On the heels of that MasterChef trailer, the Food Network is circulating a promo for Scott Conant’s new show, 24-Hour Restaurant Battle, wherein teams of “aspiring restaurateurs” compete against each other for seed money by opening a restaurant concept within 24 hours. Judges include Marcus Samuelsson, Geoffrey Zakarian, Drew Nieporent, Jason Denton, and writers and publicists like Ben Leventhal and Alison Brod. It’s kind of like Top Chef’s “Restaurant Wars” meets Chopping Block meets Hell’s Kitchen meets etc. etc. The lines in the promo are pretty choice: “I can do it, and I don’t have to be afraid anymore!”; “I’m 100 percent man — I’m not going to say ‘pretty please’ at this point.” There is outrage over stemmy arugula, and yes, there are tears. The series premieres with a “sneak peek” on July 18 at 10 p.m.
