FLOPPED. The Mystery Ingredient Winter Weekend Cooking Challenge

Josh and I are a little bit addicted to watching cooking shows.

Our favorites are anything featuring Gordon Ramsay, and our very favorite was his show Master Chef.  In case you didn't see it, it was an exciting competition between hundreds of home cooks from across America.  They had to complete all sorts of crazy cooking challenges and as the weeks went by they slowly get weeded out. The final winner, a darling 21-year-old Mississippi girl, won $250,000 and a cookbook publishing deal.  Sweet.

Lately, since we're all caught up on Ramsay's shows, we've been watching back episodes of Chopped.  It's not nearly as good as Master Chef but it's still fun to watch.  In Chopped four chefs compete against each other and try not to get "chopped" from the competition.  They each get four crazy ingredients and have to create a meal out of them that will impress the judges.

Every time we watch these shows we dream of beating all the other chefs.  And since we probably never will we decided to make our own challenge. :)

And since we're not really so sure about our on-the-fly cooking skills, we're calling it...

FLOPPED.

Meet the contestants:

Chef Leah grew up in Southern Vermont.  She grew up helping her mom cook.  While she loves to bake, cooking dinners (especially meat) sometimes overwhelms her.  Her specialties are brownies, waffles and pancakes.

Strengths for this challenge:
Has experience cooking lots of different types of dishes, is familiar with a wide range of ingredients, has a cute apron.
Weaknesses for this challenge:
Relies to heavily on recipes, is sometimes afraid to take risks, freezes under pressure. 

Chef Josh grew up in Chicago, IL.  His cooking career began when he got married and wanted to give his wife a break.  His specialties are spaghetti, curried rice and sugar cookies.

Strengths for this challenge:
Is very inventive, thinks out of the box, is not afraid to take risks, loves trying new flavors.
Weaknesses for this challenge:
Has somewhat limited cooking experience, believes cumin belongs in everything.

Meet the judge:

Chef Knox is a recent graduate of Gerber 1st Foods Academy of Green Beans and Pears. 

And he is a world-renowned critic of rice and oatmeal cereals.


CHOPPED. The Rules.

On separate nights each chef will go to the store and pick out 4 mystery ingredients for the other chef, who will then make a meal out of those ingredients.

The total cost of the four ingredients must be less than $10.

All four mystery ingredients need to be incorporated into the meal.

Any other ingredients we have in the kitchen can also be used.

Internet searches and cookbooks are not allowed.

The winner gets to cook all the family meals for the rest of our lives!

JUST KIDDING.  There isn't really a winner, we just want to give our creative cooking skills a workout.


Please stay tuned for FLOPPED, Challenge 1.