Chan’s Chocolate Tower

Pastry chef and San Francisco native Jansen Chan competed against three other chefs to build the best landmark made completely of chocolate for a $10,000 prize and bragging rights in this Sunday’s episode of the Food Network Challenge.
AsianWeek

AsianWeek Article:

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Chan’s Chocolate Tower
published by Rainier Ramirez, February 14, 2008

For Chan, 32, this was the perfect competition for him to compete in; he had received a degree in architecture from the University of California, Berkeley, before going to culinary school at the Le Cordon Bleu in Paris, France. He is currently a pastry chef at Oceana Restaurant in New York City.

The episode, taped last December, gave Chan and an assistant eight hours to build the entire tower on camera. Chan’s experience with architecture helped in creating the dimensions and organization of the tower. He described the building process as creating a toy model, adhering three-dimensional chocolate beams together piece by piece.

Chan knew it was going to be difficult, because he had never made anything this large before.

“Time was the hardest part. We knew we could do it; it was a matter of doing all we wanted to do in eight hours,” Chan said. He added that the studio felt as cold as a refrigerator since the network was worried about the chocolate melting.

Although it was a competition, Chan said it was a big achievement for him just to have a finished product to show the judges.

“There wasn’t really a competitive nature among the four of us; we were all just happy to finish. Because I was busy with my own project, I never had time to look at anyone else’s. I won’t be able to see how everyone built theirs until I see the show.”

Gwen Chan, former superintendent of the San Francisco Unified School District, said of her son, “I am aware of the hard work it has taken Jansen to be where he is today, and I am immensely proud of him.”

After the competition, he jokingly said that he never wants to touch chocolate again, since it was stuck to his hands the whole time.

“I don’t think Asians and chocolate have a particular affinity for each other,” said Chan, who specializes in chocolate works. “Everyone loves chocolate.”