We love you, Ted Allen!

With last night’s premiere of Chopped!, the Food Network is slowly transforming into the Showtime to Bravo’s HBO. No question, Chopped! is a very entertaining show, and there’s a refreshing awkwardness about it; the chefs are less comfortable in front of the camera—it feels more realistic. True to Ted Allen’s promise, the focus was on the cooking. There were no “make edible pajamas for Padma to wear to a slumber party with Gail and Martha Stewart” challenges (or was that just a dream?), and it was refreshing to see all NYC chefs in a show that was filmed in NYC (hint hint, Top Chef V). Like a saucy mistress, Chopped! satisfied those urges that Top Chef simply won’t indulge, such as cutting all the B.S. and product placement and getting down to the nitty-gritty.

As for the show itself, the premise worked kind of like a mini Iron Chef. Four chefs are tasked with cooking three courses. After each course, one dish (and chef) is eliminated until there’s a one-on-one for dessert and the winner receives 10,000 bucks, big ones, or smackeroos. Enter the contestants: Sandy Davis, Summer Kriegshauser, “21-year-old Katie Rosenhouse” and Perry Pollaci (who we swear we saw in the second episode of Top Chef, when they had to serve a meal to all the people who tried out for Top Chef but didn’t make it).

Each course has its own what’s-behind-curtain-one-style box of secret ingredients. The appetizer box held baby octopus, bok choy, oyster sauce and smoked paprika. Cooking the first course, no one knew what they were doing—which is exactly what you want from reality TV: people running around scared. When time was called, the chefs brought their dishes in front of judges Aaron Sanchez, Alex Guarnaschelli and Marc Murphy, and it was Summer—a primarily vegan chef—who went home for flavor problems and serving her dish on a giant leaf of cabbage. No one’s octopus dish was particularly great, though Perry did make a sweet looking bok choy broth.

For the entrées, contestants were given duck breast, ginger, scallions and honey. Perry and Sandy went traditional, each doing their interpretations of duck à l’orange, while Katie dug into her pastry background and made a savory cocoa-ricotta crêpe to go with hers. That creativity gave her the edge over Perry, who was called out for using cilantro twice in a three-course menu (he made a cilantro oil for his duck dish). Sandy’s bird wasn’t cooked perfectly, but his saving grace was potatoes fried in duck fat. Down to two, they forged on to dessert.

Animal crackers, prunes and cream cheese were what Katie and Sandy had to work with, and dessert being Katie’s forte, she ramped up her energy in the final round, even taking judge Marc Murphy aback at one point while she made cream cheese quenelles: “At 21, to be able to make a quenelle like that…very impressive.” The judges tasted their dishes—animal cracker soup with a cream cheese frosting dollop from Sandy, and an animal cracker semifreddo with prune compote courtesy of Katie. On the chopping block, the judges praised Katie for having the most innovative dish (her duck with crêpe) but noted that the cream cheese in her dessert was overpowering. And that’s how Sandy Davis became the first winner of Chopped!

Next week: tofu, blueberries and oysters with Christopher Jackson, Klaus Kronsteiner, Pippa Calland and Raymond Jackson.—Zachary Feldman

Related story: TONY talks to Ted Allen on the eve of Chopped!