On this week’s episode of Food Network Obsessed, host Jaymee Sire shares her thoughts on Food Network’s forecasted food trends for 2021 before diving into a conversation with Chopped Host, Ted Allen. Ted goes in-depth about the process of filming Chopped and how, after hundreds of episodes, the team has it down to a tight 10 hour day. Ted talks about the elusive Chopped basket and how, contrary to popular belief, it’s anything *but* random. Jaymee asks whether Ted prefers to be a host or a judge and how he stays at the top of his game in such a cut-throat industry. Ted also shares what it was like to be a part of the original cast of Queer Eye, his thoughts on the reboot, and the importance of LGBTQ+ representation in media. Finally, Ted describes his home kitchen and the weirdest ingredient in his fridge right now.
On this week’s episode of Food Network Obsessed, host Jaymee Sire shares her thoughts on Food Network’s forecasted food trends for 2021 before diving into a conversation with Chopped Host, Ted Allen. Ted goes in-depth about the process of filming Chopped and how, after hundreds of episodes, the team has it down to a tight 10 hour day. Ted talks about the elusive Chopped basket and how, contrary to popular belief, it’s anything *but* random. Jaymee asks whether Ted prefers to be a host or a judge and how he stays at the top of his game in such a cut-throat industry. Ted also shares what it was like to be a part of the original cast of Queer Eye, his thoughts on the reboot, and the importance of LGBTQ+ representation in media. Finally, Ted describes his home kitchen and the weirdest ingredient in his fridge right now.
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Food Network’s 2021 Food Trend Report: https://www.foodnetwork.com/fn-dish/news/food-trend-predictions-food-network-2021
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Find episode transcript here: https://food-network-obsessed.simplecast.com/episodes/ted-allen-talks-chopped-queer-representation-in-media
[MUSIC PLAYING] JAYMEE SIRE: Hello, hello. And welcome to Food Network Obsessed, the podcast where we dish on all things Food Network with your favorite Food Network stars. I'm your host Jaymee Sire. And today, I am a total fan girl. I am so excited about our guests this week. I know I say that every week, but I truly mean it. How lucky am I to get to talk to all of these cool people?
I have so many things to ask our guests, but first I wanted to talk a little bit about some 2021 food trends. So every year around this time, foodnetwork.com releases its Food Trend report. If you want to check it out for yourself, we've dropped a link in the show notes. But something that caught my attention was that this is the year of the home pizza ovens, which I am totally on board with.
If you follow me on Instagram, you know I am obsessed with pizza I'm very lucky to live in New York City, where we have lots of good pizza to choose from. But I definitely hopped on board the pizza bandwagon at home during quarantine. I had never really made my own pizza dough before, but definitely taught myself how to do that and really enjoyed it.
I never really got in on the sourdough bread baking. I think I killed my starter. But pizza dough, I can get on board with that. One thing I'm not so sure about is the buzz-free beer. There's a lot of companies right now making an alcohol free beer.
Personally, I don't see the point of that. I am a fan of maybe lessening my alcohol consumption because there was a lot of wine involved in quarantine early on. But I think if you're looking at food trends, just in my own household, I think sparkling water should be on there because we consume a lot of it in lieu of alcohol in our house.
But I would love to hear what you guys think. If you have any input or ideas about food trends, you can definitely tag Food Network on your social media and use the hashtag #FoodNetworkObsessed, so we can see it and perhaps talk about it a little bit more on a future episode.
As for today's episode though, our guest is the host of Chopped. He is a judge on countless episodes of Iron Chef America. He is an Emmy award winner, a James Beard Award winner, a cookbook author, and part of the original cast of Queer Eye, of course, I'm talking about Ted Allen.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Ted, welcome to the pod. I am excited to have you on. First of all, I recently discovered you are a fellow Brooklynite. So I guess, hello, neighbor. How long--
TED ALLEN: Hey, neighbor. What neighborhood?
JAYMEE SIRE: I'm in Williamsburg. Where are you?
TED ALLEN: I'm in Clinton Hill.
JAYMEE SIRE: All right, how long have you lived there?
TED ALLEN: Oh, 13 years. I love it.
JAYMEE SIRE: What do you like about living in Brooklyn versus Manhattan?
TED ALLEN: I realized, at a certain age, that I'm not going to nightclubs. I don't go to a lot of restaurants. And I got tired of two things mainly-- the honking of horns, the noise of trucks, and just the general constant crowdedness of it all.
And I love Brooklyn is such a great medium, especially your neighborhood and mine because we are so close to Manhattan, yet we still have a tree, or two, or three. And I live in a brownstone that has a front yard and a backyard. So I've got trees and a little teeny bit of gardening that I can do. And it's just a really comfortable great in-between place, while still being immediately adjacent to the city which I adore.
JAYMEE SIRE: Yeah, I love that as well. It's very accessible to get into the city when you want. But if you don't want to be, you have your little oasis. I do not have a backyard with a garden yet, that'll be on the life goals, eventually. But now, I'm jealous of your garden. I'm going to ask you a lot of different things about Chopped and maybe some of your favorite food spots in Brooklyn. But aside from all that, what have you been up to? Aside from hosting Chopped during a pandemic?
TED ALLEN: Well, about that, first of all, I just want to express how grateful I am to work for a show and a network that makes it possible for us to continue production. It can be done. It's not easy. And it's not cheap. And so we're grateful for the chance to keep making the show. And I'm sure the viewers are going to appreciate it too.
JAYMEE SIRE: Yeah, I know. I for one as one of the viewers, am grateful that you were able to continue producing new episodes, as it is one of the most popular shows on the network. But let's go back to where it all started. How did Ted Allen meet the Food Network or vise versa? And when did that take place?
TED ALLEN: Well, so when I finished Queer Eye, Bruce Seidel at Iron Chef America somehow got wind of me and had me on as a guest judge, one time, and liked what I did. And then one day, Linda Lee, who created Chopped asked me if I wanted to try this thing. And I thought why not? And I did. And the rest is history.
We're pushing 800 episodes. If you count Chop Junior and all the shows that we've just shot, we have shot somewhere on the order of 800 episodes in 12 years. We understand how rare that is. And we are very grateful for it.
JAYMEE SIRE: That is incredible. When you first heard the concept of it way back when, I mean, what was your first thought?
TED ALLEN: Well, the thing about-- the format of Chopped is extremely simple. And if you-- very simple and straightforward. And I think that's one of the reasons for its success. It's immediately understandable. It takes the act of cooking and turns it into something akin to a short basketball game with three rounds. It's intense like a basketball game.
What I realized though that really is key about the show is that the stars of the show are the people who are competing. Those people are different every single episode. The co-stars of the show are myself and the judges. And the judges, of whom only three work at a time, but we have a panel of about 10 people that rotate. And so you're always getting different combinations of judges.
I'm a constant. And I'm fairly neutral presence in the show. I'm just keeping it moving, doing my thing. And it's a combination of constant familiarity, yet constant change. And the ingredients are different every time as well. So you take four different people, three different baskets of four ingredients. There are just innumerable things that can happen. And sometimes, crazy things happen. And it's just shown itself to be an incredibly durable formula.
JAYMEE SIRE: Yeah, I mean, do you think that that's why it has the staying power that it's had and why it has resonated with people so much because of this familiarity but also the constant state of surprises, I guess.
TED ALLEN: I do think that you're always trying to figure out why you suddenly put lightning into a bottle, as Linda did with this show. I mean we have an incredible team of producers. We always have, mostly women. Part of it is that. Part of it is Linda is someone who is really excellent at identifying great people.
So the show is run by super smart people, who are really into it, who understand what a 12-hour day is and works it because that's necessary to do all this work. People are always surprised when they learn how long it takes to make one episode. They usually ask, how many of those do you shoot in a day? And I'm like, one.
And it's just the shooting part. It takes us from about 8:00 in the morning till we've gotten it down to about 6:00 PM for wrapping. And that includes a lunch break. What they don't realize is all the hours that went into casting, finding the people, writing, taking the ingredients, doing the research on the ingredients.
And then after we finish shooting the show, what you have-- and we have something like 10 or 12 cameras, probably 10 of them held by camera operators. And then several more are GoPro cameras that are mounted inside of a fridge, or wherever, overhead looking down on the stoves, all that raw footage.
I've always estimated that a camera operator, each operator is probably shooting, I don't know, six or seven hours worth of raw footage a day. Six hours times 10 or 12 cameras. And somehow, an editor has to make sense of that and find-- here's another thing that our viewer isn't going to think about, but an editor has to think about it.
You're looking for storylines. You're looking for narratives. Did someone drop their steak on the floor but then pick it up and use it anyway? Well, that's obviously a very-- that's definitely a story. Did someone light the kitchen on fire repeatedly? That's a story.
[LAUGHTER]
And there are, of course, observers, I think three of them, producers up in the booth whose job it is to log when interesting things happen. I don't know exactly how that works because I'm never in the booth, because I can't be in the booth, because I'm the host. I wish I could see how Michael runs that booth. I'm sure it's fascinating.
JAYMEE SIRE: Are those producers giving you tidbits in your ear and letting you know some of those things are happening as they happen?
TED ALLEN: No, I don't wear anything in my ear on Chopped.
JAYMEE SIRE: Oh, you don't?
TED ALLEN: No, and I love it. And it's very kind of Linda to allow me to continue without an earbud. I do realize that most people hosting shows like this do wear an earbud. And they have a producer speaking to them. We've always gotten by with our floor producer, usually Vivian Sorensen, and a white board.
And we have all sorts of little code. I mean Sean King, our first AD, has all sorts of little hand signals, and cues, and/or maybe just waving frantically to let me know that they need to talk to me about something. But we have been doing this a long time and it ain't broke. So I don't think it needs fixed.
JAYMEE SIRE: Yeah, no. I mean, if that's working-- obviously it is working. So keep doing what you're doing. I'm sure this is a question that you probably get a lot, but I know the listeners definitely would want to hear the answer. What kind of information about the basket ingredients are you and the judges given before filming starts or are you guys finding out at the same time as the contestants?
TED ALLEN: No, we are not-- we know going in what's in all three baskets because our excellent culinary coordinator, Sarah, who also has a committee of people that select the things that go in the baskets-- and first, let me also just say, to a viewer, it might look like those ingredients are random. And they are the opposite of random.
Every single basket that Sarah designs has within it an idea. Like if she gives you a lavash flatbread, and some fresh mozzarella, and tomatoes. Maybe she wants you to make some kind of pizza play. So everything has-- there are the opposite of random.
Sarah selects the best ingredients with her committee and produces for us an extensive, it's a three or four page document of research on each ingredient so that we know, OK, ketchup was invented by the Heinz corporation in 1872. I just made that up. I don't know who made ketchup.
[LAUGHTER]
But it's got historical notes. It's got what are its flavor affinities? What does it taste good with? What is it usually used for? Is it the national dish of Iran, for example, or Nigeria, or wherever? And all of those things provide us with material to talk about.
And that's pretty much what we talk about most of the cooking rounds is what these ingredients are, what would we do with them, what does it look like the cooks are going to do with them? Is that a good idea or not? And we try to keep all of those conversations. We don't really want those chefs to hear us, although sometimes they do. We don't want to influence what direction they take.
I learned a long time ago. I am not allowed to help anyone. Every once in a while, it's just human nature when you go over to talk to someone who's cooking to say like, hey, did you think about making that into a pizza? So then they make a pizza. And they burn it. And they get chopped. You don't want to be responsible for somebody getting chopped or advancing. It should be entirely on them.
JAYMEE SIRE: Yeah, I'm so glad you brought that up about the research packets because that was something that struck me when I was working on Iron Chef Showdown. And it is so extensive and really, really well put together. And it reminded me of my days in my history and sports broadcasting, where you would have these sports researchers giving you all the background on the game or the players.
And it was cool to see that it's along the same lines of just wanting to have the host and the talent as prepared and as knowledgeable as possible. So that was something I thought was really, really interesting just as I started to dip my toe in the Food Network world.
TED ALLEN: I'm proud of that. And I think that one of the things these shows do, just as watching a football game, you're going to learn things. We teach people a great deal of information about food. And our information must be accurate. Words must be pronounced correctly. Once in a while I get them wrong or once in a while I get steered wrongly.
I used to be a print journalist. And what mattered is that I had to spell things correctly, which I'm really good at. Now, I have to try to say words that might be French words or something. And I have to say them correctly or at least try. I'm less good at that, but I do my best.
JAYMEE SIRE: I know you probably get this question a lot as well, do you get to taste the food at all?
TED ALLEN: I don't officially get to taste the food at all. And to be perfectly honest, I don't often really want to, not because the cooks aren't good but because the food-- this is not a restaurant. It's a television show. And food and television shows tends to sit around for a while. So it's almost always cold. I shouldn't-- I don't know if I should be saying. I don't know if I'm allowed to say that.
JAYMEE SIRE: You are. It's a behind the scenes look at everything on Food Network, nothing's off the table.
TED ALLEN: Well, I will tell you that the judges, who have to taste the food, right when the round-- when the cooking round ends and the chefs walk into the next room, the judges immediately go over to their cooking stations. And if there's something that's meant to be crispy, they taste it like out of the pot or if something that is really going to taste bad cold, they'll taste it out of the pot.
And that way, they get an immediate sense of how the flavors are, and how the seasoning is, whether the chef accomplished something. They all understand very well that a dish deteriorates. And it is 100% important to us that their decisions are based exclusively on the cooking that happens in those rounds. So they're very, very good at that, our judges.
JAYMEE SIRE: Yes, and I could see why you would not want to taste the cold food, after it's been sitting out, getting beauty shots, and that kind of thing. How would you fare, do you think, as a Chopped contestant yourself?
TED ALLEN: Well, I'm not a chef. I'm not a trained chef. So I have to start with that. And our judges all are chefs. And not only that, but they're chefs who have demonstrated excellence at competitive cooking, which is a specific skill that is not the same skill as being good at running a restaurant.
When you are cooking at your restaurant, you know where everything is. You're making the dishes from a menu that you have honed yourself. There are no mystery ingredients. The only time limits are those that are set by yourself and the fact that your diners expect to be fed in a timely manner. But it's a whole different set of pressures, competitive cooking.
And our judges are among the best people in the world at doing that, as is Mr. Bobby Flay and many other people who have made this a part of their lives. Bobby being an original gangster, going all the way back to the very beginning of this network has probably competitively cooked more than anybody alive. And it's. A very hard man to beat in competitive cooking. I've seen a few people do it, but he wins more often than he loses
JAYMEE SIRE: He does. People ask me that a lot because I have guest co-hosted on Beat Bobby Flay. And I tell them all the time, he really is-- he's just really good at cooking and also doing it in a competitive atmosphere. And that is not to be said about all chefs.
Some chefs could be really, really talented if they have the time that they need and they're not feeling the pressure. And there's others that just crumble under that pressure. So it is a hard thing to do. And you've seen so many contestants come and go over the years. And what in your opinion is the biggest mistake that a contestant might make?
TED ALLEN: I guess there are a number of things that seem to trip people up. One is that-- obviously, when you have this forum and you're on a national TV show, you want to do something amazing which inspires people sometimes to be too ambitious. And I like to call it-- what you need on Chopped is rational ambition.
You need to temper your ambitions with the fact that 30 minutes, 20 minutes are not long periods of time. You're in an unfamiliar kitchen. Your station might be 50 feet away from the refrigerator or your station might be 50 feet away from where we store the plates, which is on the other side of the studio, not by accident at all. And so there's going to be time wasted just running to get over there.
One smart thing that people do is sometimes they'll take a basket or they'll grab a couple of big bowls or something when they go into the pantry so they have something to carry stuff in. One thing that I think is-- you see this happen with some contestants where they open the basket and they just start staring at the ingredients and thinking. And that's usually a good sign.
If you spend 60 seconds analyzing those ingredients, thinking of your possibilities, thinking of what you can do to make them work together in something harmonious, I would say, for a lot of people, your chances of pulling off something successful are going to be better.
But many people, simply, immediately start chopping up the onion, chopping up what-- just to get something started, and just to get some things into pans. And I mean, I would say, a great number of our competitors improvise their way through the whole round, every round.
And I think a lot of cooks are like jazz musicians that way. And sometimes, they might make something brilliant. And sometimes, it all might crash and burn. That's probably part of the excitement too. It's fun to watch somebody who thinks they're a super expert step in it.
[LAUGHTER]
I'm always rooting for them. And I always root for the underdog, whichever type of underdog it may be. I just can't help, but it's just my nature.
JAYMEE SIRE: Yeah, no, I think that that's everybody watching. I think either they're rooting for the underdog or they're rooting to see some catastrophe happen in the kitchen perhaps to make themselves feel better about their own skills or just wanting to watch it unfold.
I think that that's part of the beauty of Chopped and why it is so successful. And it has had so much staying power over the years. As you mentioned, you've also been a seasoned judge as well. So before we move on, what do you like more, hosting or judging?
TED ALLEN: Well, both hosting and judging have their advantages. Chopped, I think, is much more difficult than as hard as Iron Chef is. On Iron Chef, there's only one mystery ingredient. You have a couple of sous chefs assisting you. And you have 45 minutes in which to cook.
So I tasted a lot of food on Iron Chef and it was almost all great as a result. That's a format that a chef can train for a little more than they can for ours. So it was great judging Iron Chef. Judging Chopped, I think, is harder, I think, because it's harder to cook well under those circumstances. Being a host is nice because I'm in every show. That's cool.
We're paid by the episode, so that's helpful. I love it. I have to say, it's so much fun, especially when you look at Chop Junior, where we have rotating celebrity guests coming through. I met so many interesting, fascinating great people from Meghan Markle, to Mark Bittman, one of my culinary cookbook heroes. So I'm going to go with host. I'm grateful to be where I am.
JAYMEE SIRE: You seem very happy and passionate about what you do, and especially in an industry, I think that at times, can be very taxing, tumultuous, frustrating, but it can also be very rewarding obviously. How do you manage to stay at the top of your game while simultaneously being so seemingly grounded and down to earth about everything?
TED ALLEN: I don't know. I mean, I think I've never gotten to ego involved with being on television. I've also never-- it's never made me anxious because the shows I've been in have always been shows that are shot on tape, and then later edited by a network in whose best interest it is to make me look like a superhero.
[LAUGHTER]
That was also-- that was literally true of Queer Eye. We were actually like super hero type characters in that scenario. And they're not going to show us screwing something up. You can't allow that to happen. I guess, I should warn the people who are competing in a competition show, we don't care whether you come off like a superhero. So it's your job to do that.
I mean, I've got a lot of practice at this particular one. And you would think that I might get bored with it over the years. But as I mentioned, for the same reason that people don't get bored watching, I don't get bored shooting it. It's just different every time. And I'm working with a bunch of really smart people who are my friends. We're close. We love hanging out together. And everyone's super good at this. There's just nothing to not like in that scenario.
JAYMEE SIRE: It seems like a fun time. And I'm so glad you brought up Queer Eye, again, because, obviously, you were part of the original Fab Five, or maybe not obviously if people don't remember. I remember watching that original show when it first aired in 2003. You were the food and wine connoisseur of the show. It was, at the time, very groundbreaking. It ended up winning an Emmy for outstanding reality program. In the moment, did you realize how big of an impact that show would have?
TED ALLEN: We figured it out pretty quickly when it did happen. We got a ton of press. I remember when we were first shooting the episodes and we hadn't aired anything yet, very early in the shooting process, I approached the two guys that invented the show. And I said, do you really have to call it Queer Eye? It's so provocative. Queer?
People don't really-- the word queer was just becoming what it is now, which is an inclusive term. A term meant to be inclusive and to have been retrieved from the land of being a slur, an anti-gay slur. But I wasn't quite there yet. And I said you have to call it Queer Eye? They said, yes, we do. And they were right.
The fact that queer was still a word that had a certain loaded edge to it, I think the provocative nature of that really got people's attention and made people's ears perk up. When they met us, and when they started seeing episodes, and they saw the heart and the humor that came from us five but also came from the way they edited the show, our producers knew what they were doing. When they picked the straight guy also, they knew what they were doing. And they picked people with great story.
And it was-- I do remember thinking-- once you start being-- once you start showing up in cartoons in the New Yorker, and you're on the cover of Entertainment Weekly, and you're in all these papers, and on Good Morning America, and it begins to sink in that this thing is working out. And it was a big hit for I think a year and a half or so. And then it started to fizzle.
And we all found plenty of cool things to do after that. But if you had told me that almost 15 years later, that somebody was going to reboot that show, I would have thought you were insane. And then when they did reboot it, they ended up hiring, as their food and wine specialists, a guy who worked for me for three years, Anthony Pawlowski, was our assistant. What are the chances of that happening? None.
JAYMEE SIRE: Yeah.
TED ALLEN: So it's really been a very-- it was an unlikely idea, but it was a big hit. And now it's a hit again.
JAYMEE SIRE: It is a hit again. What are your thoughts on the reboot?
TED ALLEN: Well, I've only watched it a couple of times, not because of any lack of interest-- and I certainly, I like all the guys. I've met all of them. And we actually did a family feud episode, where it was the OG Queer Eye versus the new guys. It was super, super fun to do that. We clobbered them, not to brag. It could have gone-- the way family feud is constructed, it can flip at any moment.
JAYMEE SIRE: It could come down to one question or one answer, yeah.
TED ALLEN: Especially when you get into the latter rounds because they're worth more points. Fortunately, we got our lead early on and held on to it. Anyway, I think the show is great. I understand that it's a little bit different in tone. They're a little bit-- they're looking for emotions. They're looking for tears. I think those guys cry a lot more than we did. And I think we destroy a lot more apartments than they-- I don't think they destroy the apartments and homes of their people. We made a mess.
[LAUGHTER]
I mean, we threw sofas out of second floor windows. I mean, went through people's underwear drawers, found all their porn. They all have porn. Every one of those guys always has porn. They usually have some mushrooms and some weed as well.
[LAUGHTER]
Yeah, maybe that's something about our casting people, I don't know.
JAYMEE SIRE: That's amazing.
TED ALLEN: This will tell you-- this actor will tell you something about why I have no business being on television and Tom Felecia does. We're in a straight guy's apartment, I find a package of snug fit condoms. And I say, oh, this would embarrass the poor guy if everybody saw that. And I shoved it back in the drawer. And then Tom went to the same drawer and found it. And Tom goes, look, snug fit condoms.
[LAUGHTER]
JAYMEE SIRE: Oh, my goodness. I love these stories.
TED ALLEN: We've had plenty of them. I do remember thinking while we were shooting, there's an enormous chance that this will be my one and only job in television.
JAYMEE SIRE: Really?
TED ALLEN: And I'm going to look back on this. And I'm going to miss it. And I'll be back to journalism. And somehow, thank you god, thank you-- I should say thank you, Linda Lee. Thank you, Food Network. Things have worked out. And 16 and 17 years later, I'm still, somehow, on television. I mean, look at this face. It's a good thing this is a podcast, you don't have to look at me.
JAYMEE SIRE: Oh, stop, stop, stop. I am curious though. I mean, how impactful would it have been to a young Ted Allen to be able to watch a show like that growing up, just having that representation in media?
TED ALLEN: We never set ourselves out there as people who are important, or to be activists, or to be-- we were entertaining. We were trying to entertain. But we were also the first ever, entirely, openly gay cast on any television show in history. And we knew that. We knew that at its heart we wanted people to understand that gay people and straight people are the same thing.
And we've got a lot to offer. And you shouldn't be afraid to have us in your living room for an hour. In fact, you're going to enjoy it. And you're going to laugh at it. And while you're laughing, you're also learning a little bit about us, and just any person who's a little different from you, and why it doesn't make a lot of sense to be mean to somebody because they're a little different.
So for a gay kid to see that, I know that many people, many gay kids were affected positively by that. Oh, look, there's a bunch of gay guys who are outrageous. They're all five different as are all people, what do you know? And they're succeeding. And the country loves them. And maybe I have a future. Maybe I could be on television. Maybe I can work in fashion. That's exactly what I want to do or maybe I can be a gay truck driver. There are plenty of them out there.
And I just think, it started a conversation that was-- in that sense, there was something important in there for sure, for sure. So just knowing that a couple of gay kids out there got the message that they could succeed and that they are OK, I could die tomorrow feeling that I've accomplished something.
JAYMEE SIRE: Absolutely. And as you mentioned at the time, there wasn't a show that really did that or had that representation. From where you were then to what we see in media now, do you think that there is an accurate representation or do we still have a lot of work to do?
TED ALLEN: I think we still have work to do, but I think that the consciousness has grown. The word representation is not even a word we were talking about 15 years ago. And now we all know what that means. And I know what it means to me to see gay characters and gay performers reflected out of my screen.
I think representation is better than it's ever been. It could probably be better. I think people, occasionally, still make mistakes, but I think the networks are well aware that gay people, and people of color, and people of all different-- people with disabilities, all kinds of human experience need to be reflected on a medium that is so mass, that television is for everybody.
And I think they understand that they have a responsibility. That they have-- it's good business. And it's just the right thing to do, to show our country-- the television should reflect back to the country some honest truths about what the country is and who the country is. And that message is out there. People know.
JAYMEE SIRE: Absolutely, very well said. I'm going to make the smooth transition from that topic into your home kitchen. I think everybody always wants to know what the people that they see on TV are like at home. And I'm guessing there's not a giant timer on the wall, but do you have a giant stainless steel fridge in your Kitchen? What is the home of Ted Allen look like?
TED ALLEN: We have an amazing kitchen that was designed by my husband and our architect. It's funny you should say, what you said about not having a timer on the wall because I actually really-- I don't know if you know what a dark room timer looks like?
JAYMEE SIRE: Yes.
TED ALLEN: I have a GraLab classic, archetypal, darkroom timer I used to develop black and white prints.
JAYMEE SIRE: Amazing.
TED ALLEN: I used to make custom black and white prints at a job I had. And I've always loved doing that. And I wanted to hang that timer on the wall in our kitchen. And my husband wouldn't let me. We have a big range, and a big island, and a big hood above the range.
Our kitchen is designed for multiple people to cook at the same time. There's a visitor side and a chef's side. I mean, there are things that are designed to keep the visitors on their side like, for example, the coffee machine, and the cocktails, and the beer, and everything is right there in one bar area for them. And they're not really welcome on my side
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And that pretty much works. We have stainless steel countertops on the perimeter sides of the kitchen. And the island itself is made out of stone. We have three sinks. We have a prep sink, a gigantic dishwashing sink, and then a little sink to service the bar. And people dig it. It's pretty indestructible, our kitchen, we love it.
JAYMEE SIRE: It sounds like a dream. I'm still on the dark room clock because I was the high school photo editor of my newspaper. So I know exactly what you're talking about. I used to develop my own film as well. But I also love just hearing you paint this picture of this very inviting space for company and for you guys. Does. your husband cook a lot as well?
TED ALLEN: He does some baking. And he's got-- he was going to make a carrot cake yesterday. And then he was going to make it today. And I'm beginning to think he's guilted himself out of making it. But I really do most of the cooking. He learned a long time ago. And we've been together for a long time, let me tell you, that if he just got out of my way, I would probably cook all the time.
I make mostly really simple things like stews and soups. I use a lot of chicken breasts like everybody else. And I'm also always trying to find something new to do and something that's more creative. Maybe I'll make duck breast tonight, that sounds really good actually.
JAYMEE SIRE: Oh, that sounds fancy. I mean, what's the weirdest thing somebody would find in your fridge or pantry a la a Chopped basket ingredient?
TED ALLEN: I have a mustard problem.
JAYMEE SIRE: A problem?
TED ALLEN: I do. I have a mustard problem. I have an entire-- and a hot sauce problem. I have an entire shelf--
JAYMEE SIRE: These are good problems to have, I feel like.
TED ALLEN: Well, the stupid thing about being a hot sauce fanatic is that they're all really pretty much the same thing. They're chilies. And maybe their chilies in vinegar with a little salt. They often have a little garlic. But nonetheless, I probably have 30 kinds of that.
What's more oddball than what's in my fridge is what's in my basement. And it connects to Chopped. I have a-- I'm growing a Ponderosa lemon tree in New York City, which means that I have to bring it indoors for the winter. I have a grow light that produces what looks like 400 watts but isn't because they're are LEDs. I have grown this Ponderosa lemon tree from seed, from a Ponderosa lemon that Martha Stewart grew and brought to be a basket ingredient on Chopped.
JAYMEE SIRE: Oh, my gosh.
TED ALLEN: If you don't know, you probably know. But for people who don't know, a Ponderosa lemon tastes exactly like a regular lemon but is the size of about-- it's about the size of a Nerf football. It's huge. A Ponderosa lemon is enormous.
And I think that's really cool. And I thought, well, let me just germinate some of these seeds and see if they grow. And they did. And then I put them up on my roof, where I grow tomatoes during the summer. And the thing took off and now it's 5 feet tall.
JAYMEE SIRE: Wow, how long have you been cultivating this lemon tree?
TED ALLEN: Oh, I think it's three or four years now. Is that ridiculous? Yes, it is ridiculous. But is it a labor of love, and is it fun, and do I enjoy it? Yeah.
JAYMEE SIRE: It sounds like the perfect activity and hobby to be doing during a pandemic, to be quite honest. Well, from my social media stalking, I see that you're also a fellow cat person. I'm slowly, by the way, just turning this into a Food Network cat podcast. And I know you have Maine Coons, right? So does-- I know Bobby and Anne Burrell do as well. Is that some sort of Food Network hosting prerequisite to have a cat and/or a Maine Coon as your cat?
TED ALLEN: It seems to have turned into one. Let the record show that we have the first Food Network Maine Coon cats. Barry and I had the first ones. I think Bobby came in next. And Anne came later. But nonetheless, I think the word just got around or maybe the growth of Maine Coon appreciation is universal. I'm not even sure. It's a terrific breed. They're are very friendly breed. They follow you all through the house like a puppy dog.
They're not lap cats, but they want to be in the same room as you. And they're affectionate, but they don't curl up on your lap generally, maybe some people's Maine Coon cats do that. But they're funny. Our boy cat, Rufus, likes to ambush us. He likes to hide behind a chair. And when you walk past the chair, he likes to jump out in front of you. And when he does that, we scream. And he thinks that's hilarious. And it's become a thing. So they're playful and cool. They do eat a lot of food. Rufus is 20 pounds.
JAYMEE SIRE: Wow, yeah, they're big.
TED ALLEN: They're big.
JAYMEE SIRE: They're big guys, yeah. And just for the record, Anne says, because we had her on the podcast as well. She says that she had hers before Bobby. And Bobby got the idea from her. So I'm just going to go ahead and assume she got the idea from you. So you are the Maine Coon pioneer, it sounds like.
TED ALLEN: Why am I always saying that in interviews? It really doesn't matter, but it is good to know that Anne got into it before Bobby. I mean, I think just word just got around among Food Network on camera people that this is a cool animal.
And you can tell that Bobby and Anne are just as in the tank for their cats as we are for ours. Nacho has a particularly fun life traveling around Bobby's different houses. And our cats don't want to go anywhere. And I don't know if Nacho wants to travel either, but once he gets there, I'm sure-- yeah, I know he has fun.
JAYMEE SIRE: Before I let you go, we do have one final question that we like to ask everybody at the very end of the interview. And that is, what would be on the menu for your perfect food day? So we're talking breakfast, lunch, dinner, also throw in a dessert. You can time travel, spend absurd amounts of money. You can be served by any chef. You can cook it if you want. I mean, basically, there's no rules in this question. So we just want to hear what Ted Allen's perfect food day would entail.
TED ALLEN: OK, well, in my different jobs-- for a while I was an editor at Chicago Magazine. And I also did restaurant criticism. And at Chicago Magazine, we only publish stories about restaurants that we have decided that we like, which means we go to a lot of good restaurants. I've eaten at places like Charlie Trotter and Per Se. And those kinds of experiences are amazing.
Somebody else was always paying for that, which is especially amazing. But I'm not going to go super, super fancy. I like this question. And I thought about it-- I gave it some thought. I would start my day with a chocolate croissant, which I love and a couple of cups of very strong French roast coffee, which I take black with a little sugar. I mean, I actually make my own egg McMuffins at home.
And I use better cheese and better everything. And mine are better than the place that sells them, but I think that's a great combination of foods. So sometimes I have that for breakfast or lunch. What did I think of for lunch? Just slipped my mind. Oh, I know, my very favorite sandwich in the world, which I discovered at a-- I don't know if you're familiar with the store Woolworths?
JAYMEE SIRE: Yes, yes.
TED ALLEN: They used to be more widespread than they are now. The Woolworth's in our town of Indianapolis, that we went to in a mall, had a little cafe, where I got my first ever turkey club sandwich on wheat toast cut into quarters and it remains an absolute classic to me. I love those things. I've got to have a dill pickle with that. I've got to have French fries or chips with it.
And for dinner, I mentioned duck a minute ago. I would like to have a pan seared duck breast medium rare, skin side down for 18 minutes, let the fat render out, flip it over 2 minutes on the other side. I'd serve that with a cherry sauce and duck fat fingerling potatoes, which if you ever do cook a duck breast, you'll get about a cup and a half of fat off of that thing, that beautiful golden fat makes the best potatoes ever.
And dessert, I will once again pay tribute to the magic of banana pudding. The banana pudding from the vanilla wafers box, which I like to refer to as the tiramisu of the South. Let's break this down. The banana pudding is, honest to goodness, scratch custard made the real way, the French way, a banana custard with cookies added to it as it happens in tiramisu premade cookies, and of course meringue on the top that you then burn.
I love that dish so much. My grandmother's made it for years. They usually had to make a double batch. It's great warm. It's great cold. It's great two days later. It's one of my favorite things in the world. It's a lot of trouble to make, actually, but it's great. And that's the dessert I would rather have than any other.
JAYMEE SIRE: All right, so that is the perfect food day. I love it. I might be misremembering, but I'm from Great Falls, Montana. I'm pretty sure we had a Woolworths, that's a tongue twister, growing up, but I don't remember eating there, so I like to hear the-- the food memories are always so interesting to me because it does transport you back to another time.
TED ALLEN: It does.
JAYMEE SIRE: A time when you started discovering what you like and didn't like.
TED ALLEN: Yeah, I think you're absolutely right that many of the Woolworths-- Woolworths was a discount store, for anybody who doesn't know. Only a few of them had a diner attached. And I'm sure that went out of Vogue as time went by. And then Woolworths went out of Vogue. You're right, it takes me immediately back to those days when my mom-- I have one sister, younger sister.
Mom would periodically decide, OK, Lisa, I'm going to take you shopping. Just you and me or Ted, I'm going to take you shopping. Just you and me. And it was a special thing to get that day. Maybe we were shopping for school clothes or something, I don't know. But then she would also take us to that little lunch counter for lunch. And I mean, it transports me back to like 1972, when I was in the single digits in age. And yeah, food really does transport you, for sure, eating it and even sometimes just smelling it.
JAYMEE SIRE: Absolutely, so we started with Ted now and we ended with Ted way back when he was having his first turkey club. It has been a joy to hear everything else in between. So thank you again for joining the podcast.
TED ALLEN: Thank you, Jaymee, I appreciate it. It was really fun.
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JAYMEE SIRE: Wow, he did not disappoint. I expected nothing less from Ted Allen. But I loved how he really just dove into the behind the scenes of Chopped and how that operation goes about its day to day business, because it really is an operation with a lot of different moving parts. And he peeled back the curtain for us a little bit.
I know this probably doesn't matter to you guys out there, but I think it's crazy that he does not wear an earpiece. I think that's just a testament to how talented he is. And he doesn't need a producer in his ear. So I loved hearing just about that and also the research packets. And again, there's just so much that goes into that show that everybody loves so much sitting at home. And he really gave us an insider look at that.
Of course, we had to bring up the cats. He is the originator, apparently, of the Food Network Maine Coon club. I guess it's a club now, or a posse. I'm not sure. But it was really hard to fit everything in that I wanted to ask in that interview. We did cover a lot. And I hope we satisfied your guys' Chopped obsession. Of course, you can catch new episodes of Chopped and much more Ted Allen every Tuesday at 9:00/8:00 Central, only on Food Network.
As always, thanks so much for listening. And make sure to tap that subscribe button if you haven't already so you don't miss a single thing. If you enjoyed today's episode or any of our previous episodes, be sure to rate and review. We do love when you do that. That's it for now though, we'll catch you foodies next Friday on Food Network Obsessed.
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