UnNews:Roadkill Challenge: Kentucky-Chinese cuisine gets the Food Network competition treatment
| Straight talk, from straight faces | ✪ | UnNews | ✪ | Friday, April 19, 2024, 05:47:59 (UTC) |
| Roadkill Challenge: Kentucky-Chinese cuisine gets the Food Network competition treatment | 
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2 October 2012
WILLIAMSBURG, Kentucky -- Inspired by the great Kentucky-Chinese food culture sweeping the state, the Food Network this week announced plans for a new cooking challenge show to feature the quintessential staple of the unique hybrid cuisine: fresh roadkill. According to a Food Network spokesperson, Roadkill Challenge, which will debut during sweeps week this season, will enthrall viewers as the state's best Chinese chefs square off against each other to create the ultimate roadkill dish. "Competitions will include butchering for maximum chicken-likeness, the amazing chicken flavor-match, and a special segment sure to be popular, the roadkill race, where the chefs and their driver teammate must see if they can, shall we say, create and not so much find the meat source."
"Gaminess will be the big challenge," said show judge Bobbie Dean, a respected Food Network veteran. "I'm a roadkill buff myself, having grown up in Georgia, and I know how it can get stringy and chewy depending on how hard the animal was hit. It can be a real challenge to mask the flaws of the various road-flattened meats without overwhelming the natural juices and salts. Butter was always a big factor in that effort for mom, and Chinese cooking does not usually incorporate much butter. I look forward to a very interesting competition."
Chinese chefs in Kentucky are especially excited about the new show, as they are certain it will bring them great luck. And new customers. "Around here, Chinese food restaurant struggle to find meat from restaurant supply chain that is fresh - never frozen - and inexpensive," said Chef Hue Chen of the Red Flower Chinese Restaurant here. "Customer in Kentucky demand freshness, and nothing fresher than local roadkill. So at my restaurant we take shovel, trash can and mop out every day: nothing but best for Red Flower take-out customer." Pointing out a streak on his restaurant floor, he added, "Look here! See? Fresh blood trail."
When it was suggested to him that the show may not get the positive reaction nationwide that he expects locally, as the roadkill food culture hasn't yet extended beyond the borders of Kentucky, Chen claimed not to be aware that there was anything wrong with it. "What wrong with roadkill? It fresh, it sometime not even yet dead! In China, people love! Oh, but no worry - it not dog. It usually deer, maybe sometime racoon or possom when not so lucky. Eh, it all taste like chicken."
The show is slated for a single season, with the network retaining the option to extend it in the unlikely event that it doesn't put off everyone more than 100 miles from the Mason-Dixon line.
Sources[edit]
- Mike Krumboltz "Roadkill... yum!". Yahoo! News, October 2, 2012