Brace Yourself For a Cutthroat Squirrel

When Francesco Palmieri, chef/owner of the Orange Squirrel in Bloomfield, stepped onto the set of the Food Network’s latest competition, Cutthroat Kitchen, his finely-honed knives were replaced with plastic takeout utensils and he was told to make creamed broccoli without using broccoli. He says he knew he was in for “a high stress-level situation.”

Cutthroat Kitchen premieres this Sunday, August 11th, at 10 p.m., with Alton Brown as the devilishly provocative host.

Palmieri’s duel with three other chefs will air Sunday, September 15th.

Like Chopped, each Cutthroat Kitchen episode begins with four competitors. But there’s a lot more to survival than just cooking well under time pressure.

Each chef is handed a briefcase containing $25,000 in crisp bills and is advised to use the cash wisely.

The only way they can spend their stash is by bidding against each other for auction items to help themselves or sabotage their opponents.

Each episode confronts the chefs with three challenges. As in Chopped, after each challenge one chef is eliminated. The last chef standing takes home whatever cash remains in his or her briefcase.

“Anything can happen—if you are willing to pay for it,” Brown says on Cutthroat Kitchen’s online video teaser.

Not only do the chefs have to cook winning dishes with limited resources, they also must outwit their foes and preserve as much of their purse as possible, all while the clock ticks.

“A bank can diminish quite rapidly,” notes Palmieri, 43.

When Palmieri was approached by the network, he agreed to compete for two reasons—because Alton Brown, who he calls “a highly-seasoned, super-pro,” would be the host, and because the concept fit into his own “quirky wheelhouse.”

Palmieri’s top-rated Orange Squirrel kitchen produces unusual pairings such as skate wing with guava purée and crispy plantains, or a vegan BLT made with smoked tomato, crispy kale and "fakon" vegetarian bacon. Then there are tongue-in-cheek (literally and figuratively) sides such as his Squirrel Nuts, which are crisp, truffled potato cheese puffs.

Cooking challenges are nothing new for the puckish chef. A 2000 CIA graduate, Palmieri worked in several top Manhattan restaurants—including Windows on the World and Coco Pazzo—before opening the Orange Squirrel five years ago.

Despite feeling uncomfortable watching himself on TV, Palmieri has also appeared on the CBS show Two in the Kitchen and on NBC’s Today, where he made mushroom tempura and a broccoli gratin—actually using broccoli, unlike his Cutthroat Kitchen challenge.

“It was intense," he says of his experience in the TV competition. "It was extremely stressful, there was a lot of drama.” But he says he would definitely do it again.

The Orange Squirrel

Cutthroat Kitchen

SUZANNE ZIMMER LOWERY is a food writer, pastry chef and culinary instructor at a number of New Jersey cooking schools. Find out more about her at suzannelowery.com.

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