I summon the Iron Dopers! Or at least Japanese speakers

[ElvisL1ves]

On "Iron Chef", right after Chairman Kaga has unveiled the theme ingredient, he starts the battle with unsubtitled words that sound like "Aora kizim!" Now, I seriously doubt that it means, as Fukui-san's stuck-in-the-Seventies voiceover actor says, "Bang a gong, get it on", but what does it mean?

And, when Kaga summons the Iron Chefs, is there any reason he says "Iron Chefs", in English, instead of "Ryori-no Tetsujin"?

[Melandry]

Check out the Iron Chef Glossary here (http://www.foodtv.com/tvshows/ironchefglossary/0,4782,,00.html) on the Food Network website. According to it, he's not saying anything in Japanese, but rather "Allez Cuisine!" (in French), but it sounds rather garbled to me, too. Now that I've been told that's what he's saying, I get it, but I wouldn't have guessed it independently.

[Melandry]

Oh, sorry, forgot to add that I have no idea about the second part of your question.

[Osakadave]

My two cents re. "Iron Chefs" and not "Ryori-no Tetsujin" would be that Japanese love to use extranious foreign language words, especially English.

[Tsubaki]

And I would second what Osakadave says.

I love Kaga-san.

[Lamia]

He is indeed saying "Allez Cuisine!", his French just isn't too great.

[KXL]

My two cents re. "Iron Chefs" and not "Ryori-no Tetsujin" would be that Japanese love to use extranious foreign language words, especially English.

Just like Julia Child would end every episode of "The French Chef" by saying "Bon appetit!"

[Osakadave]

Exactly, KXL!

[ElvisL1ves]

Domo arigato, y'all. I never would have guessed, either.

How popular is the show in Japan, while we're at it? It must get pretty good ratings, for Fuji TV to have kept it on the air so long despite its significant production costs.

[PublicBlast]

If memory serves me correctly [rimshot], IronChef hasn't been in production for a while now. They still film specials every now and then (like the Morimoto/Bobby Flay contest, or the Millennium competition) but they don't have new episodes every week. What we get on Food Network is like 5 or 6 old seasons from Japan. I assume Japan also gets reruns. (I saw one in Japanese a while ago--Oota-san is HARD to understand!)

Why isn't it still in production? I've heard that in Japan, production companies will quit while they're ahead and a series/show is still popular, rather than squeeze every last bit of revenue out of it until nobody is watching anymore. (Chris Carter of The X-Files should've taken a page from this book.) Besides, there's still money to be made in syndication, as Food Network has demonstrated.

[Ferrous]

I summon the Iron Dopers!
You rang?;)

[Milton De La Warre]

There WAS an "Iron Chef USA" show for a while ---I think on Fox--- with William Shatner as the Chairman (well, who else?). Kitchen Stadium was re-created in the MGM Grand. I don't think the show is still around.

I can't get the link to come up now, or I'd paste it here:
"You know you're too into Iron Chef when..." It's great.