Ego vs Skills

after reading this post today on the gender inequality in the kitchen restaurants on punk planning and then going for a few rounds on battle mode in brand tags it had me thinking about who wins out in battle between male vs female chefs, when it comes to celebrity chefdome? i just asked my wife to quickly name some celebrity chefs, right off the bat, she busted out w/bobby flay, mario batali, todd english, morimoto, emeril....and so on. all male chefs. not even a mention of julia childs or rachel ray, both of whom have been in the news lately. so, back to the battle of the chefs...let's take a chef like gordon ramsey vs giada de laurentiis, who wins in celebrity and awareness? i would say gordo edges giada out by a wedge of gouda. he's got a shitload of restaurants, and his shows like kitchen nightmares and hell's kitchen seem to be doing pretty well. however, giada probably has to try a lot harder to attract viewers, and it can't be just on her pedigree alone. lucky for her she's got great looks and killer blade skills. yes, this sucks to point out, but it's why food network has her on every afternoon and into the weekend.

then watch any of episode of iron chef america, when a female chef goes up against an iron chef. do any of the women pick cat cora? no, they pick one of the male chefs. two recent episodes that that i watched. one was bobby flay vs gabrielle hamilton and the other michael symon vs april bloomfield. these women pick the guys, cuz they wanna show 'em that they can compete with 'em on the same playing ground, unlike in other professions. anyone recall michelle wie trying to make the cut on the pga tour? anyways, back to food...in both ica challenges, these women prevailed over their "more dominant" male counterparts. both of these accomplished female chefs probably not as popular or "celebrity" as giada or the male iron chefs challenges, but they are very skilled and deserving of their success, nevertheless. maybe they don't have the ego found in their male counterparts? the ego that's need to catapult themselves to the "celebrity chefdome" status? maybe they just let their cooking do all the talking. hopefully, we get to see and taste more greatness from women chefs based on their skills and not on how much big talk they can make? btw, if you're ever in nyc, check out prune and the spotted pig these are headed up by ms. hamilton and bloomfield, respectively. cheers! i'm off to have some food and drink. it's the weekend, baby! btw, this is a video of stud male celebrity chef, tv guy, and author anthony bourdain talking about food and chefs. it's a long video, worth a watch if you're into the AB. towards the end, at about 53:00, he takes a dig a cat cora. "who is cat cora? was she grown in a petri dish?." more male chef ego talking?