- [Narrator] Three years ago,
Hot Ones host Sean Evans,
a man who admittedly does not cook beat Babish,
and what a handful of people called
"The Biggest Calzone Competition Upset of 2018."
Today we bring you the rematch.
Can Babish unbotch his previous defeat
or will Sean add a jewel to his crown?
Pizza icon, Mark Iacono
is back again to decide on this episode of
"Botched by Babish."
- So Sean, today, three years and two months and five days,
four hours ago, (Sean laughs)
you beat me in a Calzone Cook Off.
- I remember it well.
- I was very ashamed because by your own admission,
you don't cook.
- No, basically never.
And I think it's the only cooking competition
that I've ever won.
On that show,
we would do cooking competitions with them at the time.
Think I was over my one crowning, shining
Superbowl championship moment,
was beating you in that Calzone Cook Off.
(Andrew chuckles)
And I'm gonna do it again.
(both laughing)
- I, as you can imagine,
that was a little embarrassing for me
because cooking's kind of my thing.
- Yeah. - Like I love cooking.
(chuckles) And I didn't cook
for... months after that.
I couldn't get out of bed - Dark times.
- It was a very dark time for me.
And I've been plotting my revenge since,
and I have it today ready for you in Calzone form.
- It's a Calzone-off, it's revenge, it's a vengeance game.
Can Babish win it back?
- Probably not.
Let's make some Calzone, shall we?
- Let's do it.
- Gentlemen, start your headbands.
(both laughing)
You might notice from the menagerie behind me
that this is a
"Holiday Special Calzone Cook Off Championship."
So I'm making a Calzone Beef Wellington.
That's right!
You heard me correctly.
It is a Calzone on the outside,
but a Beef Wellington on the inside.
Have you ever even heard of such an insane idea?
Do you even know how often I have ideas like that.
Never! Nev-
- [Narrator] Andrew's Beef Wellington Calzone features a,
well, it's just a Beef Wellington in a Calzone.
- All right. (whimsical music)
So my big idea today is an Italian Beef Calzone.
Got some really nice dough here
that I'm excited to work with.
Of course, have our beef,
which has been soaking and ready to go.
Little Giardiniera, a little spicy, (inhales)
right there smells just right.
And then typically when I'm eating an Italian Beef,
I won't get cheese on it,
but I'm thinking that making this Calzone
might be kind of soupy in there,
the way that I have it designed.
So a little provolone to hopefully try to cut that
a little bit, make it easier, make it neater, make it nicer.
And then I'm thinking, this is the ace up the sleeve,
and hopefully Andrew can't hear me up there,
but I'm gonna take this Calzone
and I'm going to hit it with the gravy dip.
We're just going to have a nice, wet, soggy
Italian Beef Calzone that'll hopefully bring us the gold.
All right, let's get started.
- [Narrator] Sean's Italian Beef Calzone pays homage
to his hometown of Chicago,
and involves very little cooking.
Making it difficult to weight
Sean and Andrew's preparations equally in the edit.
- So I have here, my filet mignon, (tray thuds)
which is a little too big.
Or should I just make it huge?
(Kendall gasps) (whimsical music)
Kendall gasps yes. (chuckles)
- Yeah, yeah.
'Cause it makes it so beautiful.
(spatula clanks)
- [Kendall] How often do you cook, Sean?
- This is rare.
You know, you don't see much from me.
I don't cook often,
but when I do...
It's to win Calzone Offs.
- So I'm going to reverse sear this
which means I'm going to blast it in a ripping hot skillet,
and then I'm going to transfer it in oven.
And then we're gonna wrap it up in some pizza.
And for some reason, you guys are watching it.
- [Narrator] But before wrapping it up in some pizza,
Andrew also has to go through all the steps
of making a Beef Wellington.
Meanwhile, Sean is putting several ingredients
to top around of pizza dough.
- What I'm going to do here
is I'm gonna start with the beef.
Yeah, and you wanna save a little space on the sides here,
'cause you're going to start folding this thing up.
Here we go.
That feels pretty good there.
- [Narrator] And while Sean's Calzone
is already looking good, our judging situation isn't.
- [Kendall] Oh, no!
- (beep) what?
- Mark can't make it.
- [Andrew] What?!
That is "Oh, no." - I'm like not even trying.
Literally cannot. - Usually when you say that
it's like, "Oh no, the C-train is delayed."
"Are you taking the C-train?"
"No."
- I know. It's (beep) bad.
- [Andrew] Mark can't make it? - It's really bad.
Sawyer, you're judging. (chuckles)
Are you okay with that?
- Yeah.
(both laughing)
- [Narrator] With a new judge in place,
Andrew still has a load of cooking to do.
- Yeah. Garlic's getting nice and fragrant.
So now I'm gonna deglaze.
(spatula loudly clacking)
With a bit of Sherry. (spatula clacks)
Boop! (pan sizzling) Boop!
- [Brad] Where's Sherry?
- Where's Sherry?
- [Brad] I don't see her.
- That's very funny.
- We want a nice even distribution of ingredients here.
- [Narrator] Cheese is the final ingredient
in Sean's Calzone,
and the speed of his preparation is why he arrived
much later in the day.
(doorbell rings)
- Oh, there he is.
- Come on in! - What's up?
- Wasn't sure if the gate was open.
- [Andrew] Hey, hey! What's up? How you doing?
- What's up? Smells good in here.
- [Narrator] (sighs) I told you this was hard to edit.
Anyway, now it's time for our bakers
to finish Calzone assembly.
- I'm gonna do this pretty much exactly the way
you'd do a normal Beef Wellington,
up until the very last moment.
And there's gonna be a surprise twist. (chuckles)
Namely that it's going to be a Calzone
instead of Wellington.
(Brad gasps)
Gasp is right, Brad. (chuckles)
- All right, and now we'll see how this fold goes.
(groaning)
(sighs)
We're stress testing this dough today.
- So now the challenge is that I portioned this out
to individual sizes of doubt.
And I need at least like a double size Calzone.
So I'm gonna see how this works out. (chuckles)
This needs to be about...hmm... seven feet wide, so.
- There we go.
I actually feel pretty good about this.
Let's get our seal going.
- You're gonna fit in here, yeah?
This guy's gonna fit.
He's gonna fit.
He'll go.
It'll go.
- All right.
And now we're braiding it.
Little finger under fold.
- Okay, this is outrageous.
Okay, mm-hmm.
You have something shaped like a Calzone
with a filet mignon on it. (chuckles)
Against all odds. (chuckles)
- I'm proud of it.
It feels like a good vessel.
It seems like the proportion of the ingredients
is just perfect.
But I think it's time to pop it in.
(dramatic playful music)
- [Narrator] With their Calzone sealed,
all that's left is to bake them.
In these moments,
waiting for the kiss of heat to bring new life
to the creations exteriors,
our bakers have time to mull over the decisions.
Was each one of them enough to achieve victory?
Will the flavors come together?
And why did they make Calzone through
a Christmas themed episode?
One thing is sure.
There's no changing it now,
as judgment time approach. Holy (beep)! It's on fire!
- So I, thank you for touching knees with us today,
- Mm-hmm. To judge our Calzones.
- Mm-hmm.
- And I trust just because we share 20 years
of friendship. (Sean chuckles)
- Mm-hmm. - 21 years, this year.
That you won't let that factor into your decision.
- Not at all.
- Sawyer, I present you my Italian Beef Calzone,
but maybe this is where I win it,
maybe this is where I lose it.
I'm making the decision
to give it a bath.
There we go.
- That's how they do it in Chicago, marinate. (chuckles)
- That's how you're supposed to eat
an Italian Beef Calzone.
Presented to you with no further comments, Sawyer.
(Sawyer and Andrew chuckle)
Beef. - Ooh!
- Okay, okay.
- Does look like an Italian Beef.
- [Sawyer] Does look nice.
- [Andrew] Little Giardiniera.
- [Sawyer] Does look very nice.
- And I know that it's a Chicago dish,
but it does speak to Buffalo sensibilities.
(moaning)
- That's just cheating.
(all laughing)
- All right, all right.
Very good.
- What do you think?
- It reminds me very much of the sandwich,
which then makes me think
maybe this would be better as a sandwich.
(Sean laughs)
I also liked the plate style presentation.
You know, the soup.
You know, (laughs) I don't have to manage how much soup,
you know, think about each dip in the sandwich.
Am I dipping too deep into the cup?
- Right.
- You know? Should I dip a little less each time now?
It's just this big soup.
I gotta eat fast or it gets worse.
I like that. (Andrew chuckles)
- It's soaking it up. - Yeah.
- So why wouldn't you eat- - [Sean] Pray.
- Fast as you possibly could.
- [Sean] You have a tight window.
- Yeah. - You do.
- I think that's actually the state motto of Illinois.
- Yeah. (Sean chuckles)
- I mean there it is, full circle. Deep dish.
- May I present to you, my Calzone Beef Wellington.
May I do. - Please!
May I cut your Calzone Beef Wellington?
- First of all, he knows me, I like service. (chuckles)
(Andrew and Sean laugh)
You did do the pouring for me, which I appreciate.
But, (knife scratching)
great. Oh, wow! - [Andrew] Ooh!
All right.
If you don't mind,
I'm just going to cut you off a slice. (chuckles)
Or do you wanna eat with fork?
- [Sawyer] The whole with fork? (chuckles)
Well, I am judging, so.
I will be finishing this.
- There's your. - Thank you.
(knife scratching)
- Okay. Looks perfectly cooked.
(moaning)
Yeah, I mean, it tastes very much like a Beef Wellington,
which then again, I think to myself,
(Andrew chuckles) would I rather have
Beef Wellington?
- You're telling me you'd rather have puff pastry
than pizza dough? (chuckles)
- That's my quest when I'm asking myself
as I continue eating.
- [Sean] Slightly worse version of each.
- Perfectly cooked.
- [Andrew] Thank you.
- Love the mustard. - Thank you.
- Reminds me of a time
we went to France together just to taste mustards.
Obviously, I have to finish
and then I'll give them my verdict.
- All right.
Well, we'll be sitting here,
watching it until then. - Yeah. Watching you dig in.
(moans) (knife scratching)
(moans) - [Andrew] Wow.
(light playful music)
(Andrew chuckles)
(moans)
- Gross.
(moans)
Are you okay?
(moans) (light playful music)
- Died.
They were both delicious
and I don't regret finishing them both in one sitting
(Sean laughs)
and making you guys watch the whole time.
Obviously, I've had a lot of time to think about it.
And Sean's Calzone was very reminiscent of a Calzone.
And had a lot of great additional qualities
such as Au Jus.
That said, Beef Wellington is a delicious dish on its own.
And having it in this sort of like warm pocket,
you could hold in your hand, you know.
That's something that I've always kind of wanted
when I saw Beef Wellington for the first time.
And I bite into this!
The Au Jus, you know, that I love,
and I've said to you before,
I don't like dipping sandwiches into little cups.
I hate someone else making decisions about how much little
cup of juice I deserve.
- Right.
- So the fact that it was given to me as is, no judgment,
this is how it's eaten.
This is the amount of juice this sandwich gets.
That I like a lot.
- It was a bombastic move.
- And not to mention, I love juice, you know, love juice.
And I've said it before,
that Christmas should be at the forefront
of all of our minds.
That's why I have to.
When I bite into these two things,
I close my eyes and I think about Christmas.
I have to give it to my dear friend.
(Sean and crew clapping) - [Brad] Woo! Woo!
(Andrew sighs) - [Brad] Woo!
(Sean and crew clapping)
- It's been a long road here, you guys. (chuckles)
- But you know what?
I think we keep the tradition going.
Next year, I'll come right back here. 2022.
We do this every year.
- You got it. It's a date.
- It's a date.
- Let's hug.
- Okay, let's hug it out, guys.
- (sighs) It's good. I'm so full.
(dramatic piano music)