I'm Bobby Flay.
Each week, one brave chef
will try to take me down in my house.
-I'm not worried about Bobby. -What?
-Ooh. -This culinary battle
is gonna shake down in two rounds.
Round one. To get to me
two contenders have to go through each other,
using an ingredient of my choice.
Let's do it!
[Bobby] Two people that know me well,
will decide who's got the skills to beat me.
Round two, I go head-to-head
with the winning contender.
It's their turn to surprise me
-with their signature dish. -[man] Go!
-♪ Friendly competition ♪ -Is that distracting?
-This is gonna be the first one I don't finish. -Flay's in trouble.
-Whoo! -[Bobby] Bottom line...
-No! -...everyone's out to beat me.
[bell ringing]
All right. I'm feeling lucky tonight.
Who wants to place their bets on me?
Please welcome two fierce competitors
that will stop at nothing to see me lose.
It's Food Network's Brooke Williamson,
and Cliff Crooks.
[audience cheering]
Remember when cooking used to be easy?
You just like go and cook in your restaurant.
Now you gotta come out here, do a hip bump.
-[chuckles] -Get, you know...
-We nailed that. -...big rounds of applause. You did nail it.
Now, you guys are all over the network.
I know you've been on, uh, Tournament of Champions, a few seasons,
and then you're on Triple Threat also.
Yeah. Give me like 30 minutes
and a bunch of random ingredients and I have fun.
Cliff, you've done Tournament of Champions as well.
That's one of those things you go in with, you know,
-very minimal expectations, then... -Yeah.
-...sink or swim. -Right.
Oh. See I go into it with really high expectations. [chuckles]
-So it's extra terrifying. Yeah. -Right. [chuckles]
And then, Worst Cooks,
you've done a few different seasons now. How was that?
-Scary and amazing. -[Bobby] Yeah.
I've done, I think, three seasons of it.
I mean, you must've done it, what, 15 years ago?
Uh, take it easy. I was paving the way for you.
[all laughing]
All right. Let's bring out some chefs.
Our first contender was in a pop-punk band,
for 15 years.
-From Portland, Oregon, Javier Canteras. -[Bobby] Yeah!
[audience cheering]
[Brooke] Yeah!
And our next contender is putting El Paso, Texas on the culinary map,
Emiliano Marentes.
-[Bobby] Yeah. -[Brooke] Whoo!
Those are tortillas. [laughs]
Javier, Emiliano, how's it going?
-Good, how are you? -How you doing, chef?
-What's your goal tonight? -To beat you, Bobby.
-What about you? -Beat both of you.
-[chuckles] -Well, yeah, 'cause obviously you wanna get to me,
but before that happens you must go through each other.
I'm gonna give you an ingredient
and you must make that the star of your dish.
And tonight's ingredient is...
This is my favorite part.
...Castelvetrano olives.
Love them.
[Emiliano] The Castelvetrano olive is tricky,
since I rarely use it in any type of Mexican dishes.
You know what this reminds me of? A martini.
[chuckles]
[Bobby] Twenty minutes on the clock.
Make sure you guys are the king
-of your Castelvetranos. -[bell ringing]
-[Cliff] Let's go! -[metal clanking]
[audience cheering]
-I love these olives. -Yeah. They're not crazy salty,
so they don't overwhelm other things.
So, I think the challenge here is
to make sure that they stand out.
I like the idea of making it a component of a relish.
Maybe a little garlic oil, white anchovy,
because they will still stand out because of that buttery
-and floral nature. -Yeah. Nice.
[Javier] Being in the world of Spanish cooking,
I do work with olives, but not those in particular.
[Cliff] Hey, Javier, what are you making?
You know, I'm gonna do a olive piccata,
-which is basically fancy olive tapenade. -Oh.
Put that on some toast
with some, uh, spicy garlic shrimp on top of that.
Shrimp craves something acidic,
and cooks really, really quickly.
So, that's just gonna work awesome together.
All right, crowd. Who's cheering for Javier?
-[audience cheering] -Yeah!
I moved to Portland, Oregon to pursue a career in music,
but needed to pay the bills so started working in restaurants
and ended up falling in love with it.
Throughout my entire career
I've always played with really unique flavors,
drawing from my Spanish roots.
Today, I'm the chef and owner of Urdaneta.
Where we do a little bit of a modern twist
on the old tapas classics.
Beating Bobby Flay would make me feel like I've made the right decision
to cook food for a living.
I know that Bobby's really familiar with Spanish flavors,
but no one can top a real Spaniard in the kitchen.
Emiliano, what do you got going on over there?
-I'm gonna make Camarones a la Veracruzana. -Nice.
Sometimes I add black olives to the tomato sauce,
uh, but I'm gonna use the Castelvetrano olives.
First I'm gonna char the onions,
to get a nice flavor on them.
Then, I'm gonna add the tomatoes and garlic.
-Shrimp and olives and shrimp and olives? -[Bobby] Yeah.
[Emiliano] I grew up with always being in the kitchen.
Both my parents are really great cooks.
When I was 17, I started working in a casino,
eventually moving up to chef de cuisine.
In 2018, I decided to open up my own establishment.
Elemi's known for tacos
and we make each tortilla using imported corn from Mexico.
I've been featured in Taste the Nation with Padma Lakshmi.
And in 2022, I was nominated
as a semi-finalist for a James Beard Outstanding Chef.
Bobby, there's no time to taco about it.
I conquered El Paso, now I'm conquering you.
Let's give it up for these guys. Come on.
So, I start the sauce with garlic and shallot,
cherry tomatoes and harissa.
Javier, what are we making over here?
[Javier] Working on some garlic shrimp.
Gonna make tapenade out of the olives.
What else is going in the tapenade?
Some lemon, some harissa,
and I'm gonna kinda marinate the shrimp in olive juice.
[Cliff] All right. You still have enough time?
-Yeah. Yeah, we'll see. [chuckles] -Okay. [chuckles]
-Emiliano, so this is almost a Veracruz-style... -Yeah. Exactly.
I'm gonna incorporate the Castelvetrano olives in the sauce.
And then I add capers,
fresh oregano and cilantro.
[Cliff] Watch your time.
-He's hustling over there, okay? -I am. Thank you.
[Cliff] Let's go, chefs. You have 14 minutes.
-Let's go! -[audience cheering]
[Cliff] So, Emiliano's got his garlic
and he's using the olive as the base, so there's a lot of tomato.
They're both using a lot of the same flavors.
But, like, one is more Mediterranean, the other is Mexico.
[Emiliano] I'm gonna get the shrimp and devein them.
With the shrimp heads, I'm gonna smash them over the sauce,
because the juice provides an intense umami flavor.
Now, I start working on the piccata,
with the olives, harissa, garlic, and olive oil.
After that, I toss the shrimp into a bowl
add a little bit of olive juice and I let that marinate.
-Nine minutes, guys. -[audience cheering]
What you have going on over here?
-I'm making this Veracruz-style sauce. -Okay.
-[Emiliano] Gonna be a little bit more rustic, not blended. -[Brooke] Okay.
So, if you make it past this first round,
how are you feeling about Bobby?
Actually I'm more confident on that one than this one.
-[Brooke] Good luck to you. -Thank you. Appreciate it.
Now I start toasting the sourdough.
-Javier, how are you feeling over here? -[Javier] Feeling pretty good.
So, I decide to put the shrimp in the sauce
with the shell to impart more flavor.
-Olives are right over here. -Yeah.
About to put some more in this sauce right here.
[Brooke] And then you're going on toast?
-[Javier] Going on toast. -[Brooke] All right. I like it.
Six minutes, 20 seconds left.
Oh, no.
My pan is really hot. The olive oil caught on fire.
[Bobby] Yeah, the pan was, like, basically burned
-before he put the shrimp in. -Really hot.
It's not a big problem because I need my shrimp
to sear quickly in a really hot pan.
And he just cooled it down with some tequila.
[Emiliano] It's a little herbaceous
and adds a little complex flavor component.
I quickly start to peel the shrimp,
put them back in the sauce,
and then I toss the shrimp heads with a little bit of flour,
and throw them in the fryer.
Three minutes to go, chefs.
Next, I'm working on a salad with a little bit of lime juice,
some radishes and more olives.
My sauce reduced a little bit too much,
but I have to start plating my dish.
I add the sauce with the shrimp
and then garnish it with the salad.
First, I put the sourdough toast on the plate
Then, I add the olive piccata, shrimp and the sauce.
-Ten! -[Javier] Last, I take the shrimp heads
out of the fryer and nestle them in beside the toast.
[all] Five. Four. Three.
-[all] Two. One. -[bell ringing]
[audience cheering]
[Bobby] Good job.
I would've loved to have added a little bit more shrimp stock
to the sauce to add volume,
but I'm happy with what I made in 20 minutes.
I'm afraid the shrimp is potentially the star,
rather than the olive.
But I'm confident I have a really good shot at winning.
-[audience cheering] -Good job.
[bell ringing]
Both times I've been here, I've beat Bobby.
Let's keep this track record going.
It all comes down to what you did
to make the Castelvetrano olives the star of your dish.
Chef Javier, what did you make?
Today, I made spicy garlic shrimp, olive piccata,
fried shrimp head, all on toast.
The tomatoes and the onions and the garlic are all incredibly delicious.
I do find that they overpower the olives,
and that bread reads a little bit greasy,
but also incredibly flavorful.
-I really like the aggressive seasoning. -Thank you.
I do appreciate the dual usage of the olive itself,
but the shrimp could almost not ever be there.
-How about just the head. -Absolutely, just the fried head
-would have been fantastic. Always. Always. Always. -So good.
-Heard that. -Emiliano, what did you make?
I made Camarones a la Veracruzana.
You left them large, so when you get a bite with the olive,
you definitely taste the olive.
But, you know, I feel like it's slightly over-reduced.
-Would've loved some fresh acid in here. -Thank you, Chef.
The shrimp aren't the star of this dish,
-but they're very, very well-executed. -Yeah.
The size of your olives is fantastic.
Similarly, it's taking a back seat
-to the over-reduced items in the dish. -Thank you, Chef.
I was a little disappointed that the sauce was over-reduced.
But I'm pretty happy with the dish I put out.
The chef moving forward to beat Bobby tonight is...
Chef Javier.
-[audience cheering] -Thanks for being here.
[Emiliano] I don't know if I agree with the decision,
but I'm happy that I got to showcase my style of cooking
and my Mexican culture.
So, Javier, you're an aggressive seasoner,
you have our faith that you can take Bobby out.
-I'm ready. -♪ Yeah, yeah Yeah, real quick ♪
♪ I been going to the top Yeah, real quick ♪
♪ I'ma switch up on the spot♪
-All right, Javier, congratulations. -Thank you.
You got through round one, how you feeling?
-Feel really good. -I'm really curious to see what we're gonna cook tonight.
-What's your signature dish? -My signature dish is...
♪ Real, real, real Hit it real quick♪
-...tortilla espanola. -[audience] Ooh.
-Okay. -I don't know, I feel like
-Bobby's probably made this dish before, a few times. -Yeah, a couple...
I actually made one a couple weeks ago.
My girlfriend grew up eating tortilla espanola.
-Was she happy with it? -No.
[all laughing]
[Cliff] Your 45 minutes are on the clock,
-and your time starts now. -[Brooke] Whoo!
[audience cheering]
-[electricity buzzing] -[metal clanking]
Tortilla espanola. So, this is a traditional Spanish omelette.
[Cliff] And it's three simple ingredients.
It's potato, egg, and it's onion.
And, you know, chefs can add a variety of ingredients to it,
certain meats, you know, like jamon.
Or in Bobby's case piquillo,
-'cause he, you know, loves piquillo peppers. -[chuckles] Well said.
You need flavor and texture throughout that tortilla.
And a lot of that comes from how cooked or uncooked
-those potatoes are. -Correct.
[Javier] Tortilla espanola is my signature dish because
it reflects a lot of my childhood.
It's just hands down one of the most famous tapas in Spain.
I'm making a tortilla espanola with piquillo peppers,
crispy jamon serrano and Marcona almond goat cheese butter.
First thing I do is start chopping the onions,
poblano peppers and potatoes.
-Javier, how many times have you made this dish? -[Javier] Yes.
Thousands of times.
Beating Bobby will prove
that I can cook on his level and win.
[Bobby] So, my take on this dish is fairly classic.
I'm making a tortilla espanola
with piquillo pepper pesto, some crispy ham,
and garlic-rubbed toast.
The first thing I'm gonna do is blanch the potatoes,
just to kind of soften them a little bit.
-Generally, they're sliced thinly and then sauteed. -Yeah.
All right. I'm gonna go check out what's going on back here.
-Coming up on 37 minutes, everyone. -[Javier] All right.
[audience cheering]
All right, Chef, what do we have, oh.
-Okay, so we have our vegetable blanch here. -Yeah, yeah
Are you from the school where you cook everything separate
and then mix it back together?
I'm going everything in the pan.
-I feel like all the flavors just meld well together. -[Cliff] Yeah.
And how much color do you usually get on your potato?
Uh, hardly any.
Just make sure your seasoning is just as aggressive
-as it was in the first round. -Yes, Chef.
I season the potato mixture
with a generous amount of salt.
Poaching all of those ingredients,
so that olive oil can be absorbed,
creates a really creamy tortilla.
[Bobby] So, in my eggs I'm adding salt, pepper,
butter, and some Manchego cheese.
You don't usually see that, but I just wanna give it some natural saltiness.
Hey, Chef. So, what are you doing over there? You mixing eggs?
-Whisking some eggs. -How many eggs do you have in there?
Are you using the whole flat of eggs? Is that 30 eggs in there?
That's a big tortilla. Are you gonna season these eggs?
-Uh, yeah, they're seasoned. Salt and pepper. -Yeah?
Bobby, is he annoying you yet?
-Very much so. -Aw...
-Are you gonna use piquillos? -I'm gonna make a piquillo pesto.
-[record scratches] -[laughs]
[laughs] Give it up for Bobby.
So, Javier is cooking everything all at once,
-with very minimal color, which is traditional. -Right.
Bobby has a little bit of color on his onions.
-He also has larger pieces of potato. -Okay.
So, Javier's potatoes are thinner?
-They're diced potatoes. Yeah. -Oh, they're diced. Okay.
Jamon serrano is also called serrano ham,
and it's gonna give this tortilla some added saltiness.
And then, I put some garlic in the pan with olive oil.
I add brown sugar, sherry vinegar, and piquillo peppers,
which are indigenous to Spain.
[Bobby] The potatoes should be gluing my eggs and onions together.
So, I wanna make sure I have enough layers of potatoes in there.
I mean, the biggest challenge with this dish
is getting it cooked and getting it set.
And then, you have to be able to cut it. I'm gonna cut mine.
[Cliff] Bobby, how you feeling about time?
[Bobby] Not sure. I have my tortilla in the oven,
just, you know, we'll see what happens.
Tortillas should never hit the oven.
-[Brooke] Ooh. -[Cliff] No. Ooh.
-Did you hear that, Bobby? -Whatever.
[both laughing]
[bell ringing]
-Bobby, is that a piquillo pesto? -[Bobby] Yes.
One of my favorite sauces.
So, it's piquillo peppers, pine nuts, garlic,
some Parmigiano Reggiano cheese
and then olive oil and salt and pepper.
[Brooke] I hate showing up empty-handed.
Bobby is not a fan of cupcakes, but my goal today...
-Who doesn't like a cupcake? -...is to change his mind.
[Cliff] Please have him eat his way through.
[Brooke] Twenty-eight minutes left.
I figured I'd bring you some cupcakes,
-'cause I know how you love them so much. -[chuckles]
-Look. Down. -You're going down
-Bobby. [laughs] -Bobby, that's your name. [laughs]
All right. Ooh, that one's filled with marshmallow.
You like red velvet, right? Funfetti with chocolate frosting.
Ooh, what about vanilla frosting?
Ooh, that one's strawberry. Oh, carrot cake.
[Bobby] Actually the carrot cake is very good, too.
-It is. -And the coconut is good, too.
-You know what's even better? -No.
The fact that you've just wasted
-four minutes trying cupcakes. -I know.
-It's okay. -[audience laughing]
Next, I get some serrano-style ham, throw it in the fryer.
This is gonna add a little texture
and a little bit of that saltiness from the pork.
-Javier, so your potatoes are in that olive oil? -[Javier] Yes.
And then, cook it in that?
-I'm actually gonna make little individual tortillas. -Oh.
-Do you wanna keep that a secret? -I do.
[Brooke] Is that cream cheese?
Gonna do a goat cheese Marcona almond butter.
I have Marcona almonds, which are Spanish almonds,
buttermilk, Spanish goat cheese, and cream cheese.
I cook the food of my family and my country,
and I'm gonna bring this win home for them.
-[Brooke] Twenty-two minutes left. -[audience cheering]
Javier looks great.
He must've been able to impart so much flavor into the actual potatoes.
Which by boiling the potatoes, Bobby was not able
to impart any flavor, except for salt.
-But flavor profiles, they're very similar. -Similar.
So, now I think it's gonna be a matter of execution.
[Javier] After I crack all the eggs I need,
I season them with salt and whisk them.
Throwing in the potatoes really hot into the eggs
almost starts to kinda create this creamy custard.
-It's a absolute sin to have a tortilla that's dry. -Yes! Thank you.
I really can appreciate the individual tortillas.
[Brooke] Because he's like, "A tortilla should never hit the oven."
This is his method of getting it cooked fast enough.
So, I'm making some crostini, so I'm slicing a baguette,
splattering it with some extra-virgin olive oil,
some salt and pepper and I toast it in the salamander.
[Javier] The art of flipping the tortilla espanola,
it's a pretty serious thing.
It's that perfect time where the egg is creamy and custardy,
but not overcooked.
-Javier. Oh, those look great. -[Javier] Not to shabby.
-So, we're coming up on 14 minutes even... -Heard that.
...let's just make sure that they are cooked through.
-Your garnishes are lovely on top. -Heard that.
-Give it up for Javier, please. Thank you! -[Javier] Yeah, come on!
[Cliff] Come on! Hey, Chef.
-It's so beautiful. You're doing such a great job. -Thank you so much.
Give it up for Bobby! Wait, are you really gonna throw that in the blaster?
-[Bobby] Gotta cool it down. -Do you want the outside of that to be slightly frozen?
-[Bobby] No, just nice and room temperature. -[man] Yeah, Bobby!
-[Bobby] Yeah. -Yeah, Bobby.
Bobby's making, uh, a gigantic souffle.
Throwing it in the blast chiller,
can also have the effect of just like [exhales]
-sinking the whole thing. -Right.
We've got three minutes. Let's get everything on the plate.
Now, because these are individual tortillas,
I can't see what the middle looks like,
but I know that they're gonna be perfect.
So, I put it on top of the Marcona almond goat cheese butter,
add the piquillo peppers with the crispy garlic,
crispy serrano ham, some micro greens, and done.
[Bobby] I'm just happy to get mine out of the pan,
cut into actual wedges, and on to the plate.
I put some piquillo pesto on top of the tortilla.
I put the crispy ham into the piquillo pesto, so it stands up,
and then I rub the crostini with some fresh garlic,
and then some chives on top.
-[audience] Ten. Nine. Eight. -[Bobby] A little extra-virgin olive oil over all of it.
-That's it. Very simple. -Six.
[all] Five. Four. Three.
Two. One.
-[audience cheering] -[Brooke] Whoo!
[Javier] Bobby brings big, bold flavors for a living,
so after seeing his dish I'm kinda thinking,
is this a closer match than I thought?
[Bobby] I think it's gonna come down to execution and seasoning,
'cause we both have the same ingredients.
So, we'll see what happens.
-Beautiful job. -You too. Thank you, Chef.
So, tonight's challenge was tortilla espanola.
Bobby, Javier, we'd like to introduce you to the judges.
The director of the NYU Food Lab,
Lourdes Castro.
Co-founder of Leaves and Loaves Goods,
David Santos.
Cookbook author and VP of Culinary at Dos Caminos,
-Ariel Fox. -[audience cheering]
Judges, please start with the first plate in front of you.
It's really beautiful, it's very inviting.
The onions are nicely sauteed.
And then, the piquillo pesto adds a nice sharpness.
But there is quite a bit of garlic, a little bit too much.
And there's a little bit of oil kinda puddled underneath my crouton.
The color really pops from the piquillo pesto.
The flavor is really good,
the cook is super moist, and the egg's nice and set.
I thought maybe the garlic was a little too assertive,
and I didn't need to have that crispy ham.
I would've really liked to see maybe some fresh ham.
I'm a garlic fan, so I actually really liked the sauce.
I think it has a brightness to it that the dish needs.
I'm a huge Manchego cheese fan,
so I love that this was used in this dish.
But I had a few undercooked potatoes in mine.
Thank you, judges. We're gonna have you switch your plates now.
There's just something adorable about having
your own little personal tortilla.
It's cooked really beautiful,
potato, everything's kind of soft and creamy inside.
The goat cheese almond crema,
really, really nice, but I didn't like the jamon.
The flavor is just a little off.
It's just kind of not doing it for me.
[Lourdes] Well, I love that you get your own little tortilla.
The texture is totally on point,
and it's perfectly seasoned.
I really, really do love the piquillo peppers.
The ham, it's quite nice,
but the goat cheese, it's putting me off a bit.
Visually, it's not as, uh, vibrant for me.
But the texture and seasoning inside is spot on.
I was very surprised that this was goat cheese,
but I think it goes really well
with the acidity on the piquillo peppers on the top.
So, judges, there can able be one winner.
Please take a vote.
Feels like my heart is just pounding out of my chest.
It's taking an eternity to get the answer.
And the winner is...
Javier, you just beat Bobby Flay!
[audience cheering]
I can't believe that I just beat Bobby Flay.
-Congratulations. -[Javier] I wanted to prove to myself
that I can cook on Bobby's level,
an Iron Chef's level, and today I proved that.
[laughing]
[Bobby] Enjoy it.
-Congratulations. Congratulations. -Congratulations.
-[Brooke] Thank you. -[Cliff] You are still undefeated.
-Oh, yes! -Isn't it so great?
-I'm Javier Canteras and I just beat Bobby Flay! -[audience cheering]