I do?
I'm gonna grill them. Do a honey butter.
-Chef, what do you say we grill grapes
-That would be amazing.
-as we have that grill.
-I love grilled grapes.
-I love.
-How are you coming along?
-I'm good.
-Good.
[Alton] Grilled grapes on both sides
of Kitchen Stadium.
I love when that happens,
because then you get to compare.
We've got a beautiful shot
from our overhead
on the Iron Chefs Stone-Crenn side.
Looking down
into that binchotan charcoal.
Japanese-style charcoal,
burns hot and even.
Look at those, baby. Come on, baby.
[Alton] We can see
that she dipped those grapes
into basically a pinot sauce.
[Kristen] And the honey butter.
She's brushing those grapes.
She's basting them in a honey butter
to really caramelize
and completely char the outside.
[Alton] Could be for a dessert.
Somebody needs to think about dessert.
[Kristen] Chef Cámara has a similar idea,
also quickly grilling grapes.
I can see mascarpone and Gorgonzola
there as well.
And she's being more careful
with her grapes
while Iron Chef Crenn is charring hers.
She must wanna add texture
and intensify the grape flavor.
[Alton] Okay, it looks like
Iron Chef Samuelsson
grabbed trumpet royales,
the king trumpets.
[Marcus] King mushrooms and shiitakes.
Flavor-wise, you know, they're very meaty.
I'm gonna marinate them
so I can roast them up.
[Kristen] You can use those raw,
confit them, roast them, uh, braise.
They can take up
any kind of cooking technique.
One of the things
people don't talk about with mushrooms,
they're almost impossible to overcook.
Now I'm gonna turn back over
to Iron Chef Stone's board.
We've got the dough.
Okay, Chef Stone is sweating a tiny bit.
Hey, Chef Curtis,
how is the dough coming along?
-Do you want me to be honest, Chef?
-Oui.
I messed it up.
Iron Chef Stone with his pie dough.
It looks soft from here.
Probably too much fat.
And all fat could be tricky to work with.
I'm kinda worried about that game pie.
What a mess. What a mess!
It's a dough-over.
A dough-over!
Ohhh!
[chuckles]
I like it, I like it.
I'll take it. I love a challenge.
If he is going to make a pie, he's gonna
have to get it into an oven soon.
Looks like he's just gonna let that rest
and firm up a little bit more.
There's a lot still to happen here
in this medieval battle.
Just to catch you up, Chairman has now
unleashed three secret ingredients.
Game birds,
then we've got a wide range of mushrooms.
Now, finally,
the third secret ingredient, grapes.
And they must incorporate
every secret ingredient at least once.
So we've sorted out all the dishes
they've been making, right?
[Alton] Yes. Iron Chef Stone,
I'm certain he's making a game-bird pie,
using squab breast, leg and liver.
Iron Chef Crenn is making
a classic French mushroom soup.
Iron Chef Stone also what he's calling
a wild-mushroom forest floor.
And Iron Chef Crenn
is making poached and charred grapes
with honey butter.
Gabriela, can you shave me some truffles?
Yes, of course.
Other side of Kitchen Stadium,
Iron Chef Cámara making a tamale
with achiote-marinated quail,
and then, of course,
Iron Chef Samuelsson is making
one game-bird course, roasted squab,
and one mushroom course,
mushrooms with scallops.
And also Iron Chef Cámara,
she's grilling the grapes
that could be for her dessert.
Take a look. We have got blue masa,
has gone down on top of the banana leaf,
and that achiote-marinated quail
is now being wrapped up.
-Chef Stone over on his back station.
-Oh, look at that pie.
I'm just making a couple of pies,
pigeon pies.
[Kristen] He didn't have time
to remake the dough
so he chilled it to get it firm enough
to be able to form the pie.
The dough is a little softer
than I'd like,
which is gonna mean
it's gonna to taste amazing
if it doesn't melt.
[Alton] He might have saved time,
but we'll see whether he ends up
with a proper medieval pie.
Iron Chef Samuelsson
working with a mixture,
some of the cooked cracked wheat
that he had earlier,
some truffle shavings.
Now he's opening up some coconut milk.
Coconut, truffle, cracked wheat.
A different approach. Interesting.
[Kristen] We have sunchokes
on Iron Chef Stone
[Alton] Yes. Mandolin now in the hands.
Don't do this at home, kids.
Use a hand guard.
Iron Chef Stone is a professional chef.
Doesn't have to.
Sunchokes come from the sunflower family.
It's almost like a starchy apple,
a little bit.
-Like a potato and apple
-[Alton] But with celery rubbed onto it.
And I like 'em fried.
[Kristen] I love them.
They're absolutely delicious.
[Alton] So those are definitely
going to become crisps.
I'm putting the puff pastry right now.
[Alton] Iron Chef Crenn, she's got
a beautiful soup tureen, antique.
It's probably 7000 years old.
She just added some of the mushrooms
that she cooked down
and some crème fraîche
topped with the puff pastry, striated.
There it goes.
-[Kristen] Look how beautiful that is.
-[Alton] That's in the oven.
Iron Chef Stone, now he's got a blender
that he's working with,
the porcinis
that he was working with earlier.
Now he's pouring a mixture.
What's in the foamer, Iron Chef?
Uh, porcini puree.
-Just puree?
-Yeah.
[Alton] Porcini puree.
That could be going
with his sunchoke and parsnip.
Don't know.
Okay, looking over on Iron Chef
Samuelsson's side of the world,
he's got What is that?
-Tuna.
-It's tuna.
-[Kristen] Why?
-[Alton] Because that's a medieval fish.
[Kristen] I'm gonna find out
what Chef Samuelsson's doing.
[Alton] Go.
-Iron Chef, we see toro.
-Yeah.
Wait, and scallops?
Yes. I don't know
if I had a plan for medieval.
I'm older than you,
but I wasn't around at that time.
You know?
But why not? This is delicious.
Medieval is all about
cooking on high heat and fire,
so we just burnt them a little bit.
-[Kristen] A surf and turf for the ages.
-Yes. That's how people ate.
-Surf-and-turf everything!
-Thank you, Chef.
[Alton] Iron Chef Stone's pie
is coming out of the oven right now.
It still looks good,
but we'll have to wait and see
if it's cooked all the way through.
Okay, plating happening
over on the Iron Chef Crenn-Stone side.
That is a whimsical arrangement.
I feel like that's actual bark.
It is Oh, the bark is bark.
[Kristen] Where did that soil come from?
From medieval time.
[Alton] Dirt from France
provided by The Chairman.
They're gonna build something
that is an amusement,
so it will be inedible.
My idea is
we put this in the middle of the table.
It looks like a foraging scene.
[Alton] Plating happening on both sides.
[Kristen] Iron Chef Samuelsson
is plating that toro and the squab
going with that mushroom sauce.
We also see on top
of that, uh, cracked-wheat mixture,
um, he's got the scallop
and some of that beautifully
sautéed mushroom on top.
[Marcus] Looks great.
[Gabriela] I'm doing
just a little of the mascarpone.
[Marcus] Yep.
[Alton] Over on the Iron Chef Stone-Crenn
side of the world,
Iron Chef Stone is taking so much care
to remove the outer skin
from these fried parsnips.
Now they fried the parsnips whole
to help remove the skins,
which is apparently all they're using.
Now they're frying the skins again,
to make tube-shaped bark
or little logs
for his forest-floor scene. Smart!
The plating happening fast and furious.
The grapes are down.
Let's plate like this. This is delicious.
-What do you want to do?
-I wanna do it like a soil.
Like a soil? Okay.
-Is that okay?
-Yeah.
[Alton] What's crumbled up,
that's the chokes that they fried up.
There comes the porcini puree.
And now they've made
a little hollow log out of parsnips.
It's a forest floor!
All right, there's Iron Chef Stone's pie.
Very rustic.
It'll come down to texture and taste
for the judges, I imagine.
The tureen is out.
Sixty seconds and it'll all be over,
except the eating and judging
and the winning and losing.
[Gabriela] There we go.
[Alton] The courses are, at this point,
Iron Chef Samuelsson and Cámara
have a tamal
with achiote-marinated quail,
and a tomatillo salsa.
[Gabriela] Little bit of sauce over?
-[Marcus] Great.
-[Gabriela] It's gonna be spicy.
[Alton] Okay, roasted mushrooms
with scallops and cracked wheat.
Coffee and honey-glazed squab
with the liver flan and fire-roasted tuna.
-[Marcus] Got the grapes?
-[Gabriela] Got the grapes.
[Alton] Also fire-roasted grapes
with Gorgonzola and mascarpone cheese.
-This looks medieval to me.
-Behind!
Coming up on the 30-second mark.
-Hurry up.
-[Dominique] Oh my God.
[Alton] Over on the Stone-Crenn
side of the world,
now their courses
are, okay, mushroom forest floor
with a parsnip crisp,
sunchoke crumble, and porcini puree.
[Curtis] So that's
the fully edible version of that.
[Alton] A classic French mushroom soup.
[Dominique] Curtis, let's get that out.
[Alton] A game-bird pie
using squab breast, leg, and liver.
-[Curtis] Confit leg, crispy leg on top.
-[Dominique] Yep.
[Alton] And poached and charred grapes
with honey butter.
Five, four, three, two, one,
and medieval battle is over
here in Kitchen Stadium.
A clash of Iron Chefs.
[Marcus] Good job.
Okay, that is joy. That is pure joy.
-[Gabriela] Look at that feast!
-Beautiful.
Look at that feast!
-[Marcus groans]
-[Dominique whoops]
Oh là là.
[Curtis] You were amazing.
I kind of was a little slower
than I should've been.
[Dominique] Three secret ingredients!
And I'm like,
you really have to think so fast.
-[Marcus] It's gonna be amazing.
-Right?
Medieval is all about soft food.
-[Gabriela] Tamal is very soft.
-[Marcus] Yes.
[Gabriela] That flan was out of control.
Yeah. I think it's gonna work.
No, it's definitely gonna work.
Our flavors are so much better
than theirs, I can guarantee you.
-I love that.
-All right.
[heavenly choral music plays,
dramatic drum beats]
Judges, welcome to the table
that's named after you.
This has been a pretty epic battle
and it's time for us
to get medieval on the offerings.
So remember, you are judging
on taste, presentation,
and use of the secret ingredient.
You have 100 points to play with
for each team's offerings.
Let's start with Iron Chef Crenn
and Iron Chef Stone.
-[Nilou] Hello.
-[Andrew] Evening.
[Nilou] Oh!
Ooh.
[Justin] Thank you.
-[Kristen] Thank you.
-Pleasure.
Greetings, Iron Chef Crenn,
Iron Chef Stone.
Before you describe this fascinating dish,
give us some insight
into your general approach
to the medieval challenge.
Well, it's an exciting challenge.
The medieval times
was a time of entertainment,
a time of surprise at the dinner table,
but it was also an interesting time
in terms of classes.
Right? There was the regal dinner parties
that were thrown,
and then there was also
people less fortunate
that were out foraging for their food.
We're trying to show a few
of those different classes in our feast.
You'll see what people may have found,
wild mushrooms growing amongst logs
and some foliage,
and what I've tried to do
is recreate the center of the table
in an edible form.
The log is actually a parsnip crisp.
The soil is made up of a sunchoke crumble.
The mushrooms have been cooked
with a little garlic and shallots.
There's a porcini puree.
I do feel like I'm foraging,
because I kind of keep on
wanting to find the perfect bite.
You have all that creaminess
from the puree
that has a strong porcini flavor,
and then you get hits of acid
from the chanterelles.
You have really given us
a piece of art here.
Thank you, Nilou.
I wasn't alive during medieval times
like Andrew,
but it takes me to my Missouri summers
as a kid where I would go forage.
I would, not even knowing,
just figure out what leaves I could eat.
It really is a work of art.
-Thank you very much.
-Thank you.
There's a chips and dip aspect to this
that is really whimsical.
It never loses sight of the fact
that we're eating mushrooms.
It is absolutely glorious.
Iron Chefs, thank you.
We look forward to the next course.
Thank you so much.
I'm staring at this thing, trying to think
of what I would do differently,
and I'm just like, "Wow."
-When you start out up here
-[Nilou] Mmm!
my God, where are we gonna go?
-Oh là là là là là là.
-Oh my God.
That's called making an entrance,
I believe.
-[Nilou gasps]
-Ooh!
It's drama.
We call this the Hunter's Soup.
We make a stock with quail,
and then reduce that down
with a little bit of cider,
cook down the mushroom.
We have a little bit
of different mushroom in it.
We have porcini, we have girolle.
Nilou, what do you think?
You've developed so much flavor.
The mushrooms are smoky and woody,
and you obviously have
all of that delicious game-bird flavor,
and two of the very key ingredients.
And it just feels like
somebody who loves me made it for me.
-I love you!
-I hope I'm not overstepping.
-I hope I'm not overstepping.
-No, it's great. Thank you.
The stock, the cider, the cream,
the mushroom broth.
I mean It
I I am truly speechless
at the quality of what's underneath.
The puff pastry itself
is buttery, crunchy,
it's like the best crouton for a soup.
It's exquisite.
Thank you.
I didn't know it was possible
to progress from that.
Now I'm really wondering
where you're going with the next one.
When you said you can tell
that this was made with love, like,
like, really, it's like a hug.
You can tell when you just look at it.
You're like, "This is special."
-Iron Chefs, thank you very much.
-[Dominique] Thank you.
What we've seen thus far
is really beautiful execution.
Mm-hmm.
But we're halfway through the menu,
and we don't have,
like, a dramatic meat dish.
Two dishes to go.
-[Justin] Oh, hello.
-[Nilou] Ooh!
Thank you.
God, does that smell good
with the herbs on the
[Justin] Thank you. Mm!
-Chef Stone, I believe this was yours.
-It is.
Tell your tale.
[Curtis] This is game-bird pie.
Inside you'll find the liver
of the pigeon,
as well as the breast and some more leg,
and I've made pie dough.
Mm!
Chef Stone, what happened with your crust?
We were watching you struggle with it.
[Curtis] I did this one
with a 50-50 ratio of duck fat and butter,
and the duck fat had gotten too warm,
but I think the flavor
is really wonderful.
I have to tell you,
I thought, "That's not gonna work."
I was dead wrong.
I like that soft crumble.
Almost delicate shortbready quality
because of the duck fat.
[Nilou] Mm!
The filling is absolutely exquisite,
seasoned beautifully.
The gravy is fantastic.
You know, a little more liver,
throw in some vegetable,
something else in there
to crunch or something.
It's a minor quibble.
Very nicely done, Chef.
Thank you so much.
This little guy
was among the highlights for me,
even though I love
what was inside of the pie.
I love gamey taste,
and so this really
represents it beautifully.
That said, I do wonder
if there was a moment
besides this little bone
where we could've had
a little bit of meat drama.
[Curtis] Mm.
I had never had squab or pigeon,
because for 20 years of my life,
as, like, a kid magician,
I used pigeons and doves.
-They were like my friends.
-Mm!
But enough time has passed
that I feel like it was time for me to
Let's eat one,
and I feel like we did it up right.
Like, this could be my last squab,
and I will die a happy man.
-Aww.
-[Dominique] Wow.
-[Nilou] That is nice.
-That is nice.
Thank you.
Iron Chefs, thank you.
We look forward to your final course.
[Nilou] Thank you.
-[Nilou] Wow.
-[Andrew] Mm.
There's your flagon.
-Chef Crenn.
-Oui.
Please explain.
[Dominique] So the third
mysterious ingredient was grapes,
so we wanted to bring back the idea
of they were making wine,
and the grapes and the fire,
and the smokiness.
We poached the grape inside of the wine
with cinnamon, orange juice,
and grilled them.
And we want you to eat with your hand.
-Are you saying like this?
-[Andrew] Yes.
Like this.
I love grilled fruit, but this is one
of my new favorite combinations.
With the sourness of the crème fraîche
and that little drizzle of honey,
it's just perfect.
And I do like the fun of doing this
if I wasn't so afraid of dripping
all over myself. Gorgeous.
I almost wanted the clusters of grapes
to be a little bit higher off the flame
so that there wasn't quite as much char
on some of them.
That said, when you do
get a perfect grape,
it creates this incredible
explosion of grape in your mouth.
-And that is pretty joyful.
-Thank you.
I love the char. I love the mulled wine.
I would love to see Andrew
serve Nilou a grape in the proper fashion.
-Oh my Lord.
-[Justin] To cap this meal off.
I am mad about this, but
Oh.
Thank you, Andrew.
-That's sexy.
-[Nilou] Thank you, Chef.
And now, Andrew.
-[all chuckle]
-[Nilou] Oh.
Too much. Too much!
Iron Chefs, thank you
for an outstanding meal.
-Thank you very much.
-Thank you.
Thank you.
Next up, Iron Chef Samuelsson,
Iron Chef Cámara.
[Gabriela] Okay! Good evening.
-[Justin] Good evening.
-Hi!
[Andrew] Ohhh!
Ooh, I have been waiting
for this for a minute.
[Alton] Iron Chef Cámara,
Iron Chef Samuelsson,
please give us some idea of how
you approached the medieval challenge
as a team.
So we approached medieval
through our lens and our history.
Africa, Italy, the Nordics, and Americas.
[Gabriela] In front of you, a quail tamal.
While thinking of medieval,
I needed to make something with corn.
-Mm.
-This has bones.
-[Nilou] Mm!
-The quail is cooked in there.
-There's a leg, a quail leg.
-Oh!
And the breast.
Chef Cámara, I mean, I'm obsessed
with what you do with masa.
The achiote is beautiful.
The flavor balance that the tomatillo
gives you, the brightness.
This is a perfect starter
to what I know is going to be
an unexpected series of dishes
from you both, so I'm very excited.
And there will be bones.
There will be bones!
[all laugh]
-Mmm!
-Because bones is where the flavor is.
The challenge is medieval,
and I recognize this.
-This is gorgeous.
-[Gabriela] Thank you.
-Bravo.
-Thank you.
When it was clear we would get a tamale,
I mean, he was giddy
like Springsteen
was playing "Born to Run."
You know, it was like, "Oh!" Bravo indeed.
-Thank you.
-Chefs, thank you for the first course.
We look forward to the next.
-Okay.
-[Nilou] Thank you.
The corn flavor is so intense,
and it's not over-seasoned.
There wasn't too much of the salsa.
There wasn't too much of the game bird.
That course was really, really yummy.
I was very happy. Very happy.
[Gabriela] Hi!
[Marcus] If you can,
start eating right away.
-If we can.
-Oh.
-[Gabriela] Comin' in hot.
-You don't have to worry about me, Chef.
Chef Samuelsson,
please tell us what you made for us.
Yeah, medieval, the crew,
they were the OG partiers,
but also the big surf-and-turf guys.
There was fish and meat
served at the same time.
So you have coffee-and-honey-seared squab
with a liver flan and fire-roasted tuna.
From a texture standpoint,
the insane crunch of the caramelized honey
and coffee on the fried bone
is a beautiful expression of who you are.
-I I want a pile of these.
-[Nilou] Yeah.
There's nothing better than the bone
that has a little meat on it.
Really beautiful to see you
blend your story in here with medieval
I think was also very important.
-Gorgeous food.
-Thank you very much.
This pudding-flan-liver moment
tastes like my dream chicken-liver mousse,
and then the perfect sear on squab.
-A resounding yes.
-Thank you.
When you think medieval feast
you think of excess.
And not always. It's about decadence,
and I feel like this was
that perfect expression of less is more.
I loved the crunch of this squab bone.
It was It was just perfect. It was great.
-Great.
-Iron Chefs, thank you very much.
Thank you!
What he's doing here
is the minimal Scandinavian presentation
of what he imagines
a period in time to be,
and I think it was very compelling.
Yeah.
Oooh.
-Oh-ho!
-[Gabriela] A feast.
Ooh là là.Oh, thank you.
-[Gabriela] Here we are again.
-Yes, welcome to
The mushroom feast.
[Marcus] The dish you have in front of you
is roasted king trumpet mushrooms,
shiitake, and scallop,
finished off with cracked wheat,
young coconut, truffle sauce.
It's just a celebration of mushrooms.
Iron Chefs,
it's a celebration of mushrooms,
but I think it's the texture
of the mushroom
somehow making the coconut
and the scallop together
like this little family,
reminding you what they have in common.
It was fantastic.
What joins it together for me
is the scallop,
because oceanic flavors,
I think, marry really well
with the woodsiness of the mushrooms,
always have
Yeah. Well, that's a sort of a classic.
There is so much amazing flavor
on this plate.
Feels, like, really autumnal,
the mead that you've infused this with
is really beautiful.
That, to, me is pure Iron Chef
Kitchen Stadium magic.
I wanna keep on eating this, for sure.
Thank you.
We look forward to your final course.
-Thank you.
-Thank you.
If you were not in a competition,
you didn't know it was medieval-themed,
you might not know
this was medieval themed
-That's exactly
-The other team
-Well, they really nailed that.
-It was very medieval presentation.
But this was definitely unique
and beautiful. Yeah, gorgeous.
-[Nilou] Oh!
-[Kristen] Thank you.
[Nilou] Ah!
[Justin] The grapes.
So this is our interpretation of medieval
-Yes.
-Europe.
This is fire-roasted grapes
with Gorgonzola and mascarpone cheese.
This is sort of an homage
to my grandmother.
She's Italian. She's from Florence.
We had the mascarpone
and the Gorgonzola cheese,
and I remember she was always making a dip
that we ate with grapes, so this is it.
So interesting to see across two kitchens
the idea of fire-roasted grapes
and how differently
the dishes were executed.
What I am really responding to
is the salinity of the cheese
that you've introduced.
-It almost feels like a cheese course.
-Yup.
It does have a panforte.
Very Italian feeling. I loved.
I love it. Superb, and it obviously
ties together with the blue-vein cheese.
Bravo, and, like you,
I just love cooked grapes.
The delicate nature
that these grapes were cooked,
the care that
You know, they're cooked so evenly
and they're so warm inside,
like a little burst.
I mean, it's really fantastic.
Iron Chefs, thank you
for a spectacular meal.
-We had a blast
-[Andrew] Thank you so much.
-We had so much fun.
-[Nilou] Great job, great job.
-Hope it showed in the food. We had fun.
-It did. Gorgeous.
Damn! So interesting,
a white dairy with roasted grapes,
but a very different experience.
Two great minds
sort of hit on the same basic idea.
-We could talk all night long.
-[Nilou] We could.
But you go off to your table
and do what you know you gotta do,
and Kristen and I will get ready
to do what we gotta do.
Thank you, both of you.
[Alton] Will it be
Iron Chef Stone and Crenn's European take
on a medieval menu
or Iron Chef Cámara and Samuelsson's
global view on The Chairman's challenge?
True culinary nobility
duked it out tonight,
but a winning team must still be crowned.
Sire?
This was an Iron Battle
of culinary warriors.
You took us back to medieval times
and valiantly fought with flavor and fire!
But only one Iron Chef team
reigns supreme,
and that winning team is
Iron Chefs
Cámara and Samuelsson!
[cheering and applause]
[Marcus mumbles]
-[Gabriela mumbles]
-[Marcus] I love you.
[Gabriela] You too.
-[Curtis] Congrats.
-[Marcus] Thank you.
Well, food fans, there you have it.
Our Iron Chefs have met in brave combat,
and Iron Chef Cámara
and Iron Chef Samuelsson
have vanquished their opponents
in this medieval Iron Battle,
but only by a slightest of margins.
The judges scoring it 85 points to 84.
[Kristen] From Iron Chefs
Cámara and Samuelsson,
we truly saw an unexpected take
interpretation of the medieval theme.
[Alton] Ultimately, the judges felt
it was a bolder, riskier approach
to the secret ingredients.
This tag team of titans was a triumph.
Gosh, that's a lot of Ts,
but the quest for an Iron Legend
shall continue in the next battle.
So thank you, yonder patrons,
for watchingIron Chef.
I'm Alton Brown, a lowly page.
And I'm Lady Kristen Kish.
And we are proclaiming adieu for now.
[closing theme music plays]
[men chant]Yah ♪
[drum beats]
Rah ♪
[plays long note]
Yah ♪
I have blown the bugle of battle!
Rah ♪
[cheering and applause]
Hear ye, hear ye!
I'm, uh, Alton Brown, a mere page,
and my Lord, The Chairman,
has decreed that this arena
is hereby open for battle.
And I'm Lady Kristen Kish,
and soon brave combatants
will clash here in Kitchen Stadium.
Now, look, yonder cometh The Chairman.
I am the king of this kitchen,
and I decree
there shall be no challenger today.
The Chairman requires a battle
amongst his Iron Chefs
to further test and assess their skills
with a battle of epic proportion
as teams!
[Alton] Wow. Um, so an unexpected twist.
The Chairman has
summoned only his Iron Chefs today
for an extra-special battle.
First up, it will be
Iron Chefs Dominique Crenn
and Iron Chef Curtis Stone!
[cheering and applause]
Being an Iron Chef,
your food really has to speak for itself.
I grew up cooking in French restaurants,
so my style of cooking is very European.
I've worked in some of the best kitchens
in the world, so
I'm not easily intimidated.
Atelier Crenn is my restaurant
in San Francisco.
This is where I share with the world
the beauty of cooking.
I am the first female in the United States
who's received three Michelin stars.
So make no mistake, I'm here to win.
[dramatic music plays, audience cheers]
Versus Iron Chefs Gabriela Cámara
and Marcus Samuelsson.
My career has been defined
by farm-to-table Mexican food
using extraordinary produce.
I have opened 15 restaurants
around the world.
I'm excited to be competing
against two other Iron Chefs.
Competitiveness is what makes you
do things well.
Who doesn't love winning?
I'm chef-owner of Red Rooster Harlem,
and I've opened restaurants
all over the world.
My culinary style is very unique to me.
Being Swede-iopian means Nordic techniques
with African ingredients.
No one does what I do,
and I know I'm not
going to let The Chairman down.
Four Iron Chefs stand before me.
Two unbeatable teams.
Let us prepare for the biggest battle
this kitchen has ever seen.
I hope you are prepared to go back in time
to the origins of culinary combat.
For this battle, we will feast in
medieval times!
-What?!
-Oh!
Your medieval menu
must feature three secret ingredients,
but there are a labyrinth of surprises
in store for this battle.
Because you are all Iron Chefs,
you will not learn
of all the secret ingredients at once.
[chuckles]
The first secret ingredient
for you to get medieval with is
game birds!
The two additional secret ingredients
I will bestow unto thee during battle,
when the time is ripe.
Iron Chefs,
you will have just 60 minutes
to make an extravagant medieval menu,
a feast to be remembered!
Each Iron Chef team
will prepare four dishes
highlighting our secret ingredients.
Okay.
So now with an open heart
and empty stomach,
I say unto you in the words of my uncle
[plays long note]
Allez cuisine!
[Alton] And Battle Medieval is on
here in Kitchen Stadium,
and four Iron Chefs run for their fowl.
[Gabriela] What do we do? Where do
[Alton] Lot of birds consumed
during the medieval period.
[Kristen] Game birds
are one of those things
that really does test
the quality and the skill of the chef,
because it's not like
cooking a big rib eye.
They are very delicate in flavor
Because there's no fat in them.
No intramuscular fat.
[Kristen] You have to balance
with other ingredients.
-[Marcus] Nice squab.
-[Alton] We got squab.
-[Alton] Basically baby pigeons.
-[Curtis] I'll get you some pigeon.
[Alton] We have quail.
Whoa!
[Alton] I believe
I see a goose up there,
and I think that we have
got a couple of turkeys.
[Gabriela] Shoo! Shoo! [chuckles]
Okay, so maybe I'm gonna
In medieval time they ate a lot of pies.
Yeah.
Maybe I'll make a pie,
with the squab maybe?
-[Gabriela] Ready?
-Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[Alton] Looking around,
nobody came down with a turkey.
We've got squab and quail
on both sides of the kitchen.
-I'm gonna butcher the quail
-Yeah.
just so that the meat is clean,
I'm gonna marinate it, make a tamal.
-Tamal, nice!
-Yeah.
So medieval was always
about, like, a show.
We're gonna have
a lot of things happening.
[Marcus] We're gonna do the squab.
I'm gonna butcher that.
I'm gonna take out the liver.
Medieval is all about soft food, right?
They didn't want to use their teeth,
because they were bad.
Okay, we need
to do something with the bone,
make a stock with quail,
and then just layering flavors.
Then we see
what the other ingredients are.
We don't know what the other
Okay, let's get a start right now.
Yeah, we do. You start the stock.
-I'll make the pie dough.
-Yeah.
[Curtis] Let's go!Allez, allez!
Before things get all medieval
in this kitchen,
let's say hello to our own lords
and ladies of judging,
Nilou Motamed, Andrew Zimmern
and our special guest judge,
master of magic, comedian and host,
Justin Willman.
[Kristen chuckles]
[Alton] Ah. Okay. So thank you, judges.
-I have port wine for you here.
-Thank you, Chef.
[Alton] Chef Cámara breaking down
I thought that was squab. It's not.
it's a little quail, isn't it? Quail are
a little bit smaller than pigeons.
Of course, their meat's not as red.
All right, the Iron Chefs
are going to be busy today
cooking without any sous-chefs.
Each team must work together
to get everything done in time.
Knowing these chefs,
what do you think we're gonna see?
Over on Iron Chef Stone
and Iron Chef Crenn's side,
I imagine we're gonna see
very heavy French technique.
Then on Iron Chef Samuelsson
and Cámara's side,
their food will span the globe.
Iron Chef Samuelsson's Swedish background
has medieval influences,
but I'm curious to see
if he'll incorporate anything medieval
from Ethiopia.
Yes, and I really wanna
see medieval Mexico.
Iron Chef Cámara's mostly
focusing on quail.
She is so well known for tortillas,
for masa preparations, for tamals.
I'll be really surprised
if we don't see something like that.
All right, Iron Chef Stone
at this very moment,
that looks like squab being taken apart.
Squab is a fancy word for "pigeon"?
-Yes, it is. Yes.
-Same thing.
-Yes.
-It's a branding shift.
"Just us pigeons."
-"You don't wanna eat us."
-Exactly.
I'm a big fan of pigeon.
You know, it has similarities
to dark chicken meat,
but with an earthier, gamier flavor.
Currently over on the Stone-Crenn
side of the world,
Iron Chef Stone sautéing pigeon
or squab breasts.
Iron Chef, what is that going to become?
Back in medieval time,
they ate lot of pies.
I've always loved eating it.
I love cooking it.
It's a delicious thing. Why not?
I can confit the legs,
pan-roast the breasts.
I wanna get a nice amount of color
on the skin.
I'm gonna cook 'em
nearly the whole way through that way,
make the dough, rest of the dough,
make the mix, line the pastry.
Normally a pie would take
two and a half hours start to finish.
We don't have a lot of time,
but I'm very fast, so you just never know.
Chef Crenn, if I roast some spices,
do you think you'd have time to grind it?
Yeah. Look at that, baby.
Can you hear singing the bird?
Iron Chef Crenn, she is cocky and spicy.
-Isn't she, though?
-Both.
Because she's arguably
the best chef in the world today.
No question.
Ah, this is so good!
Iron Chef Crenn loves
to play on senses and theatrics.
[Alton] Right now,
she's got a lot of something bubbly.
We'll call it Champagne. She's French.
It's not Champagne. That's cider.
[Alton] Not Champagne. It was apple cider.
Looking down into that pot,
that's got a bunch of the quail in it.
Looks like part of an apple.
It looks like a bird stock, with quail.
Ah, this is so good!
Clearly this would have been,
in actual medieval times,
we're cooking for rich folks here,
because the poor did not get fresh meat.
They got offal, they got leftovers.
But Iron Chef Samuelsson
has, I believe, some livers.
[Alton] Ah, okay. Look at that.
All of that liver and all of that butter
together in one place
over there, marinating,
I'm going to guess, pâté, right?
I'm going to make a squab
and chicken-liver mousse.
During the medieval time,
it was all about soft food,
and this is an opportunity to do that.
Interesting. Let's see what else
he's gonna do with the squab.
[Kristen] I see some squab legs
cooking in their own fat.
We're just gonna
confit a little bit of squab.
-[Kristen] Confit squab leg.
-[Alton] How can he do that in this time?
-It takes three days to do that.
-Well, they're little baby legs.
Confit and the method
of cooking meat in fat.
-Which is called fat poaching.
-Fat
Confiting would require
curing in salt and herbs.
-You have to take out the moisture.
-Call it confit if you want.
[Kristen] Then go tell him that.
[Alton] No. He does whatever he wants.
-How are you doing, Marcus?
-[Marcus] Doing good, Chef.
-I think it's a good fit, you know?
-[Gabriela] Yes!
I am making a quail tamal.
Quail is good for it,
because the meat is gonna be very tender.
You don't necessarily think of Africa
or America when you think of medieval,
and I just wanna make sure
that I highlight a little bit
of my Mexican culture, as usual.
This is from the Mayan culture
in the south of Mexico.
Okay. Use the achiote.
[Alton] And now she is taking
a little bit of achiote paste,
a light, nutty flavor.
[Gabriela] It's a paste
that comes from a seed
that I am very fond of.
[Alton] And citrus is being added.
[Dominique] How we doing here?
We are doing a tamal. I'm making a tamal.
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah,
so you need that cut right?
Oh, thank you! Isn't she lovely?
Hey, you're on my team, Dominique!
Leave them alone.
-[Dominique] Just trying to help.
-Thank you!
[Alton] Iron Chef Crenn
went for a visit, on walkabout.
Stay on your side, Chef!
What are you doing?
She's so sure of her game
that she can help me.
[Alton] So Iron Chef Cámara,
she added her quail to that achiote paste.
Oh. Let's see what The Chairman
has brought to bear.
[plays bugle]
What's going on?
Behold, it is time to learn
of thy second secret ingredient.
Mushrooms!
Mushrooms?
Oh my goodness.
Ohhh! That is great.
Each Iron Chef team will have to feature
magnificent medieval mushrooms
in their menu!
[Curtis] Oh my goodness.
Yes, I love mushrooms!
Chef, get the porcini, get the porcini!
[Alton] Of course, during medieval times,
a lot of mushrooms were consumed,
but half of the people that ate them died.
-[Gabriela] What do we get?
-Trumpets.
-Yeah.
-Okay.
Okay, let's go.
-Trumpets, and then what else?
-Get some porcini!
[Kristen] Chef Samuelsson
went for one of absolute my favorites,
the king trumpet.
[Curtis] You're so greedy!
You're so greedy.
-You took everything.
-You can get some.
[Dominique]Allez!
[Alton] I see the biggest matsutakes
I've ever seen.
[Kristen] Those are amazing.
Mushrooms will go here.
Look at this beautiful deer. More porcini.
[Alton] Chef Cámara
has the matsutakes there,
some oysters, shiitakes,
and more of the king trumpets.
On the Crenn side,
we've got the chanterelles,
we've got shiitakes,
king trumpets are over there as well.
[Kristen] Mushrooms you just rattled off
are low in moisture content,
which will yield
a more concentrated caramelized flavor
without too many other steps.
[Alton] We're gonna probably see
a lot of sautéing, broths.
[Curtis] I have to think of another dish.
Chef, what if I do, like
I'm gonna do a dish in your honor.
-Medieval France.
-Whoo!
-The forest floor.
-Yes, yes, I love that!
Hey, I'm going to do medieval France
with Paul Bocuse in mind.
-Ooh!
-What do you think about this?
[Alton] Great idea, Iron Chef.
Paul Bocuse, of course,
one of the most prominent French chefs.
[Kristen] Maybe she'll make
one of Paul Bocuse's soups.
Mushroom, quail stock.
[Alton] Yes.
-[Gabriela] Marcus?
-Yes.
What do you think of doing
something with mushrooms and seafood?
-I love that.
-Just like the hint of seafood. Right?
-What do you want?
-Trumpet.
Let's do something with scallop.
-Did you see nice scallops
-Yeah.
-In the pantry? Perfect.
-Scallops. There's seafood there.
-Yeah.
-Mm, lovely.
[Dominique] Mm! Mm!
[Alton] So, we've still got
one secret ingredient left
from The Chairman.
Remember, each team of Iron Chefs
must prepare four courses
andincorporate
every secret ingredient at least once.
Iron Chef Samuelsson and Cámara
have three courses in play,
two with game birds
and mushrooms with scallops.
This is the base of the pie.
Get my stock in there.
Iron Chefs Crenn and Stone
have a game-bird pie in progress.
Iron Chef Stone
making pie dough of some type.
He's got a mixture of goose fat
and flour have gone in there.
[Curtis] Okay.
[Alton] We've got dough.
It's being rolled out by Iron Chef Crenn.
I think that's puff pastry.
[Dominique in exaggerated French accent]
La puff pastry!
[Alton] The dough gives it away.
She has to be making
Paul Bocuse's famous truffle soup
where puff pastry is baked
on top of the serving vessel.
What are you working on, first of all?
'Cause I see eight different
You know, in medieval time,
they would like pie.
And you know what?
Bocuse, kind of like,
you know when you do that puff pastry?
-Yeah.
-He didn't invent that.
They were doing that in medieval time.
That's what I'm gonna do.
[Kristen] All right. Thank you.
It's very French.
I gotta make my country proud, you know?
[Alton] Yes, so over
on Iron Chef Crenn's workstation,
a very large cast-iron pan
loaded full of various types of mushrooms.
She's gonna make a soup
out of that and the quail stock.
Yeah, I see you.
Is that just a truffle
hanging outta your mouth? [laughs]
I just felt medieval.
[Alton] Okay!
Over on Iron Chef Cámara's side,
she's gonna make tamales.
She's got the masa over there,
that's in a stand mixer. Very medieval!
In fact, some historians say
steamed corn preparations
have been around
for more than 10,000 years.
[Gabriela] Okay.
[Alton] She's got
the marinating pieces of quail.
Um, now she's got the banana leaf out.
Something to steam it in.
[Kristen] Iron Chef Samuelsson
has Ethiopian green coffee.
It's not roasted,
so it's lighter in color.
[Alton] Not something I would've
imagined for a medieval battle.
Iron Chef Samuelsson, what are you using
the coffee beans for?
I'm roasting Ethiopian coffee.
One of the oldest things of value.
-I'm gonna make a vinaigrette
-[Kristen] A vinaigrette.
with my squab dish.
[Alton] There's also some cracked wheat
that he has added some oil to and stock.
Maybe that's gonna go with mushrooms,
which, by the way,
is very true to the theme.
A lot of grains in medieval food.
[Kristen] Iron Chef Stone,
I saw him working a blond roux.
That roux is equal parts fat and flour,
usually used to thicken something.
[Alton] It's got to be
the filling for his pie.
[Kristen] I'm gonna go find out.
-Iron Chef Stone?
-Oui.
-Is this a filling?
-This is the beginning of a pie.
I love medieval.
You know, I'm quite a Neanderthal.
I mean, look at me. You can tell, right?
So, the whole idea of doing
something very primal and primitive,
it's how I like to cook anyway.
Okay, great pie. Look at this.
-Ah!
-[Kristen chuckles]
[Dominique] So good!
[Kristen] Approved.
She is one of the most unbelievable chefs
I've ever worked with.
We're gonna have each other's back
the whole way through.
-Thank you.
-You got it.
[Alton] We can see Iron Chef Samuelsson.
He's working with so many components
for his squab course.
Um, there's a lot of squab in a pan,
what appears to be its legs.
He's gonna be roasting those,
and also confiting squab in herbs.
Let's see, we also see a blender.
He's working,
adding that liver mousse mixture,
and it's also, I think, got some port wine
and a fair amount of shallot.
There's also a little bit of quail leg
going into it.
A port-wine mead.
Very medieval ingredients in here.
[Alton] The mead, of course,
is basically hooch made out of honey.
Can be delicious, but man, the headache.
Iron Chef Stone
just flamed some livers there.
He just flamed mead.
It's pretty interesting
that we do have liver and mead
on both sides of the kitchen.
They used a lot of wine in medieval time.
[Alton] That's true. Okay.
Back over to Iron Chef Samuelsson.
The liver mixture that he made earlier,
the liver, and all of that butter
going into small little buttered tins.
I would bet
that they're going to bake those
and call it a liver flan instead,
since a flan is baked and a mousse is not.
All right, we can see Iron Chef Cámara.
Right now, she's using the heat
from the range
to just loosen up her banana leaves
so she will be able to wrap
her masa and quail filling inside them.
I gotta keep up with my tamales
because I'm a little bit late.
[Alton] Making tamales is time-consuming.
If those banana leaves
aren't the right texture,
her tamale will fall apart when it cooks.
Back over, Iron Chef Crenn
is working with a lot of mushrooms.
Rosemary has been
added to the sautéing mushrooms,
kind of a mélange of mushrooms.
That's for the soup.
[Dominique]Ouah!
Yes, baby. Whoo! How are you doing?
All I'm focusing on right now
is exactly what's in front of me.
-[Alton] Chef Stone, what are you cutting?
-These are those beautiful porcinis.
I'm gonna go ahead and cook 'em in butter,
get 'em nice and brown,
my current plan.
Doing a bit of a re-creation
of the French landscape in medieval times.
A lot of people were foraging.
[Alton] So Iron Chef Stone
is going to turn his mushrooms
into a medieval scene.
I look forward to seeing that.
Back over Oh, our Chairman
-[plays bugle]
-[Dominique whoops] What's going on?
Oh my goodness.
At last, it is time
to learn the third secret ingredient
to work into thy menus.
Grapes!
Grapes.
Okay, I'm gonna go get them.
-Whoo!
-A fruit fit for royalty!
Make grapes great!
Whoo! There was grape on the floor, Chef.
How 'bout I just take these?
[Alton] At this point in the battle,
they better think fast
if they're going
to get a grape dish done in time.
We've got the red seedless,
green seedless,
some I think called black beauties,
which is a dark-skinned-seedless hybrid,
and concord grapes.
Speaking of grapes,
Iron Chef Crenn with a pinot noir.
[Curtis] Nice job, Chef.
[Dominique] I got some red grape seedless.
Very sweet.
I think they are the best right now.
[Alton] In the pinot noir,
maybe they're cooking those.
Do we want medieval? I'm gonna
poach them in red wine right now.
[Curtis] Right.
Then what should I do?
I'm gonna grill them. Do a honey butter.
-Chef, what do you say we grill grapes
-That would be amazing.
-as we have that grill.
-I love grilled grapes.
-I love.
-How are you coming along?
-I'm good.
-Good.
[Alton] Grilled grapes on both sides
of Kitchen Stadium.
I love when that happens,
because then you get to compare.
We've got a beautiful shot
from our overhead
on the Iron Chefs Stone-Crenn side.
Looking down
into that binchotan charcoal.
Japanese-style charcoal,
burns hot and even.
Look at those, baby. Come on, baby.
[Alton] We can see
that she dipped those grapes
into basically a pinot sauce.
[Kristen] And the honey butter.
She's brushing those grapes.
She's basting them in a honey butter
to really caramelize
and completely char the outside.
[Alton] Could be for a dessert.
Somebody needs to think about dessert.
[Kristen] Chef Cámara has a similar idea,
also quickly grilling grapes.
I can see mascarpone and Gorgonzola
there as well.
And she's being more careful
with her grapes
while Iron Chef Crenn is charring hers.
She must wanna add texture
and intensify the grape flavor.
[Alton] Okay, it looks like
Iron Chef Samuelsson
grabbed trumpet royales,
the king trumpets.
[Marcus] King mushrooms and shiitakes.
Flavor-wise, you know, they're very meaty.
I'm gonna marinate them
so I can roast them up.
[Kristen] You can use those raw,
confit them, roast them, uh, braise.
They can take up
any kind of cooking technique.
One of the things
people don't talk about with mushrooms,
they're almost impossible to overcook.
Now I'm gonna turn back over
to Iron Chef Stone's board.
We've got the dough.
Okay, Chef Stone is sweating a tiny bit.
Hey, Chef Curtis,
how is the dough coming along?
-Do you want me to be honest, Chef?
-Oui.
I messed it up.
Iron Chef Stone with his pie dough.
It looks soft from here.
Probably too much fat.
And all fat could be tricky to work with.
I'm kinda worried about that game pie.
What a mess. What a mess!
It's a dough-over.
A dough-over!
Ohhh!
[chuckles]
I like it, I like it.
I'll take it. I love a challenge.
If he is going to make a pie, he's gonna
have to get it into an oven soon.
Looks like he's just gonna let that rest
and firm up a little bit more.
There's a lot still to happen here
in this medieval battle.
Just to catch you up, Chairman has now
unleashed three secret ingredients.
Game birds,
then we've got a wide range of mushrooms.
Now, finally,
the third secret ingredient, grapes.
And they must incorporate
every secret ingredient at least once.
So we've sorted out all the dishes
they've been making, right?
[Alton] Yes. Iron Chef Stone,
I'm certain he's making a game-bird pie,
using squab breast, leg and liver.
Iron Chef Crenn is making
a classic French mushroom soup.
Iron Chef Stone also what he's calling
a wild-mushroom forest floor.
And Iron Chef Crenn
is making poached and charred grapes
with honey butter.
Gabriela, can you shave me some truffles?
Yes, of course.
Other side of Kitchen Stadium,
Iron Chef Cámara making a tamale
with achiote-marinated quail,
and then, of course,
Iron Chef Samuelsson is making
one game-bird course, roasted squab,
and one mushroom course,
mushrooms with scallops.
And also Iron Chef Cámara,
she's grilling the grapes
that could be for her dessert.
Take a look. We have got blue masa,
has gone down on top of the banana leaf,
and that achiote-marinated quail
is now being wrapped up.
-Chef Stone over on his back station.
-Oh, look at that pie.
I'm just making a couple of pies,
pigeon pies.
[Kristen] He didn't have time
to remake the dough
so he chilled it to get it firm enough
to be able to form the pie.
The dough is a little softer
than I'd like,
which is gonna mean
it's gonna to taste amazing
if it doesn't melt.
[Alton] He might have saved time,
but we'll see whether he ends up
with a proper medieval pie.
Iron Chef Samuelsson
working with a mixture,
some of the cooked cracked wheat
that he had earlier,
some truffle shavings.
Now he's opening up some coconut milk.
Coconut, truffle, cracked wheat.
A different approach. Interesting.
[Kristen] We have sunchokes
on Iron Chef Stone
[Alton] Yes. Mandolin now in the hands.
Don't do this at home, kids.
Use a hand guard.
Iron Chef Stone is a professional chef.
Doesn't have to.
Sunchokes come from the sunflower family.
It's almost like a starchy apple,
a little bit.
-Like a potato and apple
-[Alton] But with celery rubbed onto it.
And I like 'em fried.
[Kristen] I love them.
They're absolutely delicious.
[Alton] So those are definitely
going to become crisps.
I'm putting the puff pastry right now.
[Alton] Iron Chef Crenn, she's got
a beautiful soup tureen, antique.
It's probably 7000 years old.
She just added some of the mushrooms
that she cooked down
and some crème fraîche
topped with the puff pastry, striated.
There it goes.
-[Kristen] Look how beautiful that is.
-[Alton] That's in the oven.
Iron Chef Stone, now he's got a blender
that he's working with,
the porcinis
that he was working with earlier.
Now he's pouring a mixture.
What's in the foamer, Iron Chef?
Uh, porcini puree.
-Just puree?
-Yeah.
[Alton] Porcini puree.
That could be going
with his sunchoke and parsnip.
Don't know.
Okay, looking over on Iron Chef
Samuelsson's side of the world,
he's got What is that?
-Tuna.
-It's tuna.
-[Kristen] Why?
-[Alton] Because that's a medieval fish.
[Kristen] I'm gonna find out
what Chef Samuelsson's doing.
[Alton] Go.
-Iron Chef, we see toro.
-Yeah.
Wait, and scallops?
Yes. I don't know
if I had a plan for medieval.
I'm older than you,
but I wasn't around at that time.
You know?
But why not? This is delicious.
Medieval is all about
cooking on high heat and fire,
so we just burnt them a little bit.
-[Kristen] A surf and turf for the ages.
-Yes. That's how people ate.
-Surf-and-turf everything!
-Thank you, Chef.
[Alton] Iron Chef Stone's pie
is coming out of the oven right now.
It still looks good,
but we'll have to wait and see
if it's cooked all the way through.
Okay, plating happening
over on the Iron Chef Crenn-Stone side.
That is a whimsical arrangement.
I feel like that's actual bark.
It is Oh, the bark is bark.
[Kristen] Where did that soil come from?
From medieval time.
[Alton] Dirt from France
provided by The Chairman.
They're gonna build something
that is an amusement,
so it will be inedible.
My idea is
we put this in the middle of the table.
It looks like a foraging scene.
[Alton] Plating happening on both sides.
[Kristen] Iron Chef Samuelsson
is plating that toro and the squab
going with that mushroom sauce.
We also see on top
of that, uh, cracked-wheat mixture,
um, he's got the scallop
and some of that beautifully
sautéed mushroom on top.
[Marcus] Looks great.
[Gabriela] I'm doing
just a little of the mascarpone.
[Marcus] Yep.
[Alton] Over on the Iron Chef Stone-Crenn
side of the world,
Iron Chef Stone is taking so much care
to remove the outer skin
from these fried parsnips.
Now they fried the parsnips whole
to help remove the skins,
which is apparently all they're using.
Now they're frying the skins again,
to make tube-shaped bark
or little logs
for his forest-floor scene. Smart!
The plating happening fast and furious.
The grapes are down.
Let's plate like this. This is delicious.
-What do you want to do?
-I wanna do it like a soil.
Like a soil? Okay.
-Is that okay?
-Yeah.
[Alton] What's crumbled up,
that's the chokes that they fried up.
There comes the porcini puree.
And now they've made
a little hollow log out of parsnips.
It's a forest floor!
All right, there's Iron Chef Stone's pie.
Very rustic.
It'll come down to texture and taste
for the judges, I imagine.
The tureen is out.
Sixty seconds and it'll all be over,
except the eating and judging
and the winning and losing.
[Gabriela] There we go.
[Alton] The courses are, at this point,
Iron Chef Samuelsson and Cámara
have a tamal
with achiote-marinated quail,
and a tomatillo salsa.
[Gabriela] Little bit of sauce over?
-[Marcus] Great.
-[Gabriela] It's gonna be spicy.
[Alton] Okay, roasted mushrooms
with scallops and cracked wheat.
Coffee and honey-glazed squab
with the liver flan and fire-roasted tuna.
-[Marcus] Got the grapes?
-[Gabriela] Got the grapes.
[Alton] Also fire-roasted grapes
with Gorgonzola and mascarpone cheese.
-This looks medieval to me.
-Behind!
Coming up on the 30-second mark.
-Hurry up.
-[Dominique] Oh my God.
[Alton] Over on the Stone-Crenn
side of the world,
now their courses
are, okay, mushroom forest floor
with a parsnip crisp,
sunchoke crumble, and porcini puree.
[Curtis] So that's
the fully edible version of that.
[Alton] A classic French mushroom soup.
[Dominique] Curtis, let's get that out.
[Alton] A game-bird pie
using squab breast, leg, and liver.
-[Curtis] Confit leg, crispy leg on top.
-[Dominique] Yep.
[Alton] And poached and charred grapes
with honey butter.
Five, four, three, two, one,
and medieval battle is over
here in Kitchen Stadium.
A clash of Iron Chefs.
[Marcus] Good job.
Okay, that is joy. That is pure joy.
-[Gabriela] Look at that feast!
-Beautiful.
Look at that feast!
-[Marcus groans]
-[Dominique whoops]
Oh là là.
[Curtis] You were amazing.
I kind of was a little slower
than I should've been.
[Dominique] Three secret ingredients!
And I'm like,
you really have to think so fast.
-[Marcus] It's gonna be amazing.
-Right?
Medieval is all about soft food.
-[Gabriela] Tamal is very soft.
-[Marcus] Yes.
[Gabriela] That flan was out of control.
Yeah. I think it's gonna work.
No, it's definitely gonna work.
Our flavors are so much better
than theirs, I can guarantee you.
-I love that.
-All right.
[heavenly choral music plays,
dramatic drum beats]
Judges, welcome to the table
that's named after you.
This has been a pretty epic battle
and it's time for us
to get medieval on the offerings.
So remember, you are judging
on taste, presentation,
and use of the secret ingredient.
You have 100 points to play with
for each team's offerings.
Let's start with Iron Chef Crenn
and Iron Chef Stone.
-[Nilou] Hello.
-[Andrew] Evening.
[Nilou] Oh!
Ooh.
[Justin] Thank you.
-[Kristen] Thank you.
-Pleasure.
Greetings, Iron Chef Crenn,
Iron Chef Stone.
Before you describe this fascinating dish,
give us some insight
into your general approach
to the medieval challenge.
Well, it's an exciting challenge.
The medieval times
was a time of entertainment,
a time of surprise at the dinner table,
but it was also an interesting time
in terms of classes.
Right? There was the regal dinner parties
that were thrown,
and then there was also
people less fortunate
that were out foraging for their food.
We're trying to show a few
of those different classes in our feast.
You'll see what people may have found,
wild mushrooms growing amongst logs
and some foliage,
and what I've tried to do
is recreate the center of the table
in an edible form.
The log is actually a parsnip crisp.
The soil is made up of a sunchoke crumble.
The mushrooms have been cooked
with a little garlic and shallots.
There's a porcini puree.
I do feel like I'm foraging,
because I kind of keep on
wanting to find the perfect bite.
You have all that creaminess
from the puree
that has a strong porcini flavor,
and then you get hits of acid
from the chanterelles.
You have really given us
a piece of art here.
Thank you, Nilou.
I wasn't alive during medieval times
like Andrew,
but it takes me to my Missouri summers
as a kid where I would go forage.
I would, not even knowing,
just figure out what leaves I could eat.
It really is a work of art.
-Thank you very much.
-Thank you.
There's a chips and dip aspect to this
that is really whimsical.
It never loses sight of the fact
that we're eating mushrooms.
It is absolutely glorious.
Iron Chefs, thank you.
We look forward to the next course.
Thank you so much.
I'm staring at this thing, trying to think
of what I would do differently,
and I'm just like, "Wow."
-When you start out up here
-[Nilou] Mmm!
my God, where are we gonna go?
-Oh là là là là là là.
-Oh my God.
That's called making an entrance,
I believe.
-[Nilou gasps]
-Ooh!
It's drama.
We call this the Hunter's Soup.
We make a stock with quail,
and then reduce that down
with a little bit of cider,
cook down the mushroom.
We have a little bit
of different mushroom in it.
We have porcini, we have girolle.
Nilou, what do you think?
You've developed so much flavor.
The mushrooms are smoky and woody,
and you obviously have
all of that delicious game-bird flavor,
and two of the very key ingredients.
And it just feels like
somebody who loves me made it for me.
-I love you!
-I hope I'm not overstepping.
-I hope I'm not overstepping.
-No, it's great. Thank you.
The stock, the cider, the cream,
the mushroom broth.
I mean It
I I am truly speechless
at the quality of what's underneath.
The puff pastry itself
is buttery, crunchy,
it's like the best crouton for a soup.
It's exquisite.
Thank you.
I didn't know it was possible
to progress from that.
Now I'm really wondering
where you're going with the next one.
When you said you can tell
that this was made with love, like,
like, really, it's like a hug.
You can tell when you just look at it.
You're like, "This is special."
-Iron Chefs, thank you very much.
-[Dominique] Thank you.
What we've seen thus far
is really beautiful execution.
Mm-hmm.
But we're halfway through the menu,
and we don't have,
like, a dramatic meat dish.
Two dishes to go.
-[Justin] Oh, hello.
-[Nilou] Ooh!
Thank you.
God, does that smell good
with the herbs on the
[Justin] Thank you. Mm!
-Chef Stone, I believe this was yours.
-It is.
Tell your tale.
[Curtis] This is game-bird pie.
Inside you'll find the liver
of the pigeon,
as well as the breast and some more leg,
and I've made pie dough.
Mm!
Chef Stone, what happened with your crust?
We were watching you struggle with it.
[Curtis] I did this one
with a 50-50 ratio of duck fat and butter,
and the duck fat had gotten too warm,
but I think the flavor
is really wonderful.
I have to tell you,
I thought, "That's not gonna work."
I was dead wrong.
I like that soft crumble.
Almost delicate shortbready quality
because of the duck fat.
[Nilou] Mm!
The filling is absolutely exquisite,
seasoned beautifully.
The gravy is fantastic.
You know, a little more liver,
throw in some vegetable,
something else in there
to crunch or something.
It's a minor quibble.
Very nicely done, Chef.
Thank you so much.
This little guy
was among the highlights for me,
even though I love
what was inside of the pie.
I love gamey taste,
and so this really
represents it beautifully.
That said, I do wonder
if there was a moment
besides this little bone
where we could've had
a little bit of meat drama.
[Curtis] Mm.
I had never had squab or pigeon,
because for 20 years of my life,
as, like, a kid magician,
I used pigeons and doves.
-They were like my friends.
-Mm!
But enough time has passed
that I feel like it was time for me to
Let's eat one,
and I feel like we did it up right.
Like, this could be my last squab,
and I will die a happy man.
-Aww.
-[Dominique] Wow.
-[Nilou] That is nice.
-That is nice.
Thank you.
Iron Chefs, thank you.
We look forward to your final course.
[Nilou] Thank you.
-[Nilou] Wow.
-[Andrew] Mm.
There's your flagon.
-Chef Crenn.
-Oui.
Please explain.
[Dominique] So the third
mysterious ingredient was grapes,
so we wanted to bring back the idea
of they were making wine,
and the grapes and the fire,
and the smokiness.
We poached the grape inside of the wine
with cinnamon, orange juice,
and grilled them.
And we want you to eat with your hand.
-Are you saying like this?
-[Andrew] Yes.
Like this.
I love grilled fruit, but this is one
of my new favorite combinations.
With the sourness of the crème fraîche
and that little drizzle of honey,
it's just perfect.
And I do like the fun of doing this
if I wasn't so afraid of dripping
all over myself. Gorgeous.
I almost wanted the clusters of grapes
to be a little bit higher off the flame
so that there wasn't quite as much char
on some of them.
That said, when you do
get a perfect grape,
it creates this incredible
explosion of grape in your mouth.
-And that is pretty joyful.
-Thank you.
I love the char. I love the mulled wine.
I would love to see Andrew
serve Nilou a grape in the proper fashion.
-Oh my Lord.
-[Justin] To cap this meal off.
I am mad about this, but
Oh.
Thank you, Andrew.
-That's sexy.
-[Nilou] Thank you, Chef.
And now, Andrew.
-[all chuckle]
-[Nilou] Oh.
Too much. Too much!
Iron Chefs, thank you
for an outstanding meal.
-Thank you very much.
-Thank you.
Thank you.
Next up, Iron Chef Samuelsson,
Iron Chef Cámara.
[Gabriela] Okay! Good evening.
-[Justin] Good evening.
-Hi!
[Andrew] Ohhh!
Ooh, I have been waiting
for this for a minute.
[Alton] Iron Chef Cámara,
Iron Chef Samuelsson,
please give us some idea of how
you approached the medieval challenge
as a team.
So we approached medieval
through our lens and our history.
Africa, Italy, the Nordics, and Americas.
[Gabriela] In front of you, a quail tamal.
While thinking of medieval,
I needed to make something with corn.
-Mm.
-This has bones.
-[Nilou] Mm!
-The quail is cooked in there.
-There's a leg, a quail leg.
-Oh!
And the breast.
Chef Cámara, I mean, I'm obsessed
with what you do with masa.
The achiote is beautiful.
The flavor balance that the tomatillo
gives you, the brightness.
This is a perfect starter
to what I know is going to be
an unexpected series of dishes
from you both, so I'm very excited.
And there will be bones.
There will be bones!
[all laugh]
-Mmm!
-Because bones is where the flavor is.
The challenge is medieval,
and I recognize this.
-This is gorgeous.
-[Gabriela] Thank you.
-Bravo.
-Thank you.
When it was clear we would get a tamale,
I mean, he was giddy
like Springsteen
was playing "Born to Run."
You know, it was like, "Oh!" Bravo indeed.
-Thank you.
-Chefs, thank you for the first course.
We look forward to the next.
-Okay.
-[Nilou] Thank you.
The corn flavor is so intense,
and it's not over-seasoned.
There wasn't too much of the salsa.
There wasn't too much of the game bird.
That course was really, really yummy.
I was very happy. Very happy.
[Gabriela] Hi!
[Marcus] If you can,
start eating right away.
-If we can.
-Oh.
-[Gabriela] Comin' in hot.
-You don't have to worry about me, Chef.
Chef Samuelsson,
please tell us what you made for us.
Yeah, medieval, the crew,
they were the OG partiers,
but also the big surf-and-turf guys.
There was fish and meat
served at the same time.
So you have coffee-and-honey-seared squab
with a liver flan and fire-roasted tuna.
From a texture standpoint,
the insane crunch of the caramelized honey
and coffee on the fried bone
is a beautiful expression of who you are.
-I I want a pile of these.
-[Nilou] Yeah.
There's nothing better than the bone
that has a little meat on it.
Really beautiful to see you
blend your story in here with medieval
I think was also very important.
-Gorgeous food.
-Thank you very much.
This pudding-flan-liver moment
tastes like my dream chicken-liver mousse,
and then the perfect sear on squab.
-A resounding yes.
-Thank you.
When you think medieval feast
you think of excess.
And not always. It's about decadence,
and I feel like this was
that perfect expression of less is more.
I loved the crunch of this squab bone.
It was It was just perfect. It was great.
-Great.
-Iron Chefs, thank you very much.
Thank you!
What he's doing here
is the minimal Scandinavian presentation
of what he imagines
a period in time to be,
and I think it was very compelling.
Yeah.
Oooh.
-Oh-ho!
-[Gabriela] A feast.
Ooh là là.Oh, thank you.
-[Gabriela] Here we are again.
-Yes, welcome to
The mushroom feast.
[Marcus] The dish you have in front of you
is roasted king trumpet mushrooms,
shiitake, and scallop,
finished off with cracked wheat,
young coconut, truffle sauce.
It's just a celebration of mushrooms.
Iron Chefs,
it's a celebration of mushrooms,
but I think it's the texture
of the mushroom
somehow making the coconut
and the scallop together
like this little family,
reminding you what they have in common.
It was fantastic.
What joins it together for me
is the scallop,
because oceanic flavors,
I think, marry really well
with the woodsiness of the mushrooms,
always have
Yeah. Well, that's a sort of a classic.
There is so much amazing flavor
on this plate.
Feels, like, really autumnal,
the mead that you've infused this with
is really beautiful.
That, to, me is pure Iron Chef
Kitchen Stadium magic.
I wanna keep on eating this, for sure.
Thank you.
We look forward to your final course.
-Thank you.
-Thank you.
If you were not in a competition,
you didn't know it was medieval-themed,
you might not know
this was medieval themed
-That's exactly
-The other team
-Well, they really nailed that.
-It was very medieval presentation.
But this was definitely unique
and beautiful. Yeah, gorgeous.
-[Nilou] Oh!
-[Kristen] Thank you.
[Nilou] Ah!
[Justin] The grapes.
So this is our interpretation of medieval
-Yes.
-Europe.
This is fire-roasted grapes
with Gorgonzola and mascarpone cheese.
This is sort of an homage
to my grandmother.
She's Italian. She's from Florence.
We had the mascarpone
and the Gorgonzola cheese,
and I remember she was always making a dip
that we ate with grapes, so this is it.
So interesting to see across two kitchens
the idea of fire-roasted grapes
and how differently
the dishes were executed.
What I am really responding to
is the salinity of the cheese
that you've introduced.
-It almost feels like a cheese course.
-Yup.
It does have a panforte.
Very Italian feeling. I loved.
I love it. Superb, and it obviously
ties together with the blue-vein cheese.
Bravo, and, like you,
I just love cooked grapes.
The delicate nature
that these grapes were cooked,
the care that
You know, they're cooked so evenly
and they're so warm inside,
like a little burst.
I mean, it's really fantastic.
Iron Chefs, thank you
for a spectacular meal.
-We had a blast
-[Andrew] Thank you so much.
-We had so much fun.
-[Nilou] Great job, great job.
-Hope it showed in the food. We had fun.
-It did. Gorgeous.
Damn! So interesting,
a white dairy with roasted grapes,
but a very different experience.
Two great minds
sort of hit on the same basic idea.
-We could talk all night long.
-[Nilou] We could.
But you go off to your table
and do what you know you gotta do,
and Kristen and I will get ready
to do what we gotta do.
Thank you, both of you.
[Alton] Will it be
Iron Chef Stone and Crenn's European take
on a medieval menu
or Iron Chef Cámara and Samuelsson's
global view on The Chairman's challenge?
True culinary nobility
duked it out tonight,
but a winning team must still be crowned.
Sire?
This was an Iron Battle
of culinary warriors.
You took us back to medieval times
and valiantly fought with flavor and fire!
But only one Iron Chef team
reigns supreme,
and that winning team is
Iron Chefs
Cámara and Samuelsson!
[cheering and applause]
[Marcus mumbles]
-[Gabriela mumbles]
-[Marcus] I love you.
[Gabriela] You too.
-[Curtis] Congrats.
-[Marcus] Thank you.
Well, food fans, there you have it.
Our Iron Chefs have met in brave combat,
and Iron Chef Cámara
and Iron Chef Samuelsson
have vanquished their opponents
in this medieval Iron Battle,
but only by a slightest of margins.
The judges scoring it 85 points to 84.
[Kristen] From Iron Chefs
Cámara and Samuelsson,
we truly saw an unexpected take
interpretation of the medieval theme.
[Alton] Ultimately, the judges felt
it was a bolder, riskier approach
to the secret ingredients.
This tag team of titans was a triumph.
Gosh, that's a lot of Ts,
but the quest for an Iron Legend
shall continue in the next battle.
So thank you, yonder patrons,
for watchingIron Chef.
I'm Alton Brown, a lowly page.
And I'm Lady Kristen Kish.
And we are proclaiming adieu for now.
[closing theme music plays]