Win tickets to Battle Crab
Sold-out event features menu that won Iron Chef his title 10 years ago
Ten years ago, Rob Feenie was still chef/owner of the late, great Lumiere restaurant (sigh) and life was a different kettle of fish. Or should that be tank of crab?
He was summoned to a Mount Everest of cooking challenges — Iron Chef America — to do Battle Crab against one of the resident Iron Chefs.
At Kitchen Stadium, Feenie challenged Masaharu Morimoto, the gladiator who’d taken out 66 of 75 of his competitors before doing battle with Feenie.
“When I first walked into Kitchen Stadium,” Feenie recalls, “it was a bit overwhelming. I was naturally quite nervous already and then all of a sudden we were on this huge set faced with eight bright cameras.”
Given the home advantage (Iron Chefs know the drill, the equipment, the pantry, the madhouse atmosphere), Feenie was prepared for defeat, but after the judges’ points were tallied, he was declared winner.
“I was literally prepared to deal with losing,” he said when I interviewed him the next day. “I was shocked.” (And he looked it, too.)
The Iron Chef title proved to be a bigger deal than he expected, too. “People talk about Iron Chef America more than anything else I have done and achieved in my career. At the time, I truly had no idea that the win would stay with me and become such a professional highlight.”
Feenie is now the chef overseeing the Cactus Club restaurant chain, adding his chef magic to the casual fine dining scene.
To commemorate the 10th anniversary of his win, Cactus Club is hosting a Battle Crab dinner recreating his winning menu on Feb. 10 at Cactus Club Coal Harbour with proceeds going to The Boys Club Network.
Tickets are sold out, but anyone reading this article can try for a free ticket to the event. Just email media@cactusclubcafe.com and put “Vancouver Sun giveaway” in the subject line. The winner will be drawn from the emails on Sunday, Feb. 8. The dinner, which includes wine pairings, is worth $185 per person before tip and taxes.
The dishes are a duo of Iron Chef rolls; sablefish with crab in tom yum broth; crab ravioli with truffle beurre blanc; veal neptune with crab and hollandaise; and peekytoe crab panna cotta with pineapple jelly.
And if you can’t go, we’ve included Feenie’s recipe for one of the dishes on the menu, crab ravioli.