SFist Interviews: Brian Boitano
by Amy Crocker
Before now, the closest figure skating and cuisine had come together was when the blade of a skate served as a makeshift knife the 2000 Tom Hanks movie Castaway. Well, they’ve just got a little bit closer.
This month, figure skater Brian Boitano will star in his own cooking show on the Food Network. Boitano, who won a gold medal in figure skating at the 1988 Calgary Olympics, is perhaps just as widely known for the song "What Would Brian Boitano Do?" from the South Park movie as he is for his triple lutz. His show, What Would Brian Boitano Make? premieres on August 23. Boitano, who lives in San Francisco, spoke with SFist about the city, his new show, and how to get 20 women over to your house.
SFist: You spent so much time training for the Olympics and you still skate today, when did you have time to develop any interest in cooking?
Brian Boitano: It started after my Olympic stuff. After I bought my first house when I was 24 I would have a group of friends that came over and we would all cook together pretty much every night for dinner.
SF: How did that progress to a Food Network show?
BB: I had an idea for a show that included skating and food together. And so I had lunch with [a TV executive] and he was like, "I like your idea but why don't we drop the whole skating thing and just do the cooking." Most people want to add the skating not subtract the skating.
SF: So what was the winning concept?
BB: Each episode there’s a focus of an event or a person - usually one of my friends - that I need to create a menu for. It’s not a straight chopping and dicing show. It’s a reality-docu-soap.
SF: A “reality-docu-soap”? How does the “soap” come in?
BB: I do an event at the end of each episode and everything that happens before builds up to it. So when my friend Tony, who is a bachelor, said he wants to meet a girl, I conceive this whole thing of doing a bachelor party for him with 20 hot women. So the entire episode is how to get a bunch of women to come over. I created the recipes and then I had to go find girls for him.
SF: What did you make?
BB: I had a coffee flavored Panna Cotta with little small spoons in little espresso cups and stuff like that. I thought, “What would be romantic food? What would be easy to eat?” I make a drink in each episode, too. For the bachelor party, I made a Passion Fruit Mar-Tony. I’m actually really getting into the whole mixology thing and making the simple syrup or the flavored simple syrup.
SF: You are a Bay Area native. Was it important to film the show in San Francisco?
BB: I think [San Francisco] plays a big part in all the episodes. I’ll go to my grocery store; I’ll go to things around town. It is filmed in my house. I was born and raised near the city and I just never have thought of living anywhere else. There’s no feeling as great as flying into San Francisco airport.
SF: I have to ask, do you think you’ll do some sort of South Park tie-in?
BB: I want [South Park creators] Matt Stone and Trey Parker to be on the show - I hear they’re foodies too. But it’s not like I know them.
SF: It’s hypothetical, but what would you make for them?
BB: One of those things that Cartman always eats, what are they called? Cheesy puffs? I would try to come up with my own version of cheesy puffs.
