Trailer available here

The name of the show bothers me. The concept bothers me a bit too. Yet here I am after finishing watching the entirety of Culinary Class Wars season one on Netflix in just a handful of days.

Unsure of how the concept is problematic, or at least the translated version of the name and the phrasing of the English dub makes it seem, let me explain. Maybe it isn’t anywhere near as horrendous in the original Korean but given some of the translated dubs from the contestants I think it is completely as intended. This show openly puts 20 renowned professional chefs as the better chefs that are “worthy” of being called by their actual name in white. Whilst 80 more regular (but still amazing) chefs competing against them, have to not only be known by nothing more than a nickname, are on the black team. The name of Culinary Class Wars and it being the elite vs the rest would have made it a little bit more manageable but combining that with the names vs assigned names and white vs black makes it a very different concept and anybody with an understanding of politics, history and racial relations can identify the glaring issue here. At best it is naivety and at worst it is everybody from concept creator to the approver of the show at Netflix just brushing it all under the carpet.

Like everybody else I’ve spoken with about this show, or seen others online saying, there were a couple of stand outs amongst the nicknamed chefs; Self-made chef and Comic book chef (honorary mention to School canteen chef). To me those are the sort of people that I want more of in the culinary world. There has been a shift recently, in terms of the speed in which the culinary world works at least, of more and more not professionally or classically trained chefs being able to rise to the top of the industry and get proper recognition. More and more people with different concepts, cultural backgrounds and understanding of flavour profiles are being put under the spotlight. The main issue is though that all of these people have their stories presented as a sort of rags to riches thing even when it isn’t like that at all and it makes it rather draining as it detracts away from their actual skill or the quality of their food and instead makes it seem a bit like a pity party and that they just happened to catch some lucky break to get seen or somebody did them some sort of rescue mission on them.

Also some of it just doesn’t completely make sense to who is deemed to be the elite vs not. There is one person on the elite team that I adore, YouTuber Seonkyounglongest (Asian at Home), and whilst I agree that she has done an absolutely incredible job of creating a massive following and bringing certain recipes, ingredients, concepts and even restaurants to many she is no more or less worthy of such praise than the others I mentioned moments ago. They all have their own niches and USPs that have made them successful and anybody with determination, desire and strength are as likely to succeed but are also respected by their own groups. The elite chefs have been deemed so by a group of arbitrary Netflix show creators and teams based on their own personal preferences or again based on what makes for the easiest to sell narratives and that’s just so *sigh worthy*.

Anyway, aside from all that they all made some incredible food. I learnt new things about some recipes, ingredients and concepts. It gave me a little boost to try new things or remember my own foods that bring joy, comfort and excitement and at the end of the day awakening or reawakening passion in people, alongside entertainment, is sort of the point of this kind of show. It makes it look like it could be attainable for everyone. So I guess it works.

The last couple of episodes drop the day after this post goes live so I might do a little edit but honestly whoever wins doesn’t matter to me. My thoughts on the concept and the directional approach are unlikely to do a 180 based on what happens. If I want to add any thoughts in an EDIT will appear below.

EDIT: Alright. Those last two episodes were intense and I feel exhausted from just watching that much cooking and judging of so many dishes.

I haven’t really ever had a lot of tofu but when I did it was at this vegan Chinese restaurant in London and was amazing (I stand by the vegan lemon cheesecake I had there that was made with tofu being possibly the best cheesecake I have ever had) but because of the protein in it when it gets broken down it basically makes me ill in the same way as I get with tree nuts and peanuts/legumes (thanks food allergies). But some of those looked truly amazing and so incredibly inspired especially to have cooked in such a short period of time but going further and further into the battle.

The very small amount of character development at the end too was powerful, even if it was presented by the edit crew as a “cultural awakening” and a “I lost my passion but this brought it back” sort of thing, and it did make me pause and think about my own passions and why I do what I do and what I want to do with my life and be ‘known’ for. If you take nothing else from this show (except for the pure enjoyment of admiring yummy dishes) then let it be a reminder to you to follow a statement I’ve been trying to follow recently; Going from living and existing to thriving and striving.