TV Land

Long Anonymous Critic Brad A. Johnson To Appear on Beat the Chefs

“Full many a flower is born to blush unseen…” Photo: I Stole the TV

The “A” in writer Brad A. Johnson’s byline will no longer stand for “anonymity,” as the former longtime Angeleno critic and James Beard-winning food writer is set to appear on a new Game Show Network television show called Beat the Chefs. Food Republic reports that the show is set up as a cooking competition between three professional chefs (Antonio Lofaso, Beau MacMillan, and Jeff Henderson) and a bunch of amateur challengers and notes that Johnson will be featured as one of the show’s judges, trading in his long-valued cloak of invisibility to join The L.A. Times’ S. Irene Virbila and Jonathan Gold in the Valhalla of formerly anonymous Los Angeles food critics, leaving Los Angeles magazine’s Patrick Kuh and kinda-sorta L.A. Weekly’s Besha Rodell as the city’s sole anonymous critics.

Like most scrupulous scribes coming to terms with the New World Order of reality television and parting ways with their secret names, wigs, and wax mustaches, Johnson brushes the big reveal off his shoulders by tweeting, “Ok, well the cat’s out of the bag! Anonymity will soon be dead. This show is gonna rock!”

Beat The Chefs: It’s Pros Vs. Amateurs On New Cooking Show [Food Republic]

Long Anonymous Critic Brad A. Johnson To Appear on Beat the Chefs