Plot Synopsis

Hosted by Valerie Bertinelli, FAMILY RESTAURANT RIVALS is a one-hour culinary competition series, where family-owned restaurants tackle challenges -- from elevating childhood classics, to putting their own spin on meat and potatoes, and whipping up guilty pleasure desserts -- in their bid for the $10,000 grand prize. Along the way, they must endure real-life restaurant curveballs and please a panel of rotating judges, including Kardea Brown, Jason Fullilove, Ray Garcia, Alex Guarnaschelli, Robert Irvine, Clinton Kelly, Antonia Lofaso, Bricia Lopez, Simon Majumdar, Christian Petroni, Courtney Rada, Aarti Sequeira and Jet Tila with delicious dishes. In each 60-minute episode, three families face-off in two rounds of challenges requiring them to overcome obstacles and unpredictable twists, without letting family dynamics get in the way of success.

In the series opener, "The Family That Cooks Together," Chinese-American, Jewish and Italian-American families face off to see whose family restaurant fare is the best. In round one, host Valerie Bertinelli asks the teams to adapt their restaurants' best lunch combos for picky eaters. The two families that remain in round two have to make an impressive noodle dish with a twist that wows judges Clinton Kelly, Antonia Lofaso and Jet Tila, and the winning family takes home the $10,000 prize.