Big Name LA Chefs Square Off On New Netflix Cooking Competition Show

A pair of popular Los Angeles chefs are set to square off on Netflix’s new cooking competition show called The Final Table. Otium’s Timothy Hollingsworth and itinerant restaurateur Esdras Ochoa (Mexicali, Salazar) will both make a showing on the high-drama series, which pits popular chefs from around the world against one another.

As noted yesterday, The Final Table may well be the most ambitious new cooking competition show on television, with 24 participants spanning the world and big-name chefs acting as judges. That includes Enrique Olvera (Cosme, Pujol), Grant Achatz (Alinea), Clare Smyth (Core in London) and others. The crux of the show is that each competitor will be cooking from nine different cuisines all over the globe, with food critics, the judges, and other “ambassadors” weighing in on the final results before elimination. The trailer is below.

The series was shot and produced over the summer, in part using a massive sound stage outfitted with the best (and certainly branded) kitchen equipment. What’s most interesting is Hollingsworth — a former lead at the French Laundry and owner/operator behind a number of Los Angeles restaurants, including C.J. Boyd’s, Otium, and the soon-to-open Free Play — and Ochoa’s connections to Los Angeles and the rest of the world. While Hollingsworth will be repping LA, Ochoa will be repping Hong Kong as his primary residence, now that he is overseeing his Mexican restaurant there called 11 Westside. Ochoa, who previously ran a taco stand before opening Mexicali and Salazar, is also working on a restaurant in India, at least if Instagram is any indication.

The full The Final Table series will drop all of its episodes on November 20, just in time for some Thanksgiving binge-watching.

• Watch the Trailer for Netflix’s High Stakes Culinary Competition, ‘The Final Table’ [E]