Parking lot chefs square off in 'Tailgate Warriors'

By John Crook, Zap2It | April 24, 2010

Guy Fieri

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Stadium parking lots are often the scene of friendly face-offs between tailgaters trying to outshine each other before a game, but host Guy Fieri kicks that up several notches in "Tailgate Warriors With Guy Fieri," an hourlong special premiering Saturday, Oct. 17, on Food Network.

The host of "Guy's Big Bite" travels to Buffalo, N.Y., to oversee a competition between two rival tailgating teams, Conklin's Tailgate Bar and Grill from Buffalo and Da Bus from Chicago.

Unlike other Food Network competition shows, however, this show is something of a free-for-all, much like tailgating itself.

"The only rules are a set timeline and no working, no prepping or production started before the timeline kicks off," Fieri explains. "They have a variety of signature items they have to do, and that's it. After that, what they use to cook it with and how they cook it and how many people they have on their team is their own choice. It is not strictly controlled apples to apples. This is how tailgating is. That's what makes it so much fun, and we saw some stuff out of these guys that was amazing."

Judges for the face-off include Food Network Magazine editor-in-chief Maile Carpenter, cookbook author and radio host Jay "The Tailgate Guy" DiEugenio, and Ray Lampe, aka "Dr. BBQ," executive chef at Southern Hospitality in New York.

"It's not just 'Does it taste good?' Anyone can bacon-wrap a filet and take care of that!" Fieri says. "But we're going to consider how difficult was it, what's the originality of it, how did they present and how creative were they? This is a culinary competition in a tailgating environment."