Over the last eight years, Feeding Tampa Bay’s “Epic Chef” “Chopped”-style cooking competition has become a familiar sight inside the Epicurean hotel’s culinary theater. But last Monday in South Tampa featured a few unprecedented events.
Updated May 5
ST. PETERSBURG â For the second time in just a few months, a Tampa Bay chef is headed to the small screen.
David Benstock, the executive chef and owner of Il Ritorno in St. Petersburg, will compete on
Beat Bobby Flay, the popular Food Network competition show, on May 20.
Even though the show was taped back in October 2019 â before the coronavirus pandemic â the network waited until this year to release the episodes of Flayâs hit show, now in its 28th season.
The episode, titled âMission Impastable,â will feature Benstock and New York-based chef and cookbook author Nicole Karr. The show, which hinges on a competing chef trying to beat Flay at his own game, typically features two chefs who are first pitted against each other in a speed round competition involving a secret ingredient. The winner of that round then goes head-to-head with Flay to compete with a dish of the visiting chefâs choice.