One is no longer enough for him. At the start of the eighth season of his cooking show “Kitchen Impossible”, Tim Mälzer challenged two top chefs: Walter and Sascha Lemberg. A father-son team that doesn’t really get along that well in the kitchen, but wanted to become a dream team against maltsters. What they brought to the plate wasn’t quite as fantastic. However, at least one has cooked its way into the hearts of the viewers.
These chefs had to prove themselves
Tim Mälzer got involved with the star chef duo Walter and Sascha Stemberg. The father-son team comes from a traditional family of innkeepers, the company has been around since 1864. Sascha Stemberg is now the fifth generation to run “Haus Stemberg”. The gourmet restaurant has held a Michelin star since 2013.
Those were the tasks
Tim Mälzer was allowed to go to San José in Costa Rica, where he cooked with original chef Ricky Barthley “Rondón
The Stembergs traveled to Gordes in France, where they met chef Franz Keller and had to recreate a dish by Paul Bocuse: “Poulet au vinaigre”. The duo had to face the second task in Malmö, Sweden. There they should eat “Ox heart with black salsify
After seven seasons of “Kitchen Impossible”, it should be known that Tim Mälzer can not only cook, but also analyze incredibly well. While Mälzer played off all his routine and experience, the Stembergs kept getting bogged down with the subtleties of the dishes and sometimes disagreed. In Sweden, that was their undoing.
Titti Qvarnström’s dish was small and complex, full of regional ingredients. It also included a grated salted egg that the two wanted identified as cheese. Overall, the cook wasn’t exactly impressed with what she saw in her kitchen. “You have invented something new,” she judged.
Tim Mälzer delivered the biggest turn-off. In the Black Forest he was supposed to build an elaborate puff pastry framework for the royal pie. The Sternbergs gave him no responsibility for preparing the dough. “Fair,” he thought. But his good mood tipped when he was told how the construct was made. He felt underestimated and refused the offer, railed against the competition and literally worked his way into it. “They don’t trust me at all,” says Mälzer. The nagging quickly seemed arrogant.
The next day he had to admit that in his megalomania he dismissed the task as too easy and his suggestion of making the puff pastry himself was an “incredibly stupid idea”. But then he had to go through with it and delivered with flying colors. “Maybe that was my hole-in-one, which you only have once in a lifetime,” he said afterwards, visibly proud.
Walter Sternberg is fun. If you had to draw a traditional gourmet chef, he could be the template with his walrus beard and the belly full of pleasure. He was in charge of the restaurant kitchen for 30 years, but now he’s taking it easy. In “Kitchen Impossible” he called his performance “age-appropriate work”. If the father wanted to have a glass of wine with Franz Keller in the garden, the son just had to whirl it on by himself. And when Mälzer, beast that he can be, shook the dynamic of the Stembergs, reversed the balance of power and made his father the head chef, he was conducting from his chair. Walter Sternberg no longer has to prove anything to anyone. And that was a good thing.
Because the father-son team doesn’t really get along that well in the kitchen. The attempt failed with a bang after a few weeks. “He was about to leave, I was about to have a heart attack,” says father Walter Stemberg. Since then, the son has been the head chef and the two avoid each other at the stove – until “Kitchen Impossible”. An explosive mixture. The fact that there was no bang in the end was mainly due to father Sternberg. He withdrew into his son’s shadow as an assistant, let himself be snapped at, swallowed replies, but he didn’t snap. The looks he gave his son, on the other hand, spoke volumes.
After the Stembergs had submitted in the first task, Mälzer overtook them with a sensational performance in the Black Forest. He got the win at the start of the new season with 13.4 to 12 points. And thus raised the bar for the coming episodes. But there were no losers. Because the Stembergs also won something on “Kitchen Impossible”. According to Sascha Stemberg, Mälzer has achieved something special, “The two trips have welded us [father and son] closer together”.
In the next episode, René Frank challenges the Hamburg chef. He is one of the world’s most successful pastry chefs and has been decorated with two stars.
The eighth season of Kitchen Impossible started on February 12th and will be shown on Vox every Sunday from 8:15 p.m. This and later all other episodes of “Kitchen Impossible” can be streamed on RTL.
