America’s Culinary Cup on CBS is created, executive produced and hosted by Padma Lakshmi; is a cooking competition where 16 elite chefs vie for a grand prize of $1 million. After the first episode, the challenges are built around ten “culinary commandments.” What are those commandments? Find out more below.
Opening Shot: A helicopter speeds towards lower Manhattan, then we see scenes of Padma Lakshmi eating food.
The Gist: These are the “culinary commandments” that the chefs on America’s Culinary Cup will have to demonstrate mastery of, starting in the second episode: Meat, vegetables, sauces, dessert, innovation, flavors, sustainability, world cuisine, consistency, culinary science and technology. The permanent judges that will judge dishes along with Lakshmi are two of the country’s most decorated chefs: Michael Cimarusti and Wylie Dufresne.
When we talk about elite, we mean elite: Chefs with Michelin stars, James Beard awards and nominations, and winners of Lakshmi’s old series Top Chef and other competitions. There are even two Bocuse d’Or medalists, one of which coached the US team to its first gold medal.
Four chefs are eliminated in the first episode. Eight of the chefs are told to choose the chef they want to compete against, and they have 75 minutes to create their best dish. The starts are staggered so Lakshmi, Dufresne and Cimarusti can get the dishes fresh. The judges use a point system; the higher finisher in a pair is safe, and the other is up for elimination.
For the elimination, the judges that are safe go into a conference room and decide the pairings and which of four dishes they will make elevated versions of Shrimp and grits, clam chowder, fried chicken or beef stroganoff. The judges vote on which dish is best; the one that gets at least two votes stays.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? America’s Culinary Cup is essentially Top Chef on steroids.
Our Take: Lakshmi and company didn’t do too much to mess with a formula that has worked for cooking competitions going all the way back to Iron Chef. Give the chefs a challenge and a limited amount of time and then judge the results. Subsequent episodes of America’s Culinary Cup will take place outside the soundstage kitchen — one of the nicest we’ve seen, by the way! — and the competitors will be pitted against each other in different configurations. It sounds just like Lakshmi’s old show, doesn’t it?
But what Lakshmi has done is tweak the formula to give it a new look. The biggest tweak is having elite chefs compete. Sure, there is a personality component to why they were cast — you can’t cast a reality competition with a bunch of dull competitors — but none of the people on this show are in over their heads. As we mentioned above, they all have some high-end culinary accolades, and have all proven to be good under pressure.
Another factor, at least in the first episode, is that the pairs starts are staggered, so that as soon as the clock runs out, the plates are in front of the judges. We suspect this was one of the most frustrating aspects of Top Chef to Lakshmi, where dishes sat around while the judges were tasting and discussing the dish in front of them. This way, the dishes are presented the way the chefs wanted them to be presented.
There are surprising results, especially given how many of the chefs — Buddha Lo, Philip Tessier and Matt Peters are the most prominent examples — have competition experience at the highest levels. This shows us that the dishes themselves will be the only factor that determines whether someone stays or goes. This isn’t the first judging rodeo for either Dufresne and Cimarusti, and they explain what they like and don’t like about the dishes without trying to show off.
Performance Worth Watching: Lakshmi’s ownership of the show can be seen in her performance as host; she’s projecting a lot more warmth, sexiness, humor and energy than she ever did as host of Top Chef. This Lakshmi is more like what we see in her social media feeds or on her Hulu docuseries Taste The Nation.
Sex And Skin: Aside from the usual food p*rn, there’s nothing.
Parting Shot: Lakshmi says to the remaining contestants, “Next week we start with the culinary commandments. So get some sleep; you’re gonna need it.”
Sleeper Star: We repeatedly hear from Rochelle Daniel that she postponed her wedding to be on the show. The number of times we hear that in the first episode may or may not give viewers an idea of her fate.
Most Pilot-y Line: There’s a flip-letter board that Lakshmi jokes that “I stole from Grand Central Station.” Watching the pairings flip into place, then the scores of those pairings, was one of the more grating forms of padding by the producers.
Our Call: STREAM IT. While America’s Culinary Cup doesn’t reinvent the cooking competition genre, an energetic hosting job by Lakshmi, the elite chefs in the competition, and the format tweaks by Lakshmi and her fellow producers make the show an entertaining watch.
How To Watch America’s Culinary Cup
Paramount+ offers two subscription plans, Essential and Premium. The ad-supported Essential plan costs $8.99/month, while the ad-free Premium plan (which comes with Showtime titles and live CBS) costs $13.99/month.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.