After hitting a snag and suffering through what he called “the biggest embarrassment” on national TV, chef Adalberto Diaz managed to narrowly avoid elimination during the premiere episode of Food Network’s “The Ultimate Baking Championship.”
“I’ll make you proud,” Diaz told the judges when the show revealed he would be claiming the final spot in the top 10 and moving forward in the competition.
But during the second episode of the season, the Utah chef behind the Salt Lake City bakery Fillings & Emulsions once again found himself in a far from ideal situation.
Adalberto Diaz faces criticism on ‘The Ultimate Baking Championship’
After an intense first episode that eliminated six of the top pastry chefs from across the country, Diaz found himself in the competition’s top 10.
The first challenge of the episode tasked the remaining bakers with putting a modern twist on a classic dessert. Diaz did OK in this round, creating strawberry shortcake canapés that put him in a three-way tie for fifth place with 11 points out of 20.
But like the premiere episode, things took a turn for the worse during the second challenge.
Diaz and his fellow bakers each had 2.5 hours to create a geometric layered mousse cake. The Utah chef’s specific assignment was to give his cake a tropical and boozy theme — something he said he felt confident about given his Cuban heritage.
The chef went to work creating a blueberry mojito gelée cake with mango mousse, topped off with a chocolate hibiscus flower. He gave it an ocean look with dark blue coloring.
In a blind taste test, celebrity guest judge and pastry chef Amaury Guichon said Diaz’s final product wasn’t the right interpretation for a boozy dessert. There wasn’t enough booze in the cake, both Guichon and judge Duff Goldman said. Guichon also criticized the amount of dark blue coloring Diaz used and said it wasn’t a natural look.
“This cannot be served in a restaurant,” Guichon said.
Diaz, who was watching the judging on a screen in another room, became emotional as he heard the feedback.
He told his fellow pastry chef and competitor Juan Gutierrez that it hurt to get that kind of criticism on the show because as an older competitor, he doesn’t have as much time for improvement in his career as the younger chefs.
“We should be already there,” a visibly upset Diaz told Gutierrez.
After all of the judging, host Jesse Palmer revealed that Diaz was once again among the bottom competitors for the round. And, just like the premiere episode, the Utah chef ended up narrowly avoiding elimination.
Diaz received a 15 out of 30 for his cake, bringing his cumulative score for the episode to 26 points.
Oralia Perez, a pastry chef based in Houston, got eliminated from the competition with a cumulative score of 25.
Now, Diaz moves forward as one of nine remaining chefs competing for $50,000 in “The Ultimate Baking Championship.”
The show airs Monday nights on Food Network, with episodes available for streaming the following day on Discovery+ and HBO Max.
Who is Adalberto Diaz?
Diaz’s colorful macarons and fruit desserts are on display at Fillings & Emulsions in Salt Lake City — which the chef has described as an “eclectic Latin bakery with a French flair."
“The last 12 years I have invested everything I have, everything, into my pastry shop,” Diaz said during “The Ultimate Baking Championship” premiere episode, which included footage of his new location that features bright murals painted by his brother to highlight their Cuban heritage.
“When I win this competition, it will be a dream come true and that money is gonna go straight into my business and my amazing team of chefs and pastry chefs,” he said during the premiere episode. “I want to make sure that we make it out of these harsh economic times.”
Diaz emigrated from Cuba in 2000 and made a home in Utah, where he quickly began working in the food industry. He worked at a few places around Salt Lake City over the next decade, and earned the American Culinary Federation’s title of Pastry Chef of the Year in 2012. He opened Fillings & Emulsions the following year, as the Deseret News reported.
The chef’s appearance on “The Ultimate Baking Championship” comes on the heels of being nominated as a semifinalist for the prestigious James Beard award for outstanding pastry chef or baker.
“I am part of this community and this community has welcomed me to be part of it, and even bigger, this country welcomed me when I came here, and gave me an opportunity to be more where I am today,” Diaz told the Deseret News last year after his James Beard nomination. “And I wish that opportunity was given to more people because you don’t know how they would change the world.”