'Culinary Class Wars' producing duo reflect on crafting the ultimate cooking competition
Published: 06 Nov. 2024, 15:09
Updated: 06 Nov. 2024, 17:52
![″Culinary Class Wars″ producers Kim Eun-ji, left, and Kim Hak-min [JOONGANG ILBO]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2024/11/06/22200f40-ce57-4e38-9107-6bbed1665477.jpg)
″Culinary Class Wars″ producers Kim Eun-ji, left, and Kim Hak-min [JOONGANG ILBO]
Chef survival shows have been a staple in reality television for over a decade. But among the mountain of the genre’s archetypes, the homegrown series “Culinary Class Wars” has managed to stick out as a notable case of success.
Nabbing the top spot on Netflix’s global non-English show rankings for three consecutive weeks, the most credit arguably goes to the show's creatives, who seemed to have quite literally designed the entire showdown — apart from the results, of course. They even reportedly advised judge Anh Sung-jae to shed some weight and contestant "Triple Star" to wear glasses to create compelling screen appearances.
![Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2024/11/06/dc206aee-99b6-4337-8acf-7139522bf8b2.jpg)
Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]
The show's producing duo of Kim Eun-ji and Kim Hak-min have worked together on projects like JTBC’s vocal survival show “Sing Again” (2020-24) and “Two Yoo Project Sugar Man” (2015).
In an exclusive interview last month with the JoongAng Ilbo, the Korean affiliate of the Korea Joongang Daily, the two producers also discussed one of the show’s most beloved contestants, chef Edward Lee, calling their relationship with him “a match from above.”
![″Culinary Class Wars″ producers Kim Eun-ji, left, and Kim Hak-min [JOONGANG ILBO]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2024/11/06/7afb2e5f-6dd4-49b2-a131-925bbfa39872.jpg)
″Culinary Class Wars″ producers Kim Eun-ji, left, and Kim Hak-min [JOONGANG ILBO]
“He was going back and forth between Korea and the United States throughout the competition, so it must have been really hard to overcome jet lag, but he didn’t show it. We truly felt that he was participating in the filming with sincerity and an affection for the show," the producers said.
He rehearsed cooking the dishes in his hotel room, which didn’t have a kitchen — though the producers offered to rent one for him. Lee also hired a Korean tutor because he wanted to present his dish in Korean. Overall, it was a type of dedication that the producers could never have expected from the chef before the show.
In fact, they were so skeptical that he would even want to join “Culinary Class Wars” that they didn’t even send him an official offer. Instead, they had the youngest producer on the team, who was good at English, send him an email, “sort of just as a fan,” said Kim Eun-ji.
Lee is a decorated chef. He won the 2010 Iron Chef America title and has been nominated multiple times for the James Beard Award. Last year, he cooked as the guest chef for the White House state dinner with U.S. President Biden and Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yeol.
![Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2024/11/06/360d1116-438f-460c-aaea-698a7701d52e.jpg)
Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]
To the producers' astonishment, Lee replied to the email saying that he wanted to have a Zoom meeting. “We actually checked in again with that young staff member to see if she had correctly asked him to appear as a contestant and not a judge! And during the Zoom meeting, we repeatedly told him that this was a survival show, so he may not make it past the first round, but he just said, ‘Why not?’”
Kim Eun-ji added that Lee, at the time, was “looking for an opportunity to really express his love for Korea and Korean food.” “He said that he was happy to be part of a show that was being made in Korea and also that he would never have consented to do it if it was an American show.”
![Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2024/11/06/9596a93e-ac71-4b4c-9e8d-eff737eae78f.jpg)
Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]
The producers also shared their process of crafting the show.
“We started by watching all the cooking shows in the past and then creating a report — which ended up being over 400 pages.” They wanted to see the things that had been done before and “eliminate them from our show,” Kim Hak-min said.
“Our goal was to design challenges and create scenes that have never been seen in the genre before.” Thus, the concept came of amassing 100 chefs from Michelin-starred fine-dining restaurants to neighborhood bars and diners and then pitting them against each other.
The process was costly and time-consuming, however, added the producers, who said that constructing the very first set with 40 live cooking stations in a space about as big as a football field took about a month. “It was much more expensive than our previous decorative sets on music shows, but things like the plumbing, electricity and gas on the ‘Culinary Class Wars’ set don’t really show on camera,” said Kim Eun-ji. The producers added that they used over 300 cameras during one round alone.
![Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2024/11/06/11d1ffcc-d799-4a47-8125-6b300e5e4fd9.jpg)
Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]
The preparation and cleanup for so many chefs was a challenge as well. “The teams in charge were the ones who got to work the earliest and left the latest,” said Kim Hak-min. “We often had no idea what the chefs were going to cook, so it was really difficult trying to prepare all the ingredients for each round. I never knew so many types of herbs existed until the show!”
Seven months later, the show finally aired. While it received a lot of love, there were also criticisms regarding the fairness of the missions, particularly the ones done with teams.
![Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]](https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/data/photo/2024/11/06/b9be6b80-0f7c-4c31-8435-9eab29386848.jpg)
Scenes from Netflix's ″Culinary Class Wars″ [NETFLIX]
Kim Hak-min admitted that those team missions were set up to add drama and conflict to the reality show.
“I vaguely assumed that there would be a lot of nervousness because in the kitchen, usually, there is a clear hierarchy, and each of the contestants would be sensitive when positioning themselves in this hierarchy when put in teams. But it turned out that there was no room for conflict because there was a common goal to prepare food in time. While I was impressed by the professionalism, I was also a bit disappointed that the conflict was too mild for a typical survival show.
Ultimately, “we wanted to portray many different sides of the chefs since this was a survival show, but if the viewers were uncomfortable [with some of the missions], then those missions weren’t designed properly to deliver our intentions. We will reflect on the feedback from those viewers for the next season.”
“Culinary Class Wars” was recently confirmed for a second season. The producers hoped that the show’s popularity could go beyond the screen and become a catalyst for the local dining scene to flourish and appeal to foreigners in particular.
“The problem with Korea’s dining scene is that the demand is very limited,” said Kim Hak-min. “Ultimately, restaurants need tourists to come to their establishments. We anticipate that the [global] popularity of ‘Culinary Class Wars’ can show foreigners that there are many chefs cooking up delicious foods in Korea, drawing them to Korea and opening a significantly bigger market for the local dining industry in the future.”
BY SEO JEONG-MIN [[email protected]]
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
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