Dentist competing to be America's next MasterChef

Baby boomer is contestant on new season of TV show airing all summer in primetime

Chef Gordon Ramsay brought Christopher Walinski, D.D.S., to tears.

The famed chef is known to do so to contestants on his numerous televised cooking competitions. Mr. Ramsay can intimidate even the most intrepid.

But in this instance, Mr. Ramsay and the other judges didn’t reject Dr. Walinski’s dish.

Rather, Mr. Ramsay savored his bites of the meal and in dramatic fashion, presented a teary-eyed Dr. Walinski with the coveted apron.

The apron meant the dentist passed his audition to be one of 20 final contestants on the new season of MasterChef, called “MasterChef Generations,” airing all summer on Fox in primetime.

“Gordon Ramsay is the most high-energy person I’ve met,” Dr. Walinski said. “He expects a lot out of people, but he obviously expects a lot out of himself as well. In the end, I think he really just wants everyone to do well and exceed their own expectations. He really seems to get everything out of people. He is someone you just don’t want to let down.”

In its 14th season, MasterChef whittled down 45,000 applicants. Of those, the show’s producers invited 80 people to audition in Los Angeles. Over the course of two days, potential contestants were interviewed and created a dish. The next day, 40 people disappeared, and 40 were left to cook in the apron rounds. Of those, the top 20 are competing for the grand prize of $250,000.

This year, there is new twist, with five home cooks from each generation: Gen Z, millennials, Gen X and baby boomers.

Dr. Walinski, 59, was deemed a baby boomer.

“I have always thought of myself as a Gen Xer,” Dr. Walinski said. “I played outside until the streetlights came on and drank out of a garden hose. All those things. A MasterChef producer had a different opinion. I kept referring to myself as Gen X, but the producer stopped me and said, ‘You’ve been invited here as a baby boomer, sorry.’”

In the second episode, Dr. Walinski garnered the final apron offered to the five baby boomers, earning accolades from the judges during his televised audition of Japanese chicken karaage with yuzu mayo, gomoku rice and pickled red dragon fruit.

One of the judges, restaurateur Joe Bastianich, said the crispy chicken was "comfort food I want to eat."

“I’m half-Japanese, so I’m very familiar with Japanese flavors, which are more subtle, but on any given night, I might prepare a dish with a Vietnamese, Thai or Chinese twist,” Dr. Walinski told ADA News.

Dr. Walinski is an associate professor and director of laser dentistry at the Touro College of Dental Medicine. Before that, he held the same position for three years at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center College of Dentistry. He is now transitioning to private practice.

“I’m not sure exactly how I ended up as a dentist,” Dr. Walinski said. “Honestly, I always hated going to my dentist and have only bad memories. But I remember my mother guiding me in that direction and it just sort of stuck. I think she saw my artistic abilities but wanted me to be a doctor. Then, any time someone asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up and I told them I wanted to be a dentist, they seemed pretty satisfied with that answer, so here I am. My bad memories are what drive me to be the gentlest dentist I can be.”

He was a latchkey child and started cooking as a child.

“At heart, I’m a big foodie, and throughout my life, any time I had a delicious meal, I went home and practiced until I could recreate it,” Dr. Walinski said. “One by one, my repertoire of tasty dishes grew.”

Dr. Walinski said he knows many dentists who are wonderful cooks and consider themselves connoisseurs and critics.

“Being a dentist is a very artistic and creative profession. Dentists have to be engineers as well as sculptors in order to rebuild a smile in a way that is aesthetically pleasing,” he said. “Cooking is a very creative and personal skill as well. As they say, we eat with our eyes before we eat with our mouths. Looking at delicious food on a plate should inspire an emotional response before we actually eat the food. So, I think both professions offer creative people a way to express themselves.”

Dr. Walinski was diagnosed with prostate cancer two years ago, which spurred his decision to apply.

“At some point, we all think about our own timeline,” he said. “And even though no one knows where theirs ends, it really wakes you up when you realize things have changed overnight. Your priorities definitely change. What’s important in life changes. Who and how you let people use your time changes. As my wife, Veronica, says, ‘I thought you were a driven man before, but now you’re on hyperdrive!’ I have a lot of living to do.”

This season, the cooks are facing a multitude of cooking crucibles, including a restaurant takeover challenge, cooking a meal at the Major League Soccer LAFC stadium, and a tag-team event, where they must create a Michelin star-quality three-course meal.

Just one home cook will win it all and take home the cash prize and the title of America’s newest MasterChef.

Dr. Walinski can’t reveal who wins the title — the show was recorded earlier this year — but he relishes his opportunity to compete on his favorite TV show.

Maybe there are more happy tears to come.