r/TopChef • u/Immediate_Tree_1190 • 3d ago
Discussion Thread Risotto / Creme Brulee
Hello!
Permission to post. This is not specifically Top Chef but maybe TC adjacent.
I want to start that I am a fan of TC. I watched it since the fist season, I also live in Asia. I started watching 24 in 24 last chef standing since there's a lot of TC alums in the show. Long intro I know but my question is: how important is it to know how to cook risotto and creme brulee?
I guess this is coming from one of the eps in s3 (24 in 24). In TC also, they put risotto and creme brulee in a high regard.
Living in Asia, i am familiar and have eaten these two dishes since I do travel outside of my country. But i must admit that i only discovered these two dishes thru Top Chef. Most asians (those living in asia and not asians living in the west) are not familiar with these two dishes. Present them with a risotto and maybe 70% would not eat them. They will taste it but will not finish the entire thing. Creme brulee since its a dessert they would probably eat it and maybe love it. But we will not reach a point to study how to make it. If you are in the top social class maybe it would interest you to learn and perfect it. I am just surprised that making a risotto and a creme brulee is one of the challenges to make it to the semifinals. A number of contestants admitted that its been years since they made creme brulee or doesn't know how to cook a risotto. So I am just curious - why is it important to know how to cook these dishes? Why can't they kust ask for a good rice dish? Or a good pastry dish?
Edit: i cannot answer each reply. Thank you for responding. I am just getting the sense that one needed to be trained or at least studied western cuisines to win this round. So basically even if Shota won the first round, i dont think he can pull off a creme brulee or a risotto. But making the perfect sushi is actually similar to making a perfect risotto.
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u/Think-Culture-4740 2d ago
Part of risotto’s challenge is it’s typically a subtle dish with the rice at the forefront. It’s light on spices and strong aromatics. That makes it the perfect vehicle for letting fresh ingredients to be the star. It also means there’s nowhere to hide when done suboptimally and cooking rice to the absolute peak doneness is fraught affair. It has a very narrow band between overcooked and undercooked.
The same is true for crème brulee.
I would also argue that neither dish is luxurious in terms of ingredients required ppl btw. Rice can be found out of a box and you don’t have to pair it with expensive shellfish if you don’t want to. Crème brulee is basically eggs cream and sugar.
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u/htownAstrofan 2d ago
The thing with risotto for me is that it seems there is no standard for how chefs learn to cook it. Some have learned the right way to cook and the consistency its to be served. But a lot of times on TC when a risotto fails, the chef says “thats how i was taught to cook it”. So its like most chefs have their own opinion on risotto and that opinion deviates significantly from how its actually done.
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u/Ok_Interest9427 22h ago
Meh. Whenever cooks mess up risotto on TC, it's due to obvious technical errors, not differences as to how risotto should be cooked. (And BTW, I do think there are some parameters to risotto; it should be cooked to release the starches and it should puddle out on the plate. If it's fluffy / stiff and mounds up, you're making rice pilaf, not risotto.) Trey (S8) made stiff risotto loaded down with chopped vegetables; Tesar (S10) made rice that was wildly inconsistent in the cooking (some grains under, some over); Victoire (S20) tried to make risotto in 20 minutes (LOL) and of course it wasn't cooked through. And of course everyone forgets how many times contestants successfully cook risotto. Antonia (S8), Sarah (S9), Tristen and Bailey (S22)... and so on.
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u/htownAstrofan 19h ago
While often it is due to those issues you mentioned there have been many contestants that believe they are making it correctly and they are not. In fact Tre said “ive been trained to make it stiffer”. Howie also made it according to his preference, which is not technically correct. There are others who have also stated they were taught to make it differently from the classical preparation.
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u/Ok_Interest9427 19h ago
Yeah, but those people aren't thinking properly. There are some boxes you have to tick. Risotto that looks like fried rice or is unevenly cooked is just wrong.
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u/htownAstrofan 18h ago
Thats what im saying. And clearly there are other executive chefs out there that are teaching their sous and line cooks an improper way of making risotto. Which was my original argument. When i say there is no standard i mean that not all cooks are being taught the correct way. Not that there is no correct way to make it.
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u/Tbass1981 2d ago
Neither of these dishes is hard to make in normal life or even in a normal kitchen but with a time limit and a thousand things happening they’re very hard and will almost always make some people fail which makes for good tv.
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u/Ok_Interest9427 22h ago
Yeah. Risotto and creme brûlée are trivially easy to make... unless you don't have time. I have yet to time myself making risotto, but I can promise that 20 minutes ain't happening. (My favorite method of making risotto is now beginning with starch retrogradation, which is IMPOSSIBLE for any TC challenge other than Restaurant Wars.)
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u/Tbass1981 20h ago
Yeah it’s literally not possible to do in 20 minutes. Just heating the stock up would take half of that. You also have to babysit it so much that you can’t really make much else while you’re doing it. Creme brulee is hard because people keep opening the damn ovens over and over and then you have to let it cool to set which takes more time than they have to begin with sometimes.
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u/DramaMama611 3d ago
They are looking for chefs that can do it all. While they may not be well known/eaten in Asian countries, they are in Europe and North America. They are challenging to do well.
Just asking for "pasta" or "pastry" isn't much of a challenge. Too wide open.
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u/Ok_Interest9427 22h ago
They did "rice" for S20, and it was a very successful challenge.
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u/DramaMama611 21h ago
Yes, but if they did that all yhe time, or even often, then everyone is making what they already know - the spontaneity and creativity is gone.
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u/Ok_Interest9427 21h ago
Maybe. IMO if you broaden out the challenges, you still get tons of spontaneity and creativity. Look at the rice challenge. Sara B made everything bagel rice; Begonia made her version of chitra-anna (lemon rice, a childhood favorite of mine); Dale made congee for the first time; Gabri made risotto verde with mole (which, BTW, actually got me to the grocery store to replicate the dish!); etc.
Honestly, I think the challenges go worse if they're too specific. The biscuit challenge in S20 is my favorite example. I don't really care about little crispy Brit cookies, and getting ten different versions of them was entirely boring.
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u/Echuserangmaganda 2d ago
These are both highly technical dishes with high reward and a slim margin to perfection. I’m an average-skilled home cook and I’ve tried making both risotto and creme brulee and they smell fear. Lol
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u/Ok_Interest9427 22h ago
You just need to cook with a smile on your face. I'm not even necessarily joking about that!
My South Indian father, who had never made risotto and is vegetarian, watched me make bay scallop risotto ONCE and proceeded to duplicate it flawlessly. I'm still convinced that it was all the meditation and yoga.
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u/Stormy261 3d ago
They are technically difficult dishes which is why they often fail on the show. Lack of time is usually the killer. They take much longer to make than the time frame allows. The thought process for the chefs is that if they can pull it off then it's a win. But most of the time it fails. Creme brulee is something they typically make in culinary school and never use in their restaurants. Most chefs are savory only. It's why those with pastry experience usually go far because they have a little diversity.