King of Tetsujin Tournament
Round 1, Battle 1
I was extremely exicited when this episode aired in Southern California, in December 1999.  The new milleninnum was coming along with the end of the Iron Chef era.  There was new dramatic music.  The Iron Chef rose on the plateform in front of the live audience.  The applause was immense.  The new music along with the atomosphere made it spectacular.  Although I didn't want to see the Tetsujin fight each other, there was no choice.  It had to be done.  The match was excellent.  Both Tetsujin performed to their highest levels.  Surprise guests came, even Kobe's wife!  In the end one tetsujin stood high the other retired.

What I have for you is lots of great moments, moments that span 24 images that span 2 pages, and 1 video clip.  It was an extremely exciting match.

Download Battle Transcript
The secret ingredient is unveiled!  This pig is a special crossbreed.  Each chef was presented half a pig and inards from 2 pigs.  How nice to have a picture of the pig before it was cut up.
What the heck did Kaga unveil?  Mutant pig?
Here we see Kobe and his assistant carry off half a pig.  He almost drops the pig half in his mad dash for pork.
The video clip involves Kaga unveiling the secret ingredient in a cloud of smoke followed by Kobe sprinting (literally) up to the platform to get his side of pork.  He pulls off the meat so quickly, he and assistant almost drop the side of the pork on the floor while knocking pig parts off the platform onto the floor.  Quite an exhilarating video.  Fukui-san in the background yells, "sugoi (awesome)", as he witnesses the frenzied action.

Adding to the wackyness of this clip, we see Chin quivering and Kobe giving looks of bewilderment as the ingredient is unveiled.  I suspect neither of them has heard or seen Tokyo X.

Stats: Mpeg-1 / 352x240 / 33 seconds / 2.42 megs
 


 
Guest judges, the lovely Kikuchi Momoko and sumo grand champion, Akebono.
Kobe's lovely wife, Kaori... I'm a bit tempted to call her Kaori-chan.
Here's Chin slicing up some kidney.
Chin rids the urine smell from the kidney.  I for one like kidney, but at times cheap restaurants fail at removing the smell or will over cook it making it dense.  I have faith in Chin to make it right!
Here we Chin chopping up some pork with the flat of his cleaver.  What is he making?
It's announced that Chin is making mabo tofu.  Kikichui immediately lights up and expresses her joy.  From this moment on, the entire match seems to be centered around Chin's dish as it's mentioned numberous times throughout the match.

Time to plug my sister's haiku.

Son of Chin Kenmin
Bust out the mabo tofu
and you're sure to win

When Chin cooks mabo tofu, there is no chance in hell he's gonna lose.  They always go crazy for this dish.  Well, he did lose in the 2000th Dish Special.
Kobe always has time to make pasta.
Chin smokes a sausage he made from Tokyo X.
The original French Tetsujin, Ishinabe Yutaka.
The finished mabo tofu.
Kobe uses a blowtorch.  Very Morimoto-ish.
Female sidelines reporter with the post match intereview.
Ota gets to interview Chin.

... onto the tasting!

[ back ]