Chef Alexcia Smith of Valley Stream faced off against celebrity Chef Bobby Flay on Thursday on the Food Network’s cooking competition show Beat Bobby Flay in a Mean Girls-themed episode hosted by Tina Fey.
In the first round, Flay challenged Smith and her competitor, stuntwoman-turned-chef Asia Mei, to make the best dish using rutabaga as the main ingredient for the chance to take on Flay in round two. Smith’s rustic rutabaga puree with a warm rutabaga hash won out over Mei’s kimchi rutabaga rösti with rutabaga green apple slaw. But once Smith took on Flay in round two, she had backup from Fey, who started reading from a “Bobby Flay Burnt Book.”
“Somebody started a petition that says ‘Keep Bobby Flay out of the Hamptons,’ signed by Ina Garten, Katie Lee, Neil Patrick Harris, Rachael Ray,” joked Fey, as she tried to psyche out Flay so he would lose.
That’s because Fey and Flay made a bet that if he lost to Smith, he would have to cook for all 70 members of the Mean Girls‘ Broadway production. Smith chose lamb shwarma as her signature dish to compete against Flay, but in the end, three independent taste testers named Flay the winner — yet Flay cooked for the production crew anyway.
Born in Kingston, Jamaica and raised in Hempstead, 34-year-old Chef Smith graduated from The Culinary Institute of America in 2006, which served to launch a career that found her managing food services for corporate clients, such as The New York Times and Condé Nast. Today she is a private chef, who has worked for a number of celebrities, such as Bow Wow and Alicia Keys, and provides catering, cooking lessons, and host of other services.
“I came here to prove that private chefs play a major role in this game and I’m still really proud of what I accomplished tonight,” she said.
For those who missed it, the episode, “Fey vs. Flay,” will air again air on November 3 and 4 or can be purchased on YouTube.
