Is cooking a sport?

[ctan]

I tried watching some football to alleviate the empty aching feeling I get when there's no baseball to watch. The Army-Navy game was pretty exciting, but every other game I've tried has ben really boring...

The one competitive tv how I did see that really got me interested was ... IRON CHEF! The episode with the tie-breaking extra-half hour overtime "scallion battle" was intense!

Anyone else enjoy that show?

-ctan

p.s. ok, if I sound like a raving lunatic, it's because I'm in withdrawal.

[Butnud]

The real question is if you are a sport?

Come on cooking is an art not a freaking sport.

[ctan]

Of course I'm a sport, "if by sport you mean Nextel Phones."

[allybear]

I love "Iron Chef"!!! When I saw the title of this topic, I was thinking of "Iron Chef", and lo and behold, another fan! I know BG is also an IC fan - we were discussing it awhile ago. On New Year's Day (I think), they are doing a marathon of episodes, so I know what I'll be flipping to between bowl games!

[Stick Michael]

IRON CHEF RULES! I'm glad to see my brother and I aren't the only ones that watch it. Personally, I think Sakai is an absolute badass but Morimoto can cook with the best of them as well. That NYE marathon should be awesome.

"Whose cuisine will reign supreme?...It's the Iron Chef!"

James

[ctan]

I hope I get to see more of it! I don't have cable, and the cable system in my town doesn't have Food Network yet. I caught the scallion battle while at home in NJ with my parents. Come to think of it, that's where I have to go to see NY Yankees baseball, too... (thank goodness for the Internet so I can listen to the games...)

-ctan

[pinstripeschef]

yes it isi have two medals to prove it. iron chef is cool but instead of cameras you have like five judges walking around gettting in your way, how funny my first post was on cooking
thats what the pitching staff is going to do to the rest of league next season

[ctan]

I love cooking but it rarely get smixed with my lov of baseball. Unless you count the time I made scones and brought them to Fenway Park. Some other Yankee fans I was meeting for the first time were there and they couldn't believe I'd brought scones! (and lemon curd and blueberry jam!)

Then there was the World Series cookie bake-off. I baked a huge batch of cookies, all round and glazed with a hard white icing. I then painted them with more glaze, some to look like baseballs, some with players' numbers, others with slogans,like Let's Go Yankees (actually that spread across two cookies) and things liek "Rally Cookie" "Good Luck" and the like. We carefully monitored which cookies we ate and when--ok, here comes Tino, time to eat his cookie... hey! base hit! And well, it worked!

-ctan

[Jen!!!]

Iron Chef is awesome! I love the dubbing. Has anyone been watching The Naked Chef? He's pretty cool, too...and funny!
Cooking is an art, but it can be made into a sport, my honey and I sort of "tag-team" in the kitchen at times...he does most of the cooking, but I'll stand at the fridge, he yells out what he needs, and I lob it over to him, like football. It's fun. My household is a very strange place to be! (But there's always lots of love happening in the kitchen!)

[Chris]

I was a proffesional cook for most of my life and I always compared what I did to sport and enjoyed it in that manner.

In running a kitchen of 12 to 15 cooks, I, like a basketball coach had to know where everyone was and exactly what they were doing at all times, I had to know my team as a group and indiviually and utilize each member to his strengths in the way that I thought best helped us reach our overall goal.
This sport like many others is a race against a clock in which many objectives, some physically demanding, some requiring a strong and cognizant mind, all had to completed safely, with emphasis on accuracy and presentation.
This sport has it's hazzards, like all sports and the participant must be able to react to a quickly changing environment with grace and to be able to recognize situations and make decisions quickly, this requires confidence and good training.

Although, I've never heard of a cook getting 252 million over ten years

[ctan]

Hey chris!

Maybe if a cook could serve 56,000 people a day for 162 days a year, he could make that kind of dough...

[bombergirl]

I can't believe I overlooked this post the first time around, but anyway, when I saw the title of your post again I thought of IC right away. I think I've seen the episode with the overtime scallion battle! Anyway, my favorite Iron Chef is Ken'ichi Chin, the Chinese dude. Maybe this doesn't come across in the dubbed version, but I've seen the show in the original Japanese and he has a great sense of humor. Besides I like spicy cooking..it's all about the to-ban-djan, baby! (To-ban-djan is a spicy Szechuan chili sauce, FYI)

Thanks Ally for telling me about the New Year's marathon! Though I'll probably be spending most of my time watching the "Kohaku Uta-gassen", a televised concert which is a New Year's Eve tradition in Japan. It's set up as a battle of the sexes, with a team of the best-selling female singers (the "Ko", or scarlet, team) competing against a team of the best-selling male singers (the "Haku", or white, team). It's a riot, even though (or because?) some of the songs are really BAD...last year they had Japanese versions of "Bailamos" and "La Vida Loca" that had me ROTFL!

B "ah, New Year Japanese TV shows" G

[ctan]

Hey BG, long time no see! That quote from Bart Giamatti is priceless.

[bombergirl]

Thanks Cecelia! I haven't been around much mostly because it's my school's finals week. Glad you liked the quote: I thought it was perfect for my "off-season" signature line. I'll probably replace it in the spring (and stow it away for the next long cold winter).

B "quote appreciation" G

[allybear]

Chin is definitely my favorite IC! Although I've been rooting for Morimoto a lot more lately since they started bringing in every traditional Japanese chef to face him, along with (in last week's episode on Food Network) drums! I think Morimoto should bring a bunch of New Yorkers with him, maybe the bleacher creatures and Fireman Ed from the Jets games, and show them some noise!!

The Japanese version of "Living La Vida Loca" must be something to behold - let me know what they do with "Who Let The Dogs Out" this year!!!