The Best Part About the New Julia Child Cooking Competition Just May Be the Grand Prize

Rochelle Bilow
Rochelle Bilow
Rochelle Bilow is a graduate of the French Culinary Institute, and the former social media manager at Bon Appétit and Cooking Light magazines. She has also worked as a cook on a small farm in Central New York and a Michelin-starred restaurant in New York City. Her first book, a food and farming memoir titled The Call of the Farm, was published in 2014. Her second book, a romance novel set in Scotland, will be published in February 2023.
Follow
published Feb 17, 2022
pinterest
comments
We independently select these products—if you buy from one of our links, we may earn a commission. All prices were accurate at the time of publishing.
Julia: Season 1 - Episode 6
Credit: Courtesy of HBO Max
The New Julia Child Series on HBO Max Is Destined to Be Our Next Big Binge Watch

Over the last few decades, cooking competitions have gone through infinite innovations. From boxes of mystery ingredients to celebrity cameos, we’ve seen just about every new spin in the (cook)book. That’s why the latest cooking-themed reality show is so intriguing. It’s going old school, and it couldn’t have chosen a better chef as its inspiration.

The Julia Child Challenge premieres on The Food Network in March, and it’s charmingly nostalgic — not to mention, refreshingly polite. The show will feature eight home cooks with a soft spot for our favorite “French Chef.” The B-roll will include interviews with the cheftestants about their connection to Julia, and how they’ve been influenced by her. 

Even though Julia Child’s TV shows were purely instructive, The Julia Child Challenge is at its heart a competition with each episode featuring two cooking challenges inspired by Julia. Round one is all about technique and skills — they’ll have to recreate one of her classic recipes. (I’m *really* hoping they have to make an omelet. That’s so much harder than it looks.) In round two, they’ll have a chance to show their personality with an original dish that Julia would be proud of. 

Of course, like other competition shows, each week, viewers will see winners announced and an elimination. It will no doubt be a tough competition with a rotating cast of food celeb judges, but it’s worth digging deep for the gold here. The grand prize winner will receive an all-expenses-paid three-month cooking course at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. You know, Julia Child’s alma mater. I think I speak for most of us when I say, simply, swoon.

I think the coolest part about this show is going to be the respect paid to Julia. Not only will the competition take place in a replica of her kitchen, but the producers worked with The Julia Child Foundation of Gastronomy and Culinary Arts to keep things authentic and classic. You can start watching The Julia Child on March 14 on Food Network at 9 p.m. ET — it’s sure to be the best thing about Mondays this spring.

And, don’t forget to tune into the premiere of the HBO Max series Julia on March 31!