The Chopping Block is a brand new reality series hosted by Catriona Rowntree which has just started on the Nine Network from the creators of The Block.

The idea of the show is pretty simple, although quite complicated from the way it is explained on the show so here it goes. Two restaurants go head to head, tonight’s episode involved two restaurants from the Sydney suburb of Cronulla and they are classed as the red and blue team, red being Cafe 23 and blue Cafe Parlo.

The two teams are then fighting for the right to win $20,000 but before that happens, a food critic will dine in their restaurants and then review how well or how bad they really are. After this, each team will be given $5,000 and they then have 48 hours to use this money to improve their service.

During this 48 hour period they will be given assistance from ‘Australia’s top chef’ Matt Moran, who will try and make sure the quality of each team improves before the next visit from the food critic.

The food critic will then present his final verdict and the restaurant with the most stars is then declared the winner of the show. There you have it, so in a nutshell from the sound of that it is a dodgy shorten version of the Seven Network series My Restaurant Rules, except we don’t have to put up with Dicko. Catriona Rowntree seems to be very out of place hosting this show, you just get the impression she should be standing in front of a tropical island instead.

It is evident that the show is ‘trying’ to make a big deal where ever it can, and what I mean by this is in particular when the food critic reviewed the first restaurant. He said that they wouldn’t even try desert because they couldn’t bare another minute in the place, that to me has lost the whole point of the show having a food critic as he is meant to be there to try the food, not walk out because the place looks scabby, after all the desert could have been positive although this wouldn’t have been said even if it was.

In the end its a pretty interesting show, as it shows the strain and effort these restaurants have to go through in order to earn a buck or two, but as I personally work in the hospitality industry I wont be watching it again as I cringe at the thought of having to go to work. If the rival networks don’t place anything worth watching up against this show then it will work, but we have to remember last year Wednesday nights were dominated by the ABC so indeed this show may only find a small audience.

Technorati tags: Nine Network, Channel Nine, The Chopping Block

Please provide a link back to any content used on other sites. Thank you.

Popularity: 11% [?]