Barcelona’s Adam Greenberg Returning To ‘Chopped’

Just over a year ago, “Chopped” viewers watched as Adam Greenberg deconstructed a rice and cheese burrito and turned it into chocolate milk ice cream, triumphing over his final opponent and winning the cutthroat Food Network competition’s coveted $10,000 prize.

Armed with that valuable experience, the West Hartford native and longtime Barcelona Restaurant & Wine Bar chef is about to return to the “Chopped” kitchen for a second battle. This time, all of his competitors are past victors.

Greenberg, currently the executive chef at Barcelona’s 14^th Street restaurant in Washington, D.C., will appear on the new season of “Chopped Champions,” which began airing March 29. The five-week, pre-taped tournament brings back 16 winners from previous seasons. Four chefs compete on each episode, and the winner from each battle will advance to the grand finale, with the opportunity to take home a $50,000 prize.

Greenberg will appear on “Battle 2: Fighting Shape,” airing Tuesday, April 5. Like the original “Chopped” concept, returning chefs are given no hints or suggestions before they receive a basket of secret ingredients in each round. They’re expected to come up with a series of required dishes based on their creativity and skill level.

A Food Network description of Greenberg’s episode, which taped last fall, references “deceptively simple sausage and cabbage” in the first basket of ingredients, followed by organ meats in round 2 and “an extremely challenging basket” in the final bout, one that “will take some champion swagger and skill to crack.”

Greenberg said he was “really, really excited” to get the call for the “Champions” opportunity, adding that he was hoping for a shot at the winners’ season after his first victory. He admitted to feeling some nerves once he understood he was up against other top talent. (Contestants are not allowed to reveal how far they advance in the competition.)

“You size everyone up, and you realize, everyone sitting here won $10,000. Everybody here had their moment,” he said. But once the competition began, he focused on winning, and his years of training, along with adrenaline, kicked in.

“I’ve been doing this a long time. You go back to what you do naturally.”

During his February 2015 appearance, Greenberg faced celebrity judges Scott Conant, Amanda Freitag and Aarón Sánchez as he transformed cold poutine and Italian sausages into bocadillos (Spanish-style sandwiches) and fast-food sliders, beer, Japanese eggplant and Mexican corn into fideos, a toasted noodle dish. Despite the unconventional circumstances and ingredients, “the judges give you real critiques,” he said. “You try to take that advice from your last episode and bring it to this one; [there are] little things, little advice, you keep in your mind when you go [back] into that ‘Chopped’ kitchen.”

Greenberg, 36, who began his career at 18, worked for Billy Grant as a young cook at Restaurant Bricco — “he quickly became a mentor and someone I deeply admired,” he said – and earned a culinary degree from Johnson & Wales University. At Barcelona, he served as executive chef at the West Hartford location for four and a half years and later moved into a more corporate role with the company, overseeing the expanding restaurant group’s kitchens and assisting in training.

When his first “Chopped” episode aired, he was assisting the owners of the Fortina restaurants in Westchester County as they prepared to open a Stamford location. But as Barcelona’s parent company Barteca Holdings continued to expand rapidly beyond New England, opening restaurants in Atlanta, Tampa, Nashville, Washington, D.C., and Reston, Va., Greenberg rejoined the group last spring to head up the kitchen on 14^th Street.

His Barcelona family is ready to cheer him on for a second round.

“Love him or hate him, everybody knows when Adam Greenberg’s in the house,” said CEO and founder Andy Pforzheimer in an email. “Adam has the hospitality bug bad, and he won’t stop until every guest has a smile on their face and a full plate on the table. Adam lives and breathes food, and his Jewish-American-Spanish roots combine in his ever-changing menus. He is chef, maitre d’, and cruise director rolled into one compact, ever-moving package, and to share Adam’s food is to share his love of life.”

Though he’s moved south, Greenberg hasn’t forgotten his roots and hopes to continue to represent his home state’s culinary landscape.

“The Connecticut food scene obviously has gotten really good, and the recognition is starting to go there, which is awesome to see,” he said. “It’s something I’m really proud of. … I don’t want to lose touch with that. I don’t ever want to lose that community.”

Adam Greenberg appears on Food Network’s “Chopped Champions” Tuesday, April 5, at 10 p.m. Information: foodnetwork.com/shows/chopped.html.