All right, Dad, I am ready for the baking competition.
-Hunter, Hunter... -Yes?
...I didn't say baking, I said bacon.
Bacon competition.
Oh. I, I already baked a cake.
Hunter, go change. We got a lot to do tonight.
We have four chefs with a passion for pork.
[man] Straight for the bacon, baby.
[Guy] And they're ready to smoke the competition
with their sizzling bacon dishes.
If they don't get hog-tied by my despicable games first.
-Piggy, piggy, piggy. -Oh, dang, so expensive.
-One penny change. -Oh, no.
-Messing with Wendy. -Hello.
You knocked it out of the park.
[Guy] It's Bad to the Bacon
right now on Guy's Grocery Games.
Let's meet our bacon masters.
Now first up we have
Justin Mr. Bacon Coleman,
the chef-owner of Philadelphia's
first-ever bacon focused restaurant and food truck.
-How are you, brother? -[Justin] Doing well.
Next we got Barbie Larrinaga
who's serving up Basque and Vietnamese cuisine
with lots of bacon on her food truck.
The Bacon Barbie. Here she is.
And then there's Charif Arabe,
a second-generation executive chef
with a magical ability to transform dishes
using bacon in any form.
Look at the shirt, buddy.
-Tropical bacon. -[Charif] Ah, thank you.
-Hey, chefs. -Hey.
And finally, Arturo Leighton,
chef-owner of a Memphis Pan-Asian joint
who's traveled the world
eating bacon dishes.
-What's up, G? -What's up, brother?
-[Arturo] How you doing? -Here we go.
Let me just tell you right now,
I'm not faking, we're making bacon.
-[chefs chuckle] -[Guy] The four of you
have been hampicked...
-[Arturo] Okay. -...for this competition.
We've invited you to serve up some
sweet...
Sorry. Bacon dishes.
Dishes so great that you'll have the judges
squealing for more.
Ba-dum-bum.
[chefs laugh]
You are gonna have to play some crazy grocery games
that are more twisted than a pig's tail.
-I will stop right now. -[Arturo] Oh.
-Come on. -[Guy] I'm sorry, this is just too much fun.
The chef who makes the least successful dish
in the first round will be eliminated.
The chef that ultimately wins the competition
will get to shop Flavortown Market
for up to 20,000 bucks.
And that, ladies and gentlemen,
is really bringing home the bacon.
-Yeah. -[Guy] I want you to start off strong.
I want you to make your signature bacon dish. How about that?
Bountiful bacon dish
that really hogs the spotlight.
Nice one.
The chef who impresses the judges the most
is gonna make bank.
Bank.
Oh, that's right. Hang on a second.
Hunter, bring in the banks.
Oh.
-Look at that. -Here, piggy, piggy, piggy.
[Guy] Here, piggy, piggy, piggy, piggy, piggy.
Because, folks, this is the Piggy Bank Battle.
I don't think we've ever done this one before.
-Wow. -[Guy] You're gonna have to
pay for all of your ingredients that you need
with the money that's in these piggy banks.
Thirty in each one, right, Hunter, like I told you?
[Hunter] Uh, not exactly.
I'm not really great at math and counting.
You know this. Yeah.
So you're telling me that all of these...
-I was really trying. -...are random?
I think they're close.
[Guy] Chef Barbie, you look scared.
-Terrified. -[Guy] You can pick first.
First one, second one, third one.
-This one? -That one.
Okay. [snorts]
Chef Justin,
-one, two, or four? -Let's go with one.
-Very nice. -I like it.
-How do you open it? -[Guy] Gentlemen,
who would like to pick next?
-Let me do two, Chef. -[Guy] Here we go.
-Thank you. -[Guy] Why don't we do this? Why don't we open them
and then we can see how much money you actually got?
[Charif] Three. My, my.
[Barbie] $26.
[Guy] All right, chefs.
How much money did you get, chef?
$24.
$29.
$27.
$25.
It's kind of a big deal
how much you have,
'cause if you guys are off by,
you know, three bucks
when you go shopping, I mean, even when it comes down to $2,
$1 can make all the difference.
Someone will go home on that $1, okay?
I got 'em on that one!
[Hunter] That was close.
That was such a good one,
there's no way they got away with it.
I thought we had that.
[Barbie] Banh mi.
Hi, I'm Barbie Larrinaga,
Bacon Banh Mi Barbie from Boise.
There's too many B's going on.
My signature bacon dish are
bacon and pork banh mi.
This is a menu item
that sells out daily on my food truck.
I really want to use pork belly,
but it's so expensive. So the next best option was
to get the pork loin
that had a bit of fat on it
and deep fry it and get it to mimic bacon flavor.
The judges are gonna love this bacon mayo.
It's nothing like they've ever tasted before.
I know I have to get five-spice
because that is one of the key ingredients
in my banh mi.
Oh, that's huge.
I was born in Ho Chi Minh City.
My mother had a pho stand in Saigon.
She taught me you don't need
crazy ingredients
to make a really good banh mi.
What are we looking at spending today?
$27.
[Wendy] All right. Okay.
Carrots.
And the five-spice
puts you at $31.35.
I couldn't get my five-spice.
$15.20.
$5.26.
I've got some great spices back at my station for free,
and I'm hoping it mimics whatever
seasonings that I'm able to put on the pork loin.
-There you go. -[Barbie] Thank you.
[Arturo] I'm going straight for the bacon, baby.
The first thing I'm grabbing is bacon,
and bacon's not cheap, so I can't just
buy an abundance of it.
Of course, I get the lowest sum of money.
I got 24 bucks,
and I'm gonna try to make the most of it here.
At Good Fortune,
our focus is on noodles and dumplings,
and we put bacon in everything.
Ramen, ramen.
Oh, that's cheap, baby.
For my signature bacon dish,
the first thing that pops to mind is family meal.
Family meal, we serve it at the restaurant,
and it's basically our way to feed the staff.
And one of the things that I've been making every Sunday
has been budae jjigae, Korean army stew.
Gochujang.
Four bucks, not bad.
American-Korean fusion
started back in war times.
One of the things that I was shocked by
the first time I had budae jjigae
was that there's a big slice of American cheese.
I didn't have the cheese with me,
and so I need to make sure
I have enough money for the American cheese.
I'm gonna run to the register first, then start my broth.
Then I'll come back for the cheese.
[Wendy] What are we working with today?
[Arturo] $24.
You're fast.
That's what they tell me.
-[Arturo chuckles] -[Wendy] $23.10 right there.
-Oh. I need to take back one of the bacons. -Quick, quick.
-I'll take back one of the bacons.
I had two packs of bacon. I had to go one pack.
I need to make sure I have enough money for the American cheese.
Twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three. Okay.
There you go. Grab and go. Nothing left in your cart?
-[Arturo] Nothing. -[Wendy] Bye.
I should have more money left.
I think I need some change.
Uh, you had one penny change.
I had $24, I promise.
I need that change just in case.
You gave me $23.55.
-Okay, and it was $20... -[Wendy] And it was $23.54,
-and I gave you a penny. -Okay.
Ooh.
Messing with Wendy.
I'm not gonna question her judgment. She does this all the time.
Dang.
But I thought I took back that bacon.
I got $25.
I'm doing my bacon caramel burger,
which is one of our top sellers at my restaurant.
Bake'n Bacon is the first and only bacon-inspired restaurant
in Philadelphia.
We make bacon the star.
For my bacon caramel sauce,
vanilla helps make
the caramel sauce taste like caramel.
Oh, dang, so expensive.
How key is the vanilla to you?
It's pretty key.
I don't have enough money for this,
so I had to get canned caramel sauce.
All right. That's cheaper.
It's not gonna taste the same, but...
Just fix it up as best as I can
and work with what I have within my budget.
And what do we have to spend today?
-Um... -"And what do we have
-to spend today?" -$25.
I'm looking at the numbers go up.
$24.62.
[Justin] By doing a simple burger
and having the bacon flavors
be mind-blowing, that's just the way to go.
[Wendy] There you go.
They've already burned off five and a half minutes.
I ended up getting the most money out of all the piggy banks.
I chose the slab bacon
because I can keep them inside
nice and juicy,
and I can get the outside nice, charred, and crispy.
So at Frank's, I use bacon in everything.
In salads, ice cream.
I just love bacon.
My signature bacon dish
is a pan-seared bacon
served on top of a polenta
with a corn and black bean salsa.
I wanted to really showcase the bacon
in different capacities.
Bacon snow is our secret ingredient.
[Guy] So he got the maltodextrin,
he's gonna make his bacon dust.
'Cause he likes to take his bacon fat,
hit it with the maltodextrin and make bacon dust.
That might be a great move on the chef's part.
-[Wendy] Hello. Last but not least. -[Charif] Hello.
And you are the big spender today.
[Charif] Yes, ma'am, big money.
[Guy] Is that maltodextrin gonna make it in there?
[Charif] I hope so.
-Oh, $29. -That puts you at $29.35.
Take the tapioca maltodextrin out.
-Take this off? -[Charif] Yes, ma'am.
So your signature item of making the bacon dust
is going away.
[Charif] Oh.
So I was very worried...
Thank you.
...I couldn't afford to make the bacon snow.
That, I think, would have really added
the bacon aroma into the dish.
But slab bacon gives me all the bang for your buck.
So who better to pig out on these signature bacon dishes
than our signature Triple G judges?
The Food Network star, who is an expert in
cooking with pork,
turkey, and vegan bacon.
The one and only Damaris Phillips.
Top Chef All-Star and the Prince of Penne,
Mustache Joe. Joe Sasto.
And acclaimed restaurateur
and two-time Tournament of Champions winner,
the one and only champ herself,
Maneet Chauhan.
Do we want the main element to be bacon,
or do we want the main flavor profile to be bacon?
So when I'm looking for a bacon dish,
I want the main element to be bacon.
-Yeah. -I want bacon.
[Guy] 23 minutes!
I see banh mi coming together here.
[Barbie] Pork loin banh mi.
Best seller that we have.
Making the pickled veg, I take it.
[Barbie] Yep.
How are you preparing the bacon for this, chef?
I am going to put bacon inside my soy mayo,
which is very loved.
Be ready to get that bacon cooking.
[Barbie] Oh, yeah.
Next, since I couldn't get pork belly,
I'm going to turn this pork tenderloin
into bacon. Cut them into
thin slices.
I add my soy seasoning.
Since I only had $27,
I couldn't get my five-spice.
Five-spice adds warming notes to any dish.
So I'm going to use cinnamon
and cayenne pepper on my pork chop.
Oh, I need five-spice so bad.
Cooking has always been a passion,
but it wasn't until I realized
that working at a desk and office job that
my life was not being fulfilled.
And now I've had my food truck
since August of 2023.
I want to win because that money can
definitely help expand our business.
Okay, I need to toast my baguette.
As I'm slicing my baguette,
I drop one on the floor.
Ooh! [gasps]
Oh, my gosh.
Oh, no.
And I don't have money to go back and get another one.
[Damaris] Oh, my God.
Barbie just dropped her baguette on the floor,
and she doesn't have enough money to buy more.
[Barbie] There I had to think quickly.
[Damaris] She's gonna have to make smaller banh mi sandwiches.
Oh, no.
[Barbie] Come on, toast it, toast it, toast it.
[Guy] 20 minutes!
These are not just everyday cooks.
These are bacon believers.
Bacon believers. Bacon livers.
[Arturo] I wish I had more money.
I would have gotten the American cheese.
It's not budae jjigae without the American cheese.
-Arturo. -[Arturo] Chef.
We were doing a price check on your shopping.
I think I need some change.
Uh, you had one penny change.
I had $24, I promise.
I need that change just in case.
You gave me $23.55.
[Guy] Uh, we owe you $3.
-Yes! Let's go. -[Guy] So anything you want to go get
for $3, you're welcome to get.
-Thank you, chef. -[Guy] You bet.
I can get the cheese.
Wow, Wendy.
First time in the history of Triple G,
Wendy made a mistake.
Three bucks. [laughs]
Okay. That's a one-off,
that will never happen again.
-Do not let it go to your head. -I just trusted you.
I didn't even second-guess it.
[Wendy laughs]
All right, here's your three bucks.
-You got one penny. -[Arturo] Thank you.
[Guy] What did you get for your extra three bucks?
[Arturo] I got American cheese, chef.
Cheese is going on this.
[Arturo] You got to do it.
It's part of budae jjigae.
First thing I got to get started
is my soup base.
I got the bacon going,
onions, tomatoes.
Along with the gochujang and the bacon,
that's really gonna set a good foundation for the soup.
Both of my parents are immigrants from Chile.
My parents sacrificed
their entire livelihoods
to come here and try to provide a better life for me.
And I want to make sure that
their sacrifice is noticed,
and I give it my best effort today.
[Justin] I'm gonna do a burger
just because I feel like people love burgers.
Doing a bacon cheeseburger, keeping it very simple.
Let it do its own thing
while I start my bacon caramel sauce.
And we're gonna use some of the grease from the bacon.
The flavors are just insane,
because you have the sweetness of the caramel,
the saltiness of the bacon, and it just pairs really well.
[Joe] I think sweet and salty
really pulls the best out of bacon.
[Justin] In 2016,
my younger brother, Derek, passed away.
A few months after he passed away,
he visited me in a dream.
And in the dream, he gave me the idea for Bake'n Bacon.
I smelled bacon in the dream,
and I was trying to follow the scent,
and I finally walked onto this food truck,
and Derek was there, and I was like,
"Hey, come back with me, we thought you passed."
But he was like, "This is your concept."
And it's been super successful.
If it wasn't for him, I wouldn't have this idea.
I'm here today to just
honor him and continue to...
continue to just make him proud.
[Guy] 15 minutes!
Charif has 29.
-[Joe] Oh, okay. -[Damaris] You guys, with $29,
I feel like you can make a bacon dish.
[Joe] He got a whole block
of cured pork belly bacon.
So now he can decide
the size that he wants to cut it in.
-[Charif] All right. -[Guy] So,
tell me the story about cooking this whole big slab of bacon.
So I'm going to sear this slab of bacon
with a charred corn,
black bean bacon salsa.
Where's this polenta going in?
[Charif] That's gonna go with the dish underneath.
-Got it. -[meat sizzling]
[Charif] You hear that sizzle?
I discovered bacon in my late teens.
I'm originally born and raised in Morocco,
and we don't have much pork product.
So my first week in America,
I tried bacon,
and it was almost a revelation.
It made me want to be a chef,
and I fell in love with it.
Rocking and rolling.
That clock is a beast. It moves by so fast.
Chefs, ten minutes! Ten minutes to go!
[Barbie] I got the pork frying.
I got the vegetables pickling.
Now I'm going to work on my bacon mayo.
I'm known for this bacon mayo
on our Basquenese food truck.
It's got that crunchiness
from the bacon crumbles
with my soy sauce.
It tastes so delicious.
Why does time go by so fast here?
I had to put something back to make this happen,
but I think I'm gonna manage to get those flavors across.
I know I have to get bacon incorporated
in multiple ways.
So I'm making a tomato-bacon jam here
to try to punch up that flavor as much as I can.
So I'm throwing in leeks.
I got some bacon in there,
sugar, and some tomatoes.
I'm gonna let that stew down and just sweat and caramelize.
Uh, is that all the bacon that's going in this dish?
No, I have a ton of bacon here inside of the...
-[Guy] Got it. -...soup base as well.
I'm not gonna let a single piece of bacon go to waste.
[Justin] Bacon caramel sauce is cooking.
I check on my burger. It looks good.
So now I can add my cheese on it.
Super sharp cheese.
[Guy] It is. It is super sharp.
[Justin] As my bacon's cooking in the pan,
I add my jalapenos.
My strategy here is
to just use bacon everywhere.
[Charif] I wanted to have the bacon
render in the fat and have it crispy.
Next, I started making
the black bean and charred corn salsa.
[Guy] How we looking over here?
-You got fresh corn. -[Charif] Fresh corn.
[Guy] Cilantro,
-black pepper. -[Charif] Cilantro, black pepper,
-red onions, mixed bell peppers. -[Guy] Got it.
[Charif] I'm engaged to be married
to my high school sweetheart.
And I would like to pay for a nice wedding for us.
$20,000, that's a lot of bacon.
[Guy] Five minutes!
[Arturo] I'm ladling the stew.
I get my noodles down next.
Got a couple spoonfuls of the bacon jam.
I actually am loving
Arturo's Korean army stew.
He has some slices of American cheese,
which he's putting over the noodles.
I think it looks so good.
[Arturo] And I have that crispy bacon
for the textural component.
[Guy] Two minutes!
[Justin] I grab my dishes.
Then I put my perfectly cooked cheeseburger,
then the bacon,
jalapenos.
I check on my bacon caramel sauce.
I have savory
and sweet all together. This sauce is a winner.
-Actually, I'm... -Oh, look at this caramel.
Ninety seconds!
That's really good.
First, I proceed to plate the polenta.
And on top of the polenta,
I go with the fresh corn black bean salsa,
and then top everything off
with those beautifully cooked
pieces of bacon.
Man, that looks good, bro.
[Guy] One minute!
That clock moves so fast.
Literally blinked,
and it went from 30 minutes to plating.
I go check the fryer, and the pork is gorgeous.
It is golden.
I open the oven, and my baguettes are
perfectly toasted.
You have these huge loaves of bread,
and you're giving them these tiny little things?
[sighs] I dropped half the other one.
Then I slathered my bacon soy mayo.
Next, I add my crispy fried pork.
[Guy] Ten seconds!
[Barbie] Now I'm going to pile on all of my veggies.
-Ah. -[Guy] Five, four,
three,
two, one.
-That's it. Stop working. -[Joe] I love that.
-[Maneet] Yes! Good job. -Yeah.
[Damaris] Very impressed.
[Barbie] It looks like a hot mess.
My plate, my banh mi
is half its size,
but I know all of the flavor components are there.
Wow.
There's a lot going on there.
All right, judges, this is game one
of Bad to the Bacon,
the Piggy Bank Battle.
Huh? Came up with that on my own.
Up first, Chef Justin, tell us about this bacon dish.
I do a bacon caramel burger at my restaurant,
so I wanted to do a bacon caramel burger for you guys.
I used the bacon fat to go with the jalapenos,
the bacon caramel sauce.
-What's the name of your place? -Bake'n Bacon.
-Like the socks. -[Damaris laughing] Socks.
[Guy] So you don't even have a business card.
You're in the elevator, and you just tell somebody,
"Yeah, come check my place out
-so you can look at my sock." -Yeah, I just pull my--
I just pull up my pants a little bit.
[Joe laughs]
You really celebrate the bacon over here,
because there is so much richness.
There is bacon, there's cheese,
there is the beef.
I love the caramel sauce.
It was smart to go back,
get a jar of caramel sauce.
Very smart for a budget battle.
It needs acid.
You had that jar of red wine vinegar.
Had you hit your caramel sauce and turned it into
a sweet and sour style bacon jam,
this would have been a knock-out-of-the-park home run.
That sauce, it just, it eats very, very sweet.
Chef, why did you get in the bacon business?
My younger brother passed away in 2016,
um, and he visited me in a dream, like,
and he just gave me the idea in the dream.
I wanted to honor him,
and I did that with my first food truck,
and now we have three food trucks.
-I'm sorry for your losses. -Thank you.
That's tough. A sibling is...
-What's his name? -[Justin] Derek.
-Derek. -[Justin] Yeah.
[Guy] Look at how you're doing now, man.
-Yeah. -[Guy] So he's got to be getting
-a huge kick out of this. -Thank you.
All right, judges, up next, Chef Arturo,
what do you have for us, bud?
For my signature bacon dish,
I have made a budae jjigae,
or a Korean army stew.
So one of the key ingredients is that American cheese.
I added some fried bacon on top,
and I also put a bacon jam to kind of
accentuate a little sweetness into the dish.
[Guy] Uh, what do you think, Damaris?
Would Mr. Burt Fancy
-enjoy that, Damaris? -Oh, my God, he would lap this up.
-[Guy] Right? -[Damaris] Mr. Fancy would be up in here.
-That's her cat, by the way... -[Damaris] That's my cat.
-...in case you guys are getting weirded out. -[Damaris] He'd love it.
-This is very delicious. -Thank you.
The cheese ramen is one of my favorite.
You've had this before, cheese ramen?
Cheese ramen is one of my favorites.
The American cheese kind of
melts into it and is,
like, fatty and salty.
The crispy fried bacon on the top
is definitely budget bacon.
And you know that because of the way it fried up.
-It's so crispy and so fatty. -Yeah. Yeah.
And you went and got ramen,
the 39 cent ramen.
I think that was so smart.
I actually get bacon in each and every bite.
I can taste it in the broth.
I can also taste it in the jam that you have.
There are pieces of bacon.
I am missing a pickled element over here.
Like, when you think about it,
-a little bit of kimchi on the side. -Oh, yeah.
You got so much flavor
in this broth in such a short amount of time,
and on a piggy bank budget.
Thank you so much.
Up next, Chef Charif. What do you have for us?
All right, judges, what I've prepared for you today,
a pan-seared bacon.
Served on top of polenta
with a corn black bean relish.
Hopefully, the bacon will melt in your mouth.
I'm very impressed with this plate,
especially for a budget battle.
It really looks high-end.
Clearly, it wasn't, 'cause you only had $29.
I just love your choice of the thick-cut bacon,
'cause you get an additional texture
from some pieces that are soft,
some pieces that are chewy.
But I think over here,
there is a lost opportunity.
You had the bacon.
If you had layered it,
some in the polenta, some in the relish,
then on top, I think that
would have just fortified the flavor of bacon
and made the bacon
just the highlight of the dish.
Thank you.
And not to be outdone,
Chef Barbie, what do you have for us?
For my signature dish, I made for you
a pork loin banh mi
with soy bacon mayo,
pickled carrots and onions,
cucumbers, jalapenos,
on a toasted baguette.
Chef Barbie, this is bacon me crazy.
I love the way that you shopped
and approached this budget battle
by pulling vegetables,
'cause that's an inexpensive ingredient.
And it brings freshness.
You know, banh mi is,
-you know, it's street food in Vietnam. -[mouthing] Yes.
[Maneet] They are so flavorful and it's always on a budget.
I do get bacon in each and every bite.
So you really embraced that bacon aspect of this.
Thank you, chef.
The mayonnaise, if you jarred it,
I would eat it with a spoon.
It is spectacular.
The baguettes are small.
Because you had some trouble with your baguette
because you dropped one of them,
the size really struggles here.
You don't taste the budget.
You see the budget 'cause it's tiny.
[Guy] All right. I think those were some
bodacious bacon dishes.
We're gonna send you back to the kitchens
and we're gonna find out which little piggy goes home.
All right. Thank you very much.
Anybody safe?
-For me, Arturo is safe. -[Maneet] I agree.
[Damaris] His is the best.
[Guy] Yeah, I don't want to hear about it
because I can't even have a bite of it
'cause you guys are slopping back
-into your bowl. -[Damaris] True story.
I really like Charif.
[Guy] It was a great dish.
It was a great dish, but bacon,
I think he could have used bacon a lot better.
For me, I think,
not safe is Justin,
with that really rich,
thick, sweet caramel.
Who's going home?
Chefs.
Everybody makes great dishes. Somebody's got to go home.
The chef that will be checking out
in the big, bad, bodacious bacon battle
will be...
unfortunately, Chef Charif.
Great dish, not enough bacon, but it was great to have you.
-Thanks, chef. -[Charif] Thank you so much.
Darn. Not enough bacon for a bacon battle.
I wish I had an unlimited budget,
but that's the name of the game.
-You know what I got right here? -Pig skin.
Pig skin. This round's gonna determine
who shops Flavortown Market
for up to 20,000 bucks.
So it's go pig or go home.
-Ha. -Okay.
Okay. Now, you gave us some
delicious bacon dishes in round one,
but I want you to show the judges
that you can also do some, uh,
-swine dining. -[chuckles softly]
High-end bacon dish.
And since there's so many upscale bacon dishes,
I want you to pair it with something.
Fruit. So we're gonna play a little game
that we call fruit basket.
You're each gonna take a turn throwing the old pig skin
into the fruit basket.
Whichever basket you land in,
apples, frozen bananas,
figs, canned plums,
pineapple, and dried mango,
well, that's going to determine
what is a must-have fruit in your bacon dish.
All right. Who wants to go first?
-Hold on. Hold on. -What up?
-[Arturo] Oh, my God. -[Barbie] Oh, what?
-What? -This is my fiancee, Tara.
-Hi, guys. -[Hunter] She is a professional
pickleball player. Now, I figured
it's a little hard to throw that big ball into that small basket.
-[Guy] Got it. Got it. -How about we play...
Pig-gleball.
-Oh, my... -Oh, no.
-[Hunter] Pig-gleball. -Pig-gleball.
[Hunter] Get it?
[Guy] You're gonna take
this small little ball...
-Yes. -...with the paddle
and hit it into the... Huh.
-[Tara] Yes. -Can you guys do that?
We're gonna try.
-Who would like to go first? -I'll do it.
Oh, no.
[Arturo] All right.
-[Hunter] Hey. -[Guy] Canned plums.
-Everybody's favorite, the canned plums. -You know it. [laughs]
Barbie, you want to go next?
All right.
Going for apples.
You didn't say what kind of apple,
-so you got the pineapple. -[Hunter] Right.
-I'm good with that. Not complaining. -All right.
-You want to let the hair down for this, Justin? -Sure.
Let's try to get these apples.
Oh, no!
-[Hunter] Figs. -[Guy] And it's figs.
-Go figure. -[Justin chuckles]
[Guy] You have 30 minutes
to make a high-end bacon dish
featuring your chosen fruit.
Do you know how the show works?
We say "Three, two, one," then they go.
-You want to say it? -Here we go.
A fruit is such a great combination with bacon.
There's the sweetness,
which just contradicts the saltiness, the savoriness.
[Barbie] Beautiful. Pineapple and bacon
go together so well.
I grab bacon slab and bacon ends.
I'm making an upscale
pineapple and seafood bacon fried rice.
There's always a fried rice on our food truck,
and it sells out
just as quickly as the banh mis.
But I know I can elevate this
to an upscale dish.
Consider it like, you know, Barbie 2.0 version.
Yeah, let's just start cooking.
[Justin] I'm grabbing sliced bacon,
cubed bacon, Canadian bacon.
I'm just grabbing a whole bunch of bacon.
I want bacon to be the star of the show.
So I have to make a high-end bacon dish
and I have to incorporate figs.
[sighs]
This is definitely a curveball. A pickleball.
A pig-gleball.
I'm thinking about doing a filet.
[Guy] Plenty of time.
Filets are synonymous with high-end.
Mac and cheese is high-end to me
because it's comfort food.
It kind of goes everywhere.
My mac and cheese is on point, so...
Here's my issue.
Mac and cheese does not scream
-high-end swine dining to me. -[Maneet] Nope.
Where are the figs?
There's some figs for you right here.
I decided to go with fresh figs
'cause that would be more high-end.
I'm making a bacon fig jam.
I need bacon to be on
every single element here.
That's what I do at the restaurant,
so this is what I'm gonna do here at Flavortown.
Fig and the meat and the bacon coming together.
What a combo.
[Arturo] Guanciale.
I don't think I've ever eaten
a canned plum before. And I'm like,
"What the heck am I gonna do with this thing?"
Get that nice stuff. Center cut.
Technique is the most important thing for me
when it comes to a high-end dish.
I am making bacon gnocchis.
I'm gonna make the pasta from scratch,
and I'm really gonna show the judges what I'm made of.
You can pay $100 for a steak any day,
but a nicely-executed pasta,
that's something that you don't see often.
Wow, buttery.
I'm used to making gnocchis
with plenty of time on the clock.
I don't have that,
so I'm gonna try to make gnocchis
out of powdered mashed potatoes.
I instantly go for the crab.
The crab is gonna elevate this
to fine dining territory.
Canned plums...
Purple plums. Oh, nice, with a pop top.
Then I'm gonna make a spicy sauce
that's gonna be balanced with these canned plums.
We'll go a couple of Fresnos.
Now I just need to not mess it up.
[Guy] 24 minutes!
Chef, what do you think?
[Barbie] Pineapple compliments bacon really well.
Got that tangy sweetness about it.
I am making a bacon
and shrimp fried rice with pineapple.
-Is that high-end, chef? -High-end means
good quality ingredients with
the presentation part of it as well.
Put it all in a pineapple bowl
because I've paid
high-end dollar for it before.
Got it.
I actually love the idea.
The amazing part about high-end right now is
how you plate it.
[Barbie] How do you scoop these suckers out of here?
I know fried rice is a humble dish.
Growing up, we come from humble beginnings,
but I am going to make this high-end.
She's spending so much time
just cleaning those bowls that I'm really afraid that
she won't be able to give enough time
to the flavor building of the fried rice.
[Barbie] This is super hard.
[Guy] 20 minutes!
They need to make bacon the star
of a high-end dish.
Bacon's usually the supporting character...
-[Damaris] Yup. -...in a dish.
-[Damaris] Mm-hmm. -And so they need to make it the star
-and sing alongside everything else. -[Damaris and Maneet] Yup.
Chef Justin, what do you got for me, man?
[Justin] Um,
I feel like a lot of people go out for steaks,
so just having a nice filet.
I'm gonna add some mac and cheese.
How's mac and cheese high-end?
Depending on how you do it.
It's gonna pair with...
-No, fig. -[chuckles softly]
I have to add fig into this somehow.
I'm gonna try to incorporate them with the bacon.
A fig jam is something that I felt I can do very fast
since bacon needs to be the star of the show.
If I win, I want to take the money
and go on vacation.
My brother passed away when I was actually in Thailand,
and I don't remember much of the trip.
I want to try to do the trip over
and just revisit it and get that
spiritual connection back with my brother.
-[Arturo] Awesome. -Chef, what's on the game plan?
So what I'm gonna do is
I'm gonna try to make a gnocchi,
because I see that as a high-end dish. I got a little crab.
I'm gonna have bacon that's gonna go into
the spicy arrabbiata sauce
-that I'm gonna make. -Got it.
[Arturo] First, I'm gonna get the canned plums incorporated in here.
Mm.
Could have had pitted canned plums.
So I spend some time
pitting these plums.
They are delicious, though, even though they have
the pits in them. Oh, well.
I'm gonna blend up these plums
to add a little bit of sweetness
to my agrodolce.
So while that's simmering,
I'm gonna make my instant mashed potato gnocchi.
-I think he's making gnocchi from scratch. -He is.
[Arturo] I got the flour in there,
some bacon and herbs.
That's gonna go right into the gnocchi.
I'm curious if this is something Arturo has done before
or he's trying for the first time.
I bet he's done it before.
Like, nobody goes in and is like,
"You know what I'm about to do? Make some gnocchi.
I haven't made them before.
-I'm gonna use the instant potatoes." -[laughs]
Nobody.
[laughing] Nobody.
I've never done it before,
but I'm gonna go out on a limb here.
I've worked so hard in my career to get to where I'm at.
If I win the money,
hopefully I can open another restaurant.
And I want to make my family proud.
[Guy] 15 minutes!
Wow, look at the little bowls.
-[Barbie] I'm trying. -[Guy] How cute.
What else do we have in this fried rice?
[Barbie] I need to get my duck eggs in.
Thai chili, chili sauce, Thai basil.
So it's gonna be a little bit, I hope, spicy.
-Is the pineapple going in there, too, chef? -[Barbie] Yep.
It's gonna add that
-key sweetness to it. -Got it.
[Barbie] Get my shrimp going.
Next, I'm going to cook my slab bacon.
I added five-spice.
Cornstarch.
And I am constantly thinking about
how badly I want this.
And I want to win because that money can
definitely help expand our business.
[Justin] I'm hoping that
the pig fig jam,
that's enough of a wow factor
to make it high end.
So next, I'm gonna start on making my mac and cheese.
So I start with my cheese sauce.
Once my noodles are finished cooking,
I can add them to the cheese sauce
and plate them up and then finish it in the oven.
Is the steak getting any bacon?
[Justin] Yes.
-[Guy] Canadian bacon? -[Justin] Yeah.
Canadian bacon, why not? It's bacon.
What I am unsure about is the Canadian bacon
on top of his filets.
It's dry. It has no flavor.
You got ten minutes. Ten to go.
And what is in here?
So that's gonna be the... [chuckles]
Your awesome ingredient you gave me, the plums.
And that's gonna be kind of like a sweet, uh,
agrodolce kind of, uh,
-arrabbiata sauce. -Okay.
[Arturo] The gnocchi's in the water.
[Guy] And where's the bacon coming in?
I got bacon in the sauce. I got...
There's bacon in the gnocchi.
-[Guy] There's bacon in the gnocchi. -Yep.
And I have some bacon for garnish as well.
Did your family make bacon gnocchi before?
Never put bacon in it,
but we got to go bacon forward today, chef.
[Guy] I'll give you some points on that.
[Arturo] I'm trying to get a good sear on these gnocchis.
I took a gamble and it worked.
I think I got a shot at winning this.
This is a bacon dish, so,
I have to make sure I highlight it.
And I'm gonna put bacon in the crab mix,
and it's like a really awesome addition to the dish.
[Guy] Four minutes!
[Maneet] This move that Barbie is making
is just impressing me so much.
She's grilling it
before she is putting the rice
-in there. -[Damaris] It's really nice.
That's a high-end move.
Absolutely.
[Barbie] I scoop my bacon fried rice
into the pineapple.
Next, I gently lay
two spicy shrimp on top.
Then I add my fried slab bacon.
Pretty impressive pineapple dish.
[Barbie] Bam!
[Arturo] So I lay my crab mixture down first,
and then I take in my tossed pasta
and I start layering that on top.
I've got the bacon in the crab mix.
I got the bacon in the gnocchi.
I got the bacon in the sauce,
and I got the bacon on the garnish.
I'm actually excited to try it.
Two minutes, two to go.
[Justin] So first, I put my filet on
with the Canadian bacon on it.
It's looking pretty good, the mac and cheese.
And then I put my bacon fig jam on top.
[Guy] 90 seconds!
[Justin] Today, I came to bring home the bacon.
So last thing I want to do for the mac and cheese
is fry some bacon.
I wanted a different type of texture,
so I wanted it to be, like, a little crispy.
[Guy] Ten seconds.
Ooh, this is intense, y'all.
[Guy] Five, four,
three, two,
one. And that's it!
Nice job, everyone.
-[Damaris and Maneet whooping] -Wow.
[exhales]
All right, judges, this is it.
Game two of Bad to the Bacon.
They got to play a little pig-gleball.
Chefs had to make a high-end bacon dish
using the fruit basket that they chose.
Up first is Chef Justin,
who scored figs. Chef, what do you have for us?
I did a filet with Canadian bacon.
And then I chopped bacon along with the fig
for the macaroni and cheese,
put bacon on top of that.
So basically you have bacon prepared three ways.
-Yes. -[Damaris] This really feels
like a steakhouse dinner to me.
It hits high end for that.
The fig and bacon compote
is the star of the dish.
You were able to get some
crunch on the bacon, the fat's been rendered out,
and it has soaked into the figs and made them
just luscious and supple and kind of velvety.
Thank you.
I know you were using fresh figs.
But some dried figs in that
would have given that nugget of sweetness,
which would have balanced off the savoriness
-of the bacon. -Okay. Thank you.
"Nugget of sweetness."
-[laughs] -That's your new name.
-I'll take that. -Dancing Spice Queen, AKA
-Nugget of Sweetness. -Nugget of Sweetness.
You're bringing home the bacon
with this mac and cheese. It's textbook.
And the way that you fried the bacon bits on top
to give you almost like that breadcrumb topping
gives you a wonderful porkiness.
I wish you would have paid a little more attention
to the sear on your filet.
And for me,
this Canadian bacon just did not do it.
It's rubbery, it's hard to eat,
and I wish you would have just done something else with it.
Thank you.
Up next, Chef Barbie, what do you have for us?
I present to you high-end
pineapple bacon fried rice
with a pork slab, with shrimp.
It is beautiful, I'll tell you that much.
-Thank you. -There's no reason why
such a simple dish like fried rice
can't be elevated to a fine dining level.
You knocked it out of the park with this one.
The way you used the five-spice in this
I think is so smart.
It's comforting, it's warming,
and it's not overpowering.
Thank you, chef.
Taking the effort to just
hollow out the pineapple and serve it in the pineapple,
I think that was a great idea.
Because of the fact that you sauteed the rice
in the bacon fat, there is no escaping the bacon.
Thank you, chef.
The treatment of the bacon on the top is elegant.
There's a lot of salt that you added.
It's, like, crispy with the spices
that you encrusted that bacon with.
I think that it added heat.
[Maneet] I do think that the pineapple
could have been used in an additional way,
maybe a slaw
or something right on top,
uh, because the pineapple does get lost in the rice.
Not to be outdone, Chef Arturo.
For today's swine dining challenge,
I've made a bacon gnocchi from scratch.
Bacon inside there.
On the bottom of the plate
is gonna be the saute of crab
that also has bacon incorporated into it.
After pitting the plums,
I made an agrodolce with it.
Canned plums is tough, but what a pity.
[all laughing]
Have you used instant mashed potatoes
-to make gnocchi before? -[Arturo] I haven't.
Is that a Joe Sasto 101?
I have never seen it done
with instant mashed potatoes before,
-but, I mean, it works. -Thank you so much.
The way that you worked the bacon
and those little crispy bits into every little
potato pillow parcel,
it's such a fun little bite.
[Maneet] Making gnocchi from scratch
in a 30-minute round is
absolutely ambitious.
And that ambition, at times,
-does not pay off. -Okay.
In your case, it did.
Whoa.
Whoa, Troy Johnson drop.
[mimicking Troy] You think it was a good idea?
Well, it was.
[chuckles]
[Maneet] The canned plum tomato sauce was fighting it.
The sweetness contradicts the savoriness.
I got you.
You have absolutely nailed
fine dining in the presentation,
but what I'm missing is texture.
I'm missing that little bit of crunch.
Thank you very much, judges.
Well done.
A lot to digest
for the judges.
We're gonna send you back to the kitchens.
We will have some deliberation.
Somebody's gonna shop Flavortown
for up to 20,000 bucks.
Great job, chefs. See you in a bit. Thank you.
Who is it between?
-You're gonna say Barbie and Arturo. -Yeah.
I thought Barbie's was one of the best things I've eaten here.
They really brought the bacon.
I thought that Justin's
was the best use of the bacon
and the fruit together.
[Maneet] Arturo is at a different level.
I mean, gnocchi? Come on.
I think there's a case for all of them.
-That's a tough one. -It's a tough one.
-[Damaris] It's a tough one. -[Joe] Tough one.
I have to say, you did an excellent job.
-[exhales] -[Guy] So,
without further ado,
the winner of Bad to the Bacon
and the chance
at up to $20,000 goes to...
Chef Barbie.
Well done.
-[Barbie] Thank you. -Chef Justin, Chef Arturo,
you are real bacon aficionados.
It was great to have you.
-Thank you. -Thank you, chef.
I put a lot of my heart
on that plate, and that's something
that I'm really proud of.
-[Guy] Awesome, man. -[Justin] Coming this far
and representing my brand,
representing my passion for cooking,
and my brother Derek, this has been an amazing experience.
You're born in Vietnam.
You come to Boise. You meet your husband.
-[mouthing] Yup. -You have a food truck.
-Yup. -Well, I can assure you, no one's gonna be showing up
looking for any bacon from you now at all.
It wasn't a simple battle, but you took
all three of them down, and you are the champ. Congratulations.
-Thank you. -Well done!
We got a couple different ways
that you can win up to 20,000 bucks.
-You can go on the shopping spree... -Okay.
...in which I give you two minutes
to grab five items that satisfy
the trivia clues on the card.
Every correct item that you get
and you put in the cart, you're gonna get 4,000 bucks.
-Okay. -[Guy] Or
you could go for the check
that is behind the door.
That check is gonna be at a value of
anywhere between
$13,000
and $20,000.
I've had two panic attacks today.
I'll take that check.
Let's give it up. Let's see that check. Drum roll, please.
-[Guy] $15,950! -[Barbie] Yay!
I cannot believe
I just won.
To be a Vietnamese woman and coming on the show
and being able to win
against three incredible chefs,
I am so proud.
[Guy] With your name on it and everything.
Next time you're in Boise,
you gotta come and check it out.
She has got the game going on,
and she knows a thing or two about bacon.
See you next time on Guy's Grocery Games. Adios.
[all whooping and cheering]