Chestnuts are my favorite ingredient to use in the fall, especially for the holidays. I always find that they are meaty, hearty and have a mysterious refinement when cooked or roasted over sea salt.

Previously in 1992 44 had only received 2 stars from The New York Times columnist Bryan Miller. Zakarian has also competed as a challenger on Iron Chef America in May 2010 where he faced Masaharu Morimoto and lost with a score of 57 to 43.

Geoffrey Zakarian is an Iron Chef restaurateur television personality and author. He is featured on several television programs on the Food Network including Chopped and in 2011 The Next Iron Chef where he won the right to join Iron Chef America.