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I have been very unimpressed with the chef competition shows because of how the women never seem to win. Unfortunately I don't remember all of the details of these examples, but they made my blood boil enough at the time that I can't resist posting. If you've TiVo'd Top Chef or The Next Iron Chef, you might want to look away.
1. Top Chef 3, the Le Cirque challenge with the sea bass. Hung went first. He was praised. Casey went second. She was praised higher. The guy even said "that's the one to beat". There were I think three other chefs left at this point. So who won that round? You'd think it would be Casey, right? Wrong. It was Hung. Excuse me? The guy specifically said that Casey's was the one to beat. Nothing ambiguous in that comment. Casey was robbed.
2. Also Top Chef 3, the elimination that left the 4 finalists. It was between Sara and Dale. Sara had an excellent well-balanced composition, but she had a couple of technical flaws. Dale had a boring, safe, dull, but more technically accurate meal. Who wins? Which is a chef more prized for? All through the competition they've been harping on creativity, and her technical flaws were minor, but was Sara chosen? No.
3. Finally, the Next Top Chef. I forget the names here (there's only been one episode). But it's down to the bottom two - a woman, who has the most experience of the entire group, and a man. Actually my problem here comes before this point... Based on the comments we heard, she should not have been in the bottom two. There were at least two others where the judge's comments sounded much worse than their comments about this woman's cooking. And yet, she is of course given the boot.
And I've only mentioned the blatantly obvious things. Not the "booting three women in a row" which has also occurred on Top Chef. Maybe the editing was just better in those episodes, to hide the misogyny, or maybe those really were the three weakest chefs that week. But, at least on the cooking competition shows, women are still getting the shaft.
