The Dish At Gato Bobby Flay Is Most Proud Of

When you are Bobby Flay, you have a laundry list of accomplishments to point to, especially when you start your career at the ripe age of 18. The celebrity chef holds the most Iron Chef America titles. He has been recognized by the James Beard Foundation, awarded Emmys, starred as himself in an animated movie, and took the world to Italy during his Discovery+ limited series, "Bobby and Giada in Italy." Most recently, the "Throw Down with Bobby Flay" star started a podcast with his daughter Sophie. Flay has done just about everything you can imagine. 

Over the years, he has also cooked just about everything you can dream up. While he made his name as a grill master with a flare for all foods Southwestern, Flay is always showing us how versatile he is, and we really see this with the breadth and depth of restaurants Flay has designed and created over the years. From his soon to open Mediterranean eatery Amalfi in Las Vegas to his burger shops — Bobby's Burger Palace — to his recently closed Gato restaurant in New York City, Flay has shown he's a true renaissance man in the world of cooking. But, of all the recipes and dishes Flay has made over the years, you will never guess which one gives him the most pride. 

Flay revealed to Tasting Table there's one dish he's most proud of, and it's one he served at Gato: the kale and wild mushroom paella. Why this dish?

Bobby Flay went on to share with the Tasting Table, "I grew up in the restaurant business where meat was king and always at the center of the plate, and obviously over the last 20 years or so, people's tastes have changed." He added, "I think that chefs have become charged with making dishes that are very healthful or vegetarian or vegan that are just as creative as anything else they've done in the past, without being able to use an amazing piece of meat or some fish." 

But it took Flay some time before he got this dish to where he was really proud of it. He said, "The kale and wild mushroom paella was such a work in progress, and I can't tell you how many times I made it. I just kept thinking, I hate this dish; I can't get it right; I can't make it interesting enough; I'm just going to take it off the menu."

It actually took one of Flay's coworkers to help him see how good the dish really was as Flay went through trial and error to perfect it. Flay said, "[F]inally we figured it out, and it was like the underdog dish of the year. It's the number-one dish in popularity every single night at Gato. The fact that I could get a vegetarian entrée to be the top dish every night was really an accomplishment."