Philly’s chef Brian Duffy gets into the fire this summer on Food Network’s ‘BBQ Brawl’

Brian Duffy has done plenty in his quarter-century of chef’s work in the Philadelphia area, running kitchens at restaurants such as Downey’s, McCormick & Schmick, Manayunk Brewery, Harvest, Kildare’s, and Flying Fish Crafthouse. He’s done TV, including nine episodes of Spike TV’s Bar Rescue series. He grew up on the Main Line and is now a restaurant consultant, with a roster of clients around the country.

But until now, Duffy has never competed on reality television. At 9 p.m. Monday, the eve of his 52nd birthday, he starts as one of 12 pitmaster contestants on Season 4 of Food Network’s BBQ Brawl. The 10 episodes were shot in Northern California with chefs Bobby Flay, Anne Burrell, and Sunny Anderson as coaches.

At the outset of the 90-minute season premiere, the contestants will make tacos as the coaches pick their teams. Carson Kressley, Rodney Scott, and Brooke Williamson are judges. The finale will be Sept. 4.

“I went in a little bit nervous, and I can honestly say it was one of the hardest things that I’ve ever done in my culinary career,” Duffy said by phone from Key West, where he was working with a client.

Duffy said he has opened 15 barbecue spots over the last 10 years, including Ardmore Q on the Main Line during the pandemic. Working on a grill or a smoker “has just completely lit a fire inside of me,” he said.

The hard part of BBQ Brawl was the teamwork, said Duffy, who as a consultant is accustomed to calling the shots. “Everybody is still competing against each other, even though we had some allies as we were working together, figuring out whose strengths were what, whose weaknesses were what.”

Duffy said he and the other contestants “forged an unbelievable bond. We have a daily text thread now, and two of the people on the show are now equity partners in projects that I have going on. It was a strategic move for me to do a show like this. We had a true respect for each other, and I hope that [the producers put] that out.”

“I really think that we didn’t give a lot of drama in anything and not only that, we weren’t talking [trash] about people,” he said. “I feel really strong about the way that I’m going to be represented. I didn’t stab anybody. I think we’re good.”

The other challenge was that the cooking was entirely outdoors, “so you don’t have the comfort of an oven or a fryer or stuff like that. We really had to be kind of innovative with what we were doing.”

Duffy said he signed on to the show because he has judged Beat Bobby Flay for five years. “I’ve worked with the production crew for so long that I know that it’s a quality show,” he said. “I wasn’t looking to have a microwave thrown at me in the middle of a competition. Or like, ‘Oh, hey, by the way, we’re going to replace your knives now with sporks.’ I knew it was going to be a culinary challenge.”