[Losa] Korean people... We're very humble
and we don't like to brag.
[Jun] I'm going to honorably and humbly...
-kick their ass. -[Emma] Okay.
[laughs] It's like, "Game on."
[Esther] Their technique, on another level,
and that's the Korean way.
[Jun] Twenty minutes?
I thought it was 20 second.
[Emma] And I'm watching the time...
dwindle away.
Just do one of these.
Oh, my gosh.
[Alyse] We're known for very strong flavors.
Like fully sweating.
-[Esther] Let's go, chefs! -[Alyse] Come on, chefs. You can do it.
Finish up strong,
-[Esther] Come on, guys. -[Chris] Whoo!
[Esther] I'm gonna have a heart attack.
There's two types of Koreans.
There's the humble ones like me,
and there's also the crazy ones...
like me. [laughs]
[crackling]
In my career, I work with a lot of Michelin-star chefs,
Chef Joel Robuchon, Alain Ducasse,
mainly French cuisine.
As I got older, I realized how important it is
to know where you came from, your history, your lineage.
[speaks Korean]
[chomps, laughs]
My style of cooking is royal cuisine
with a modern flair.
In royal cuisine, everything looks effortless,
but there's a lot of thought behind it.
We think about seasonality, color, texture.
I wanna win Chopped for my parents.
They came to a country not knowing the language,
but worked every day to put food in our belly,
and I'm always forever grateful.
Ta-da!
Um...
I do get a lot of the stage fright,
but I think I'm getting a lot better.
Sometimes. [laughs]
I am chef, co-owner of C as in Charlie
in New York City.
My restaurant is Korean tapas style.
Mushrooms down.
The foundation comes from our childhood memories,
those flavors from Korea, which I can never forget.
Our family moved to Atlanta, Georgia,
when I was 11 years old.
So my style of food, it's certainly Korean and American...
all at once.
Excellent.
I'm very hard to beat
because I have one of the busiest restaurant in the city.
Delicious.
[Jun] I'm a Korean chef from Austin, Texas.
And when you taste my food, you can taste Korea
and Texas barbecue.
Korean and Texas...
perfect combination, you know?
Alrighty.
I grew up in Korea,
and then I came to the United States 10 years ago,
and I got trained
in one of the best French restaurant in New York City.
And I just moved to Texas Austin to pursue my dream.
To open my own barbecue joint.
Smoky, smoky.
The reason why I love the Texas barbecue
is it takes a lot of time and love.
And if you put love in your food,
the food come out perfect.
It tastes like Texas.
So for the other chefs, I'm gonna honorably
and humbly kick their ass with my skills.
Enjoy.
I'm the executive chef and owner
of Whistle Pig Korean in Bozeman, Montana.
We had one Korean family come in and they were like,
"There's Korean restaurant in Montana."
They were pretty confused but happy.
A happy confusion.
[laughs]
My dishes always have, um...
Flavorful flavors?
That sentence doesn't work. [laughs hysterically]
Korean cuisine is a lovely mixture
from Chinese influences
as well as some Japanese influences.
Lot of garlic, soy,
this wonderful culture of fermentation.
Gochujang has this savory, rich umami flavor to it.
So I was adopted from Korea when I was three and a half
to a white family on Cape Cod.
Oh, yeah, I would definitely feel imposter syndrome
when it comes to cooking Korean food,
because I did not grow up in a Korean family
winning Chopped would help me forever
say, "Shut up," to my imposter syndrome.
Hello, chefs.
-[Emma] Hello! -Hi, Ted.
[Ted] We are thrilled to welcome you
to a very special Korean cuisine battle.
You each have a strong Korean culinary point of view,
and we want you to celebrate
and share that with us through your dishes.
I'm so ready.
Appetizer basket is yours.
Open it up.
Oh, okay.
Oh.
[Ted] And you'll be working with jokbal.
Smells delicious. [chuckles]
Jokbal, it's a late night snack.
Jokbal is pork feet,
very common dish in Korea.
Cucumber kimchi.
[Ted] Cucumber kimchi.
Hell, yeah.
[Ted] Canned mackerel.
[Jun] My favorite.
-Huh. -[Ted] And Yuja compote.
Yuja?
[Eric] Everything is really familiar.
It looks like items when I'm really hungry
late at night. [chuckles]
[Ted] You'll have 20 minute for your first plates.
Time starts now.
-[Esther] Let's go. -[judges whooping]
Let's go chefs, make us proud.
[Ted] We have an excellent judging panel,
all obsessed with Korean cuisine.
Chef Chris Oh.
Esther Choi.
And food editor, Alyse Whitney.
We're calling this our Seoul searching competition,
S-E-O-U-L that is.
What will you be searching for?
[Alyse] I'm looking for their soul.
We wanna know their story,
and I think that a lot of us will resonate with them.
[Esther] This basket is so uniquely Korean.
So jokbal, pig trotters.
It is very gelatinous.
It's like unctuous and soft and chewy
and tender, all at the same time.
But Koreans love jokbal's.
-specifically Korean women... -Woman.
-Yes. -...because it's great for our skin.
-That's our collagen. -That why we're so beautiful.
-[laughs] -Lots of jokbal.
[Eric] Jokbal, this is my late night snack.
When I go out drinking with my friends.
I think I can make jokbal ssam,
which is a lettuce wrap.
I'm making a fried jokbal ssam
and yuja sauce.
Right behind you.
The jokbal itself is already cooked,
but I wanted to approach it as if it fits a chicharrones.
Fry them until very crisp.
[Esther] The canned mackerel,
it is a very specific flavor.
You can maybe break it down into a sauce,
like kind of use it as fish sauce.
Chef Jun, what are you making for us today?
[Jun] I'm making smoked jokbal and mackerel.
-Very innovative. Okay. -[Esther] Oh, it's smoked. All right.
[Jun] I'm born and raised in Korea,
and I don't wanna make the food that I grow up with.
I'm gonna use all my knowledge and skill
to create a new thing.
I just wanna bring Southern barbecue spin
to Korean ingredient.
[Losa] For my appetizer, I decided to make
a Korean pancake,
because in the Korean pancake
you can put different proteins and vegetables.
I was inspired by this dish
because my mother made it for me last night. [chuckles]
[in English]
Yes, she did it [chuckles] because I was hungry.
I grabbed the jokbal and canned mackerel
and add it into the pancake batter
with the cucumber kimchi.
[Ted] So for people who don't know Korean food at all,
kimchi is basically a fermented,
spicy collection of different vegetables.
-[Esther] It's an ingredient. -[Chris] It's like a staple
-of what it is, really. -[Esther] Yeah.
Thanksgiving, there was the turkey, mashed potatoes,
and kimchi.
Grab some of this mackerel here
Canned mackerel, it is delicious.
It is high in fat, very flavorful.
And I'm just like dumplings.
They are delicious,
especially if I fry them.
Chef Emma, what are you making for us?
I am making fried mandu.
-Ooh! -[Emma] With the pork and the mackerel filling.
And then I'm gonna make a sauce
with the yuja and the cucumber kimchi.
[Esther] The fact that you are even making
mandu in less than 20 minutes,
that takes a lot of work and a lot of time.
Okay, chefs, you've got eight and a half minutes on the clock.
-[Eric] Heard. -[Emma] Heard.
The Yuja is Korean clementine.
I'm making yuja makgeolli sauce.
I'm taking the rice wine.
I add xanthan gum to thicken the sauce.
-[Jun] Ooh. -[sizzling]
I'm thinking with the yuja compote
and the kimchi to make a sauce.
Bourbon go really well
with the smokiness of my dish.
This is the barbecue technique that I most love.
Four and a half minutes to go, chefs.
-[Esther] Let's go, chef's. -[Alyse] Oh.
-Let's go. You're almost there. -[Esther] Less than...
-...five minutes. -[Alyse] Finish strong.
[Emma] Time is flying, and I need to start folding my mandu.
Wow, making mandu in 20 minutes is very intense.
[Esther] She's folding them.
Then she has to cook these.
[Emma] I'm not gonna lie. I'm really nervous.
I know it's risky and I'm watching the time dwindle away.
[Esther] There is not enough time.
-[Chris] Oh, my gosh. -Oh, my gosh.
[intense music playing]
Chef behind, behind, right behind
[Emma] Time is going faster than I thought.
But I know I can get them in the fryer in time.
Chef Emma, is pleating mandu so fast.
[Emma] I run to the fryer and I drop them in.
Behind, down the line.
[Eric] The cucumber kimchi I'm gonna put it in a bowl
with rice wine vinegar and a dash of the sesame oil.
I'm chopping off the mackerels to incorporate as well.
[fizzing]
[Jun] I'm torching the jokbal,
so it has even more smoky flavor.
[Ted] Thirty seconds, chefs.
-[Esther] Let's go, chefs. -[Alyse] Come on, chefs.
You can do it. You can do it.
Pull through.
Make sure you have everything you want on it.
Finish up strong.
-[Chris] Let's go! -[Esther] Oh, my God! Chefs!
[Ted] All right, chefs. Don't drop the ball now.
Ten, nine, eight, seven, six,
five, four, three, two, one.
-Time's up. Please step back. -[Chris] Whoa! [chuckles]
[Alyse clapping] Yeah.
-Wow! -Wow!
[all clapping]
[Jun] Tougher than I thought.
Twenty minutes? I thought it was 20 second.
But I did my best.
I showed them who I am.
[Emma] When I look over at Chef Eric's dish,
I'm feeling nervous.
The competition is really tight.
So far, it's been a great journey and I just--
I hope it keeps on going.
Four chefs who love Korean cooking
just made appetizers with jokbal,
cucumber kimchi,
canned mackerel
and yuja compote.
Chef Losa, please tell us about your first course?
So I made a Korean pancake
made like a little gastrique with the yuja.
How do you feel being here celebrating Korean cuisine?
You know, it makes me really proud
because our cuisine was so quiet
for the longest time, so secretive.
Korean people were very humble,
and we don't like to brag,
but I think our food and our culture, we should brag.
[Ted] That's great.
[Chris] Growing up wasn't a profession
that was celebrated in our culture.
But now, to see so many Korean chefs
killing it in the industry, I mean, I'm gonna cry.
[Esther] Yeah, right?
This is a really special moment, you guys.
[Alyse] Yup.
-Yeah. -It was a little bit of a gamble
to put all of the ingredients...
-[Losa chuckles] Yeah. -...basically into one pancake,
'cause what if it had burned?
What if-- What if something had gone awry?
But you managed to cook a perfect jeon for us.
[Chris] I love how you use the jokbal in the jeon
because you get kind of that chewy texture.
The one thing that kind of gets lost is the cucumber kimchi.
But the sauce is really delicious.
The sweetness of the yuja great pairing with the jeon.
Thank you so much.
[Ted] Okay. Next up, Chef Eric.
I have for you a fried jokbal ssam.
The jokbal itself I wanted to approach it
as if it fits a chicharrones with yuja vinaigrette.
The presentation was beautiful,
seeing the cabbage wrapped around the wonderful filling.
My concern was that the jokbal,
because they were fried after being braised,
were a little bit um, tough.
[Chris] So Chef, I would have maybe just used, like,
the tips of the cabbage to go with a thinner portion,
'cause cabbage has such a neutral flavor
that it kind of like muddles out the rest
of the ingredients in the dish.
[Esther] The sauce is good, but very, very subtle.
I think that you could go
a little heavier on the seasoning.
Like, more, more Seoul, you know?
[chuckles] I see what you did there.
-[Chris laughs] -[Esther chuckles] More Seoul.
Thank you.
Next up, we have Chef Emma.
So I have prepared for you a fried mandu
filled with the pork and mackerel.
And then I use the cucumber kimchi and yuja
to make a lovely,
sweet and sour dipping sauce for it.
[Ted] Okay.
What inspired you to go in this direction, Chef?
I was adopted from Korea when I was three and a half.
So I grew up in a white family.
My parents would do a Korean culture camp every year,
and we would fold a mandu together,
learn taekwondo and do fan dances.
So this is just like a little taste of my childhood.
[Alyse] I'm adopted from Korea as well,
and I went to Korean culture camp.
So your story is very special to me.
[Esther] And I could tell, that you have made
hundreds and thousands of mandu...
-[chuckles] -[Esther]...by your mandu that you made today.
There's lots to do in 20 minutes,
and it's very impressive that you got all of that done.
-Thank you, Chef. -[Esther] Yeah.
I am obsessed with the crunch,
and I forgot that you used jokbal,
because it imitated ground pork
the way that you chopped it, really fine.
Yes. Thank you.
[Chris] The one thing, I wish the fillings a little bit more like,
-fluffier. -[Esther] Yes.
Uh, to kind of get like, that pillowy texture
and, like definitely needed enough spice.
Like, look at your judges.
Like spice it up.
Show us your, like, real potential and personality.
Noted. [chuckles]
-[Ted] All right. -Thank you, Chef.
Finally, Chef Jun.
I made for you guys...
[Jun reading]
[cutlery clinking]
[Esther] You did a lovely job in treating the jokbal.
The smokiness worked so nicely
with the sauce that you made, the yuja and cucumber.
But I feel like you could have manipulated
some of the other ingredients a bit more.
[Alyse] I agree. It feels a little bit
incomplete in that.
You kind of just have the basket ingredients
very beautifully plated.
But we wanna showcase the skills of your cooking.
[Chris] You know this in between like two buns,
even like, you're doing barbecue, right?
Some white bread, it'd be amazing with this.
Uh, but all in all, I enjoyed the sauce.
I enjoyed the textures of the cucumbers,
the fish, even the fish.
Like, I like the little like, fishy bites that you take
with the jokbal.
Thank you.
Thank you, chefs.
[Jun] I just tried to show who am I.
And I think in that purpose, I think I, I did great.
[Eric] I have no regrets with the dish.
The Korean cuisine is mainly focused
towards entree dishes,
so I don't wanna get chopped.
I'm not gonna get chopped.
So whose dish is on the chopping block?
Chef Jun, you've been chopped.
Judges?
[Alyse] Chef, Jun,
we loved your approach
to incorporating your love of Southern barbecue
and Korean food.
However, there was a lack of creativity
as far as transforming the ingredients in the basket.
And so we had to chop you.
Appreciate it.
All your advice. Thank you so much.
Thank you so much, Chef.
Thank you, Chef.
I hundred percent agree,
and I humbly I take their advice
and I'm gonna use it to make me
greater and bigger as a chef.
Chef Emma, Chef Eric, Chef Losa.
Second basket awaits.
Open it up.
Okay. [chuckles]
It's very interesting. [chuckles]
[Ted] You've got Korean fried chicken.
[Emma in sing-song voice] Chicken.
[Eric] Fried Chicken.
This is a popular dish in our restaurant.
[Ted] Eggplant.
Beautiful eggplant.
I love it.
-Galbi! -[Ted] Korean short ribs.
[Emma] Oh, perfect Korean short ribs.
Okay, now I have two proteins.
What am I gonna do? [laughing]
[Ted] And sweet potato noodles.
Thirty minutes to make great plates.
Time starts now.
-[Esther] Let's go, chefs. -[Alyse] Let's go, chefs.
-Yes. Tell us what you got. -Bring us the flavor.
[Emma] I got the gochujang and the gochugaru.
[Ted] Kind of feels to me as if these three chefs might
be pretty evenly matched.
I think it's anyone's game at this point.
I think with the appetizer round
they all did a phenomenal job.
I do think that they can be
a little bit bolder in this round.
I wanna see their true selves come out more
like their personality come out.
Someone have soy sauce?
-[Eric] Yes, I have. -Okay. Take some.
The judges say that they wanted
a little bit more spice,
I think... Okay.
[laughs cunningly]
It's like, "Game on. We can do this."
I start marinating the meat right away.
Soy sauce, honey,
mirin, garlic.
Ginger.
-[Chris] Chef Emma? -[Emma] Yes.
What do you got cooking over there?
Galbi-jjim.
-Spicy. -Oh, my gosh!
-Okay. Ah! -[Ted] Okay, now what's that?
Galbi-jjim is basically a soy braised Korean beef dish.
Normally, it's braised over a long period of time
to get that nice beef stew kind of flavor, texture.
[Emma] I decide because it is the thinner cut.
Okay, 30 minutes.
Maybe I can actually be able
to braise this in that amount of time.
Next I start making my spicy sauce.
Which is gochujang.
So the fermented chili pepper paste.
Gochugaru which is Korean chili pepper flakes.
Chef Eric, can I steal some fish sauce from you?
-Yes. -Thank you.
[Eric] The entree round is the most important in Korean cuisine.
For this round, I wanna showcase,
Korean traditional dish.
[Chris] Chef Eric.
-[Eric] Yes. -What you got cooking over there?
[Eric] So I'm making
-a eggplant sot bap. -[Alyse exclaims] Oh!
-Oh, sot bap -Okay.
And with the galbi-gui
because we love our galbi with a rice.
So we're gonna be serving with dakgaejang
because Korean never go wrong with soup.
-You have a lot of work to do, Chef. -Wow. [chuckles]
He's trying to make a full Korean meal,
which is the rice,
the guk, which is soup,
the main protein, which he's making grilled short ribs.
So he's literally making us the full Korean meal.
[Alyse] But in 30 minutes.
Yeah.
[Eric] This is very tough to make in 30 minutes time frame.
But I'm gonna do this.
[Losa] With the Korean beef,
I'm gonna grind it with jalapeno,
the carrot and the chicken.
And I'm gonna make a stuffed eggplant
The bone, I'm gonna utilize it to make
a really rich beef broth.
I add anchovy and salted shrimp
to complement more of the Korean flavors.
[cutlery clinks]
Fifteen minutes
Once the eggplant is ready and tender enough,
I stuff it with the beautiful meat mixture.
[Emma] I wanna get a little bit of color,
caramelization on the short ribs,
and then I add in my spicy sauce.
And I'm just praying that my short ribs cook in time.
Hope you get tender enough.
With the eggplant,
I'm gonna make an eggplant jeon.
I make my batter and I'm adding the minced up
Korean fried chicken and eggplant.
Okay, see how this goes.
[Eric] This eggplant, I incorporate into my rice.
It's gonna add a little more texture to the rice.
Sweet potato noodles.
I have to boil it until it's very tender
before I put it into the soup.
Chefs, less than nine minutes on the clock.
[Losa] Already, huh?
Eye ya ya.
The sweet potato noodle is a very specific texture. It's very chewy.
-And you can undercook it too. -Yeah.
-Uh-huh. -[Chris] Undercooked noodles.
It's almost inedible.
[Losa] Once my eggplant is almost ready.
And I realized,
"Oh, my God, I didn't put the sweet potato noodles." [chuckles]
Oh, crap.
I almost forgot the noodles.
[Alyse] Oh, my gosh! Chef Losa just dropped her sweet potato noodles.
As Chris said, an undercooked
noodle that can really ruin the dish.
Just do one of these.
[Losa] My noodles have to be incorporated into the mix,
so I have to re-stuff the eggplants and plate it.
You have to start plating, chefs.
I'm hearing the judges saying,
"Hurry up plate the food."
So I'm panicking.
One minute, chefs.
[Esther] There is not enough time.
-That's not enough. -[Chris] Oh, my gosh.
-[Esther] Oh, my God. -[Alyse] Come on!
[Esther] I'll gonna have a heart attack!
Oh, my gosh!
[Chris] Let's go, guys!
-Let's go, chefs! -[Alyse] Come on, you can do it.
-Hustle, hustle! -Oh, my gosh!
I'm gonna, I'm gonna freak out.
[Eric] This sweet potato noodles are very difficult.
They're slipping away as if they're trying to escape from me.
[Ted] Chefs, that clock is unforgiving.
-[Chris] Let's go! -[Ted] Ten, nine...
-You've got this. Get it on the plate. -[Ted]...eight, seven...
-Get it on the plate. -[Ted]...six, five,
-four... -[Esther] You can do it.
[Ted]...three, two, one.
Time's up.
-[all clapping] -[Chris] What?
-[Esther] Oh, my God! -[Alyse] Oh, my God!
Ted. I'm gonna freaking have a heart attack. [chuckles]
This is Chopped and you have 30 minutes,
-and we're not kidding about that. -Uh-uh-- [sighs in relief]
[Losa] I'm a little worried.
Had to put new stuffing and I kind of rushed it.
I'm not feeling that confident.
I wish I had a little bit more time
to braise my short ribs
And I'm hoping that it doesn't come back to bite me.
Judges are expecting incredible entrees
made with Korean fried chicken, eggplant,
Korean short ribs and sweet potato noodles.
Chef Emma, please tell us about your main course.
I have prepared for you a spicy galbi-jjim
with a Korean fried chicken and eggplant jeon on top.
[Ted] So galbi-jjim,
what is that in the tra-- When it's made traditionally?
Traditionally, it is probably slow braised.
Korean short ribs.
First of all, this is exactly what I was looking for
when we first got here.
Super bold flavors.
I love the spice.
[Alyse] I'm like, fully sweating.
-[chuckles] I told you. -[Esther] A little too spicy.
Are you sure you're Korean?
-[all chuckling] -Just like a little, little glistening.
But um, I love a crispy eggplant jeon.
So, having a crispy eggplant, a bouncy noodle and flavorful meat,
um, was a nice trifecta, and overall, the flavor was really there.
[Esther] But when you cook short ribs,
it's... it's either gonna be, like, kissed on the grill
or really braised hard and falling off the bone.
And when it's that in-between, the texture gets very, very tough.
So that's kind of what ended up happening here.
Making the right decisions always really matters.
[Ted] Thank you, Chef Emma.
Next up, Chef Eric.
All right, chefs, I have for you
eggplant sot bap with galbi-gui
and on the side we have dakgaejang
which is a spicy chicken soup.
[Ted] That was very ambitious.
Did you get everything on the plate you needed to get on there?
Um, hopefully, everything's on it.
[Alyse] The meat is cooked really nicely,
and you imparted a lot of flavor in a short amount of time.
And the chicken, um, is very tender.
But I didn't get any noodles in my portion.
[Chris] I didn't have any noodles,
but it did taste very delicious.
You basically made a dish that, you know, I think we've all grown up on.
Very comforting, very flavorful.
I do like the char on the beef and the marinade.
[Esther] I actually did get noodles in mine,
which I really enjoyed. Sorry, guys.
[all laughing]
This was a very ambitious play.
But, um, I can see, uh, how technically, uh, impeccable you are as a chef.
Thank you, Chef.
Chef, what would winning Chopped mean for you?
[Eric] Since I opened up my own restaurant,
I did get a lot of the recognition.
But for this Chopped competition,
it's purely about me as a chef, my own point of view.
So, winning this will prove that I can trust myself.
[Ted] Thank you, Chef Eric.
Next up, Chef Losa.
I have a stuffed eggplant,
made a very flavorful broth with some salted shrimp,
and the bones from the short ribs.
[Ted] Chef, what would it mean to you to win this competition?
So during COVID, it made me reconnect with my mother
because we were cooking side by side.
And she taught me some stuff that I never knew.
It reminded me how important family is.
And I want my mom to know that, you know, she means a lot to me.
So, I do appreciate when a chef makes
something very subtle-flavored, very clean.
I can taste the beef bones in the broth.
I can taste the short rib in the stuffing.
It is a little bit of a gamble to, kind of, put
all of the basket ingredients into one.
It did suffer from not being able to cook for long enough,
and we did see you kind of battle at the last minute there.
[Alyse] I agree with Chef Esther.
There was an undercook on the meat,
and, I think, the noodles,
even though it was a little undercooked,
they added a really nice bounce and chew within the filling.
[Ted] Okay.
The desert round is up next for two of you.
[Emma] I really feel confident.
But Eric doing the very traditional Korean meal,
the judges all really loved.
[Losa] Not everything went according to plan on my dish,
but my flavors were there, which is very important.
So, whose dish is on the chopping block?
Chef Losa, you have been chopped. Judges?
Chef Losa, I think your biggest enemy
-in this round was time... -Yes.
...and your Korean short ribs were undercooked.
And so, we had to chop you.
For me, it was never all about just winning.
I think I made my mother proud today
because I represented the food that she used to make us,
and I'm very grateful.
[Ted] Chef Emma, Chef Eric,
last set of mystery ingredients.
Let's go.
-Okay. -Okay.
-[Ted] What will you do with bungeoppang... -Bungeoppang.
Bungeoppang is a crispy batter filled with sweet red bean.
-Persimmon! -...persimmons...
-Korean corn dogs... -[Eric] Korean corn dogs,
I'm very confused
how to incorporate this into a dessert.
[Ted]...and strawberry milk?
[Emma] Ugh. Okay.
[Ted] Thirty minutes to make dessert.
Round starts now.
-[judges cheering] -[Esther] Let's go, chefs!
Final round!
[Alyse] Let's go last time!
-[Esther] Show us what you've got! -[Alyse] Make it shine.
[Ted] Judges, are Korean desserts the same sweetness level
as we expect in America and Europe
-or are they different? -[Esther] I mean,
growing up, I had fruit for dessert.
I feel like the most traditional Korean dessert that I can think of
-is papingsu... -[Chris] Yeah.
...which is, uh, shaved ice,
uh, with the red beans on top.
We do have a red bean-stuffed pastry, right?
Pastry. It's like... a bungeoppang is a common Korean street food,
which is these fish-shaped pastries...
-[Ted] MMm-hmm. -...stuffed with red bean.
I love sweet red bean.
It is one of my favorite things to eat.
With the bungeoppang, I am going to remove the filling,
and utilize that in a mascarpone sweet red bean cream.
-Let's go in... -Chef Emma, tell us what you're making.
[Emma] I am going to make a strawberry milk crepe
topped with the outside of a corndog crumble.
[Ted] Now for Emma to decide to make a crepe,
it does take a while to get enough crepes
to make the plates.
That's a tough one to pull off.
[Esther] Chef Eric,
are you gonna bring us some delicious dessert?
Um, I do have a plan, trying to make a...
banana pudding in a different form.
Okay.
[Eric] As soon as I saw the persimmons, it was very ripe.
I could substitute my bananas with those ripened persimmons
into the banana pudding.
For the egg whites,
I'm gonna make, uh, the meringue.
And to make my pudding,
I'm gonna make the creme anglaise
with my egg yolk.
And then I'm gonna put a little bit of strawberry milk.
Let's see how sweet this is.
Flavored milks are a very big part of, like,
-our childhood growing up. -[Ted] Okay.
[Alyse] Using the strawberry milk in a crepe is really smart,
'cause it infuses not only flavor, but color.
So we'll get, maybe, a pink crepe.
Chefs, you've got 15 minutes on the clock.
[Eric] Fifteen minutes.
[Alyse] Korean corn dogs have sugar on the outside, typically,
that's something that's sweet and savory, normally.
One of the best parts of a creamed corn dog is the outside crispiness.
I am going to make a Korean corn dog crumble,
and add it to a skillet
with some butter and sugar.
Crisp that up.
Persimmon is my favorite fruit.
The flavor profile, I would say, is like,
peach nectarine, but also, like...
-Pumpkin, kinda? Yeah. -...pumpkin-ish, too, texture-wise.
[Emma] With the persimmons, I'm going to soak them
in a honey and plum syrup,
which is going to make them naturally taste sweeter and juicier.
[Eric] Korean corn dogs,
I'm going to utilize this as a wafer
that we use for the banana pudding.
And then, I'm going to grab
the red bean paste from the bungeoppang,
and I'm gonna soak this into the corn dog.
Chefs, less than eight minutes to go here.
[Emma] I need to start cooking my crepes
because if I mess them up,
I need time to make extras.
[Esther] It's risky, and sometimes,
you have to keep making it to make it perfect.
So, time really is her enemy again.
First one is never good.
And if she doesn't ever get it right,
-she's lost her vessel-- -And her batter.
-[Esther] And her strawberry milk. -[Chris] Yeah, exactly.
-[Alyse] Yeah. -[Emma] I'm figuring out the skillet.
I'm figuring out the temperature of the stove.
And my crepes are starting to cook unevenly.
-Oh, no. -Oh, come on.
[Emma] I cannot get chopped over this.
[Emma] Time is flying.
My crepes are not looking great.
And I'm just worried that I took a risk.
I have to get them done right.
[Esther] She's really heavily buttering now.
-More butter... more better. -[Alyse] More better.
Now that the cast iron is hot enough, it shouldn't stick.
[Emma] Finally, I figure out the correct heat on the stove.
We've become friends, and we're cooperating together, finally.
Next, I start working on filling my crepes.
-[Esther] Less than two minutes. -[Alyse] Two minutes?
-Less than two minutes away. -Oh, my gosh.
[Emma] Two minutes, heard.
[Eric] I add strawberry milk creme anglaise on the bottom.
Next, corn dog batters...
and then my persimmons on top.
The next thing, I'm adding salt.
[Ted] A persimmon pudding with meringue on top,
sign me up!
[Alyse] Finish up strong!
-Let's go! -Oh, my gosh, chefs!
Make it sweet!
-[Esther] Last-minute touches! -[Chris] Lets' go!
[Ted] Okay, this is it, chefs, final seconds.
-[Esther] Okay. -[Esther and Alyse] Final seconds!
-[Ted] Ten, nine... -[Alyse] Make us proud!
-[Esther] Let's go, chefs! -...eight, seven...
-six, five, four... -[Chris] Let's go!
...three, two, one...
-Time's up! -[judges clapping, cheering]
-Whoo. -[Alyse] Yeah!
We did it.
[both chuckling]
[Eric sighs] The desert round is the toughest one.
I wanted to do a banana pudding.
And it did go really according to the plan.
[Emma] My crepes are a little bit thicker
than I would have liked.
But hopefully, it all... does well. [chuckles nervously]
[Ted] Chef Emma and Chef Eric,
your mission was to make desserts with bungeoppang,
persimmons,
Korean corn dogs,
and strawberry milk.
Chef Eric, please tell us about your dessert.
So, chefs, I made a persimmon pudding
and it is covered with meringue.
-I do think that the concept was really creative. -Thank you.
[Alyse] The persimmons have a great texture and flavor.
-And I saw that you added a little salt too, right? -Yes.
That brings out the sweetness in a different way.
I love the idea and the inspiration you had.
Unfortunately, your execution fell short a bit.
Your pudding part definitely curdled.
Yes, the execution was a little off,
but if you close your eyes, I mean...
[all laughing]
...I mean, it all tastes really good.
My most favorite part of this dish is the corn dog batter,
because you've got, like, that, kind of,
chewy, crunchy texture, that kind of soaked in all these flavors.
[Ted] All right.
Finally, Chef Emma.
I have made for you a strawberry milk crepe
filled with a sweet red bean mascarpone cream
topped off with corn dog crumble.
We watched you through your crepe journey.
-Yes. [chuckles] -So to see you accomplish the crepe was really cool.
Thank you.
The flavors here are so traditionally Korean,
but done in such a beautiful way.
The red bean mascarpone, I'm going to steal that...
-[Emma chuckles] -...because it is brilliant.
[Emma] Thank you so much.
[Chris] The crepe could've been a little bit thinner,
a little bit more crispier,
but, Chef, all in all, I feel like I would literally be having this
in the streets of Korea.
Thank you.
Thank you, chefs.
Judges, we have never had a battle that focused
entirely on Korean cooking.
What do you think? Was it successful?
Undeniably. It was just so powerful to watch
four Korean chefs represent who they are.
That first bite I had from Eric in the appetizer round,
I mean, he hit all the notes, all the textures, all the flavors.
[Alyse] His beautiful cabbage wrap,
so thoughtful and unique.
There were a couple of technical issues.
Some of the pieces of jokbal got, uh,
a little bit dry, um, from the extra fry.
But on the flip side,
Chef Emma's mandu was, uh, sublime.
[Esther] I do think that the mandu stuffing
suffered a little bit from texture,
but I think her mandu was a really smart play.
And then how about the entree round?
I mean, this is a tricky one.
-Definitely the weakest round that we had. -[Esther] Mmm-hmm.
[Alyse] Chef Eric's dish wasn't complete.
Like, neither Chris nor I got noodles.
Although I feel like he did have a great application
of the Korean fried chicken and the short ribs.
I mean, for me, Chef Emma's problem here
was the short rib itself.
-[Alyse] Mmm-hmm. -[Esther] She tried to braise it,
and it ended up with, like, really chewy
-pieces of short rib. -[Chris] Right.
But she did a good job masking
-those mistakes with her flavors. -[Esther] Yeah.
-[Chris] They were super bold, super spicy. -[Alyse] Yep.
All the dishes tasted amazing,
and I feel like this is gonna be a tough...
-a tough decision. -Yeah. Neck to neck.
[Eric] I wanna believe it's a very close decisions for the judge.
I executed what I intended,
and it was really a great experience that I had.
Great experience.
[Emma] I'm feeling very confident
based on my feedback from my dessert round.
But I do believe Eric was stronger
in the entree round, for sure.
So it's definitely neck and neck right now.
So, whose dish is on the chopping block?
Chef Eric, you've been chopped.
-Judges? -Chef Eric...
in your entree round,
the sweet potato noodles were missing on two of our plates.
And in the dessert round, your persimmon pudding curdled.
And so, we had to chop you.
Thank you so much.
[Eric] I have no doubts, no regrets whatsoever.
I gave my all for this competition.
And my experience today,
it's gonna be for the rest of my life.
And that means, Chef Emma Woods,
you are the Chopped Champion.
You've earned every cent of that $10,000.
Job well done, Chef. Way to go.
-Thank you! -[judges] Whoo!
Yeah!
[chuckling] Well, I'm just kind of overwhelmed.
Coming in with all of these amazing Korean chefs
who grew up in Korean families...
[voice shaking]...and then just being able to come in
and show all other Korean adoptees that...
like, this is our culture and our heritage as well... [sniffles]
...and that we have every right to it.
I know that sometimes it's so hard to feel that
you're authentically telling your story,
but remember, it is your story.
And if I was a kid, and I saw a Korean adoptee on screen, um,
cooking and telling her story the way you did, it was really beautiful.
[Emma] Just being a Korean adoptee,
it's so hard to not feel like an impostor,
especially cooking Korean food...
[voice shaking] that coming in here and winning is just...
I'm like, just so proud of myself.