Iron Chef

Mark Tarbell, Beau MacMillan, and Barbara Fenzl to Team Up with Childsplay on April 13

A "Recipe for Disaster Dinner" doesn't exactly sound like the kind of thing with which Mark Tarbell, Iron Chef winner Beau MacMillan, or Southwestern-cuisine guru Barbara Fenzl would be associated. But the trio of powerhouse chefs won't be in the kitchen for the Childsplay event -- ironically, the ... More >>

Epicuriad 2013: Beer For Brains Foundation's Annual Food Pairing Competition on March 22

You would think a craft beer-focused foundation holding a contest pitting one dish against a beer or wine would be, well, a little biased. But for the past two years the Beer For Brains Foundation Epicuriad has been thoroughly pleasing food, beer and wine fans alike. See also: - Epicuriad: The Fin ... More >>

Makin' Bacon

Beau MacMillan Stars in New Game Show "Beat the Chefs," Premiering Thursday, August 23rd

See also: Beau MacMillan To Appear On Premiere of Food Network's The Best Thing I Ever Made Beau Mac -- executive chef of Elements at Sanctuary Resort -- is our local celeb-chef and certifiably famous TV star, the high-energy, fast-talking BoSox buff who's truly in his element on the small screen. ... More >>

Eating Smart

Kevin Binkley, Shinji Kurita, Kelly Fletcher, and More Scheduled for Beau Mac's 2012 Lunch & Learn Series

You know it's summer in the Valley when celebu-chef and flat leaf parsley fan Beau MacMillan brings some of the stars of the culinary world out to the Paradise Valley resort Sanctuary at Camelback Mountain for his popular Lunch & Learn series. Beginning Saturday, July 14, food fans can hook up wit ... More >>

What's Your Favorite and Least Favorite Cooking Show?

Welcome to Chow Bella's Bites & Dishes, where Valley chefs and restaurateurs respond to a question New Times food critic Laura Hahnefeld has on her mind. Have a question you'd like to ask? E-mail laura.hahnefeld@newtimes.com. Miss a question? Go here.Whether it's for education, entertainment, or a d ... More >>

Am I a Food Snob? (A Flowchart)

From time to time, Zach Fowle will provide a visual guide to every day and extraordinary situations ... and (because he has bad handwriting) Claire Lawton will illustrate them. Welcome to Charted Territory: The world of a food snob is an often-confusing world of trends, vocabulary and kitchen app ... More >>

Chow Bella's Top Phoenix Food Stories of the Week

Every week, there's a cornucopia of new Phoenix food news, features, and reviews to report here at Chow Bella. If you're like most people, you probably just don't have the time to get to all of it. It's kind of like those burgers at Old Town Whiskey; it just won't all fit in your mouth ... or in thi ... More >>

Distrito to Hold Smoking (Literally) Cooking Class This Weekend

Staying in town this Memorial Day weekend? You cannot be bored. Not yet. Get up off your lazy butt and do something productive -- like attending a class on outdoor cooking. Let's embrace the season, people! This Sunday afternoon, May 27, Distrito will bring back its popular "Cook Like an Iron Chef" ... More >>

Cook Like An Iron Chef at Distrito

Jose Garces is an Iron Chef, but then, if you're a fan of Food Network's Iron Chef America, the popular culinary game show based upon the Japanese cult sensation, you already knew that. And now, his new modern Mexican restaurant in Scottsdale, Distrito, located in the newly rehabbed Saguaro hotel o ... More >>

Jose Garces, What Are You Listening To?

​Jose GarcesThe Iron Chef and James Beard award-winning chef is executive chef of Distrito, Old Town Whiskey and Garces Trading Co. To-Go at The Saguaro Hotel. When you put your key in the ignition and turn on the radio, what station would play right now? I have Sirius/XM in my car, and ... More >>

Jose Garces' Culinary Star Power Shines at Old Town Whiskey and Distrito

Iron Chef Jose Garces Shows Star Power at Old Town Whiskey, Needs a Little Help at Distrito

Chances are if you're a fan of Food Network's Iron Chef America, you've heard of chef Jose Garces. Recently, two of Garces' concepts, Distrito, a modern Mexican restaurant, and Village Whiskey (altered for Scottsdale to Old Town Whiskey), an upscale tavern, have come to the Valley, inside The Sagua ... More >>

Iron Chef Jose Garces of Distrito at The Saguaro

Jose Garces​This week in Chef Talk we bring you a few words from the man behind The Saguaro's new restaurant Distrito, Chef Jose Garces. Winner of the James Beard Foundation's Best Chef Mid-Atlantic award in 2009, Garces owns and holds the title of executive chef at a handful of restaurants ... More >>

Beau MacMillan To Appear On Premiere of Food Network's The Best Thing I Ever Made

Celebu-chef Beau MacMillan, of Elements inside Paradise Valley's Sanctuary at Camelback Mountain, is no stranger to television gigs (let's see...Chopped All-Stars, Worst Cooks in America, Iron Chef America...) Makes sense then that Beau Mac and a few of his friends will be appearing on the premiere ... More >>

Mark Tarbell to Judge First "Top of the Crop" Competition at Premier Food and Wine Festival in Maine

​If the kitchen at Tarbell's, the award-winning neighborhood restaurant in Central Phoenix, is absent one culinary whiz a few days in October, it's because its owner and chef, Mark Tarbell, is in Portland, Maine. The winner of season five of Iron Chef America, Tarbell will be one of a panel o ... More >>

Beau McMillan and Nine Other Celebrity Chefs to Compete on The Next Iron Chef: Super Chefs

​If an Iron Chef is "a king among chefs" then what's a king among Iron Chefs called? A SUPER CHEF, YO, THE ONLY TITLE THAT MATTERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! In a move that has nothing to do with sagging ratings, the fourth season of The Next Iron Chef, premiering October 30 on the Food Network, ... More >>

Iron Chef America's Mark Dacascos' Raceway Material Needs Work

​Last week, Mark Dacascos (CALL ME!), who plays "the Chairman" on Food Network's television series Iron Chef America, as well as Wo Fat, the recurring villain in the reboot of Hawaii Five-0 on CBS, did some laps in a pace car at the Phoenix International Raceway and then told a joke that wasn' ... More >>

Topps Puts Celebrity Chefs on Baseball Cards. Batter Up!

Jennifer Woods​ So my baseball card enthusiast husband tosses me an Iron Chef "Marc Forgione" baseball card the other night.  "Hey, you should write about this for Chow Bella, I wonder if anyone knows that they're putting chefs on baseball cards." And so here we are. If you notice ... More >>

The Chew: Do We Really Need Another Food Show?

​What happens when not one but two soap operas are canceled on the same day? The Earth shakes on its very foundation and giant worms from its core rise to the surface, making slaves of all mankind forever. They are replaced by equally ridiculous (but cheaper to produce) programming. Whee -- TV is ... More >>

Food Network's 24 Hour Restaurant Battle Is an Eternity of Boring

​Dreams are awesome. Especially the ones with zombies and double rainbows (oh my God!), but what about the waking dreams we have for our lives? Losing weight, running a marathon, starting a business. Those are cool, too. And for the most part, they take planning. Which is why Food Network's new ... More >>

MasterChef, the American Idol of Cooking, Premieres This Tuesday -- Prepare for Stomach for "Funeral Potatoes"

This Tuesday on Fox, Mr. needs-a-nap chef Gordon Ramsay brings the world's biggest cooking competition to America with MasterChef. Featuring home cooks competing for $250,000 and the chance to publish their own cookbook, this American Idol of cooking shows doses out more drama than the wildly pop ... More >>

Cook Like an Iron Chef with Michael Symon Starts With Dissing The Food Network

​Iron Chef Michael Symon breaks out of Kitchen Stadium this Thursday with his new show on The Cooking Channel, Cook Like an Iron Chef. Symon, who owns Lola, Lolita, Bar Symon, and the B Spot restaurants in Northeast Ohio, as well as Roast in Detroit, says the show is for people who've watched ... More >>

Cat Cora Dishes on Oprah and Iron Chef at Changing Hands

Jonathan McNamaraCat Cora prepares an Egyptian bread salad at Changing Hands bookstore.​It's no shock that Cat Cora didn't really cook anything for her book-signing at Changing Hands Bookstore last night. On errant whiff of smoke from a cook top and the overhead sprinklers at Changing Hands wo ... More >>

June 24 In Blogs: Andrew Thomas, Evil Dead, Erykah Badu, Cat Coa, and Jan Brewer

​​​In the 24-hour news cycle, it can be difficult to keep up. We have the solution. Check back on Valley Fever every evening for highlights from each of New Times' blogs. Today's entries:

What's Cat Cora Cooking Up Wednesday Night in Tempe?

​We've got the scoop -- Wednesday, June 23, Iron Chef Cat Cora is coming to Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe and she's making.... (Insert sounds of fork tinging against Champagne glass and lots of throat clearing.)

Cat Cora: Part 2 of Our Interview With the Iron Chef

​Yesterday, we gave you an appetizer for next week's main dish: a Chow Bella- and Changing Hands-hosted booksigning with Iron Chef and cookbook dynamo Cat Cora, who's currently touring the country to promote Cat Cora's Classics With a Twist. She'll be at the bookstore at 7 p.m. on June 23, a ... More >>

June 16 In Blogs: Jason Rose, Tuey Burns, Devo, Fried Ice Cream, and SB 1070

​​​In the 24-hour news cycle, it can be difficult to keep up. We have the solution. Check back on Valley Fever every evening for highlights from each of New Times' blogs. Today's entries:

Cat Cora Chats With Chow Bella, Part 1

After spending so many hours glued to the TV watching chef Cat Cora make unexpected ingredients into glorious dishes that get the Iron Chef America judges waxing rhapsodic, we figured we'd never attempt to cook like the master. But as it turns out, Cora's just as much of a whiz at devising unp ... More >>

TLC Launches Best Food Ever (or Yabba-Dabba-Done-to-Death)

Napoleon Dynamite: This is pretty much the worst video ever made. Kip: Napoleon, like anyone can even know that. Let me go, I need to narrate. Wilma!​Kip's right. How can anyone know what's the worst (or the best) of anything? TLC's hoping we'll trust their judgment with its new show, Best Food ... More >>

Cat Cora Event With Chow Bella and Changing Hands, Coming Soon!

​Yes, you read that right. Iron Chef Cat Cora will be the star of our next Chow Bella event, on June 23 at 7 p.m. We're thrilled to team up with our favorite local bookstore, Changing Hands, for a special night of cooking and chatting with Cora, who'll give a food demonstration and will ... More >>

Guy Fieri Is Too Crazy for All of Us, and This Week's Must-Watch Shows in "TV Dinner"

Looking for the latest in tasty television? Need to know the need-to-watch episodes of your favorite foodie shows? Chow Bella is here to help with reviews of the most delectable and dreadful, and a week-long, must-see schedule so you won't miss a thing. Whoa. Is NBC sure it wants Guy Fieri to host ... More >>

Chef Talk: Gio Osso of Estate House

When Chef Gio Osso graduated high school and told his parents that he wanted to go to culinary school, they weren't surprised. He wouldn't eat as a child unless he could stir a few ingredients in a pot with his wooden spoon (all from his high chair).   Years later, after graduating from Ne ... More >>

Iron Chef 2: The Duel in the Desert Pits Mel Mecinas Against Payton Curry

Jonathan McNamaraChef Mel Mecinas plates his final dish as time runs out. ​Allez-Cuisine! Whether you're viewing the uniquely Japanese original or Iron Chef America, the concept of pitting culinary greats against each other in a timed cooking battle has been proven time and time again to resu ... More >>

Oct. 1 In Blogs: Tent City, Kanye West, TASTE, and "Desert Divas"

​In the 24-hour news cycle it can be difficult to keep up. We have the solution. Check back on Valley Fever every evening for highlights from each of New Times' blogs. Today's entries: Feathered Bastard: Outlaw Fleetwood, the "Tent City" Video by Dennis Gilman Up on the Sun: Kanye West /Lady Gag ... More >>

Cooking School Secrets: Con Fusion

I'm a Food Network devotee. I love the Iron Chef challenges. The pressure is thrilling but mostly I'm blown away by the way chefs like Hiroyuki Sakai, Masaharu Morimoto and Bobby Flay combine traditions and ingredients. Fusion cuisine. It's innovative...and a big part of why I wanted to go to cu ... More >>

Phoenix Phoodies: Chef Beau McMillan Took Out an Iron Chef, Now He's Headed Back to TV

Chef Beau MacMillan, Beau Mac to his friends, is down to earth. Which is actually no small feat, since as of late, he's had his share of face time on TV. Best known for his stint on the Food Network's Iron Chef America, Battle Kobe Beef, where he made quick work of Iron Chef Bobby Flay, he's sti ... More >>

So, How Do We Look?

Chow Bella's been running for more than two years now. Can you believe it? (Me neither -- I should've at least put up a Chow Bella birthday post, huh?) What started as a ramshackle one-woman-show is now a sprawling empire of food bloggery, with a whole cast of assorted characters. Alas, yours truly ... More >>

Local chefs on national TV

Fun with fake food!

Get ready for a Food Fight

Is cuisine an artform?

Mark Tarbell on Iron Chef!

Beggar's Banquet

Sticking a fork in 2005

Iron Chef

Maybe the Valley's best

Bon Headed

Valley foodies get a taste of the big time

Nibbles 'n' Bits