Opting out of scrumptious Sodexho meals, the comrades of Culinary House cook their own. It is their mission to broaden Carls’ culinary experience beyond greasy snack bar goods and ramen noodles. Carleton’s Slow Food Convivium also has a mission: to encourage people to slow down and enjoy their food instead of gobbling it on the run. Clearly, this was house-to-group match made in heaven. The two groups finally locked tongs at the first annual Iron Chef Carleton, a cooking contest extravaganza designed to let students show off their culinary chops.
Iron Chef is a Japanese television show that is a hybrid of a game and cooking show. Every week, one of the world’s top chefs comes to the studio to challenge an “Iron Chef” to a culinary duel. Viewers get to enjoy Chairman Kaga ham as the chefs duke it out.
Carleton had its own Tom Weishan ’09 of Cujokra act as Chairman for the event. The rules for the contest were simple: All the dishes cooked in the contest must contain a secret ingredient that the contestants don’t know about until the start of the contest. Once the ingredient is revealed, the cooks will have an hour and a half to cook an entire meal centered around the secret ingredient.
There were two teams competing for the Iron Chef Carleton prize that night. The first, Team Rawhide, composed of Charlotte Muzzi ’10, Beatrice White ’10, and Ben Cochran ’10. The second was Team Sakai High (after one of the Iron Chefs, Chef Sakai), which made of Dan Breitbach ’08, Paul Caine ’08, and Peter Olds ’08. Culinary house is so well-equipped that it has two kitchens, so each team ruled its own domain.
At 5 pm, the secret ingredient was revealed. Pumpkin!
Both teams began to cook like mad, while the audience and Chairman Weishan speculated on what the dishes might turn out. Will they use the artichoke Culinary House provided them? What about the prosciutto? Why is there a rawhide bone lying on Team Rawhide’s table? It’s not going to be an ingredient, is it?
Even the cooks weren’t quite sure what their dishes would become. Team Rawhide started slicing a bunch of apples, which might possibly become some sort of apple/pumpkin pastry. When asked if they had a plan, Cochran replied, “Kind of, but not really.” Meanwhile, Team Sakai High started sweating vegetables and mixing bread dough.
Another factor to complicate the contest was the rule that one of each team’s dishes must contain some sort of exotic spice. Both teams decided on curry as sweet spices tend to go well with pumpkin. Of course, pumpkins are by no means native to the Indian subcontinent, so the results of the culture fusion were bound to be interesting.
Over the ninety minutes, the judges dropped in and out of the kitchens every once in a while to check up on the contestants. All four of the judges, Iris Yin ’08, Bethany Saperstein ’09, Vanessa Garver ’09, and Janae Walton-Green ’10, are residents of Culinary House. Walton-Green said, “We know what food is supposed to taste like.” Right on.
Finally, time ran out and both teams had to present their plates for the judging. Each team made a three course meal: appetizer, main course, and dessert. Rawhide started out with a cheese plate (there was pumpkin sauce on the cheese), and for a main course served a chunky curry-spiced pumpkin soup. Sakai High ladled out a garlicky pumpkin soup as an appetizer and a pumpkin chutney lettuce wrap with pumpkin naan (that’s an Indian bread) for a main course. Said one of the judges about the wrap: “This tastes very healthy.”
Both teams’ desserts proved quite interesting. Team Sakai High made what they called a pumpkin explosion. “We just sort of kept putting stuff in there,” said one of the cooks. It was a bowl of pumpkin soufflé with whipped cream, raspberries, chocolate, cinnamon, and just about everything imaginable on top of it. Team Rawhide’s dessert incorporated pumpkin in two ways. The team took an ornamental pumpkin, cut it into eighths, and grilled it. They served this grilled pumpkin with sautéed apple slices and – guess what? – candied pumpkin seeds! Who knew that ornamental pumpkins were both edible and delicious.
At one point, the judges appeared to be channeling their Japanese TV-show counterparts. “It has a very relaxing feeling in the mouth,” said Saperstein about the explosion dish.
With each dish well-sampled, the judges convened in a secret powwow in another room to decide on the winner. While onlookers waited, the cooks shared their opinions of their own work (and everybody else got to taste the dishes). Caine was concerned that the crisp bread he’d made to accompany the pumpkin soup didn’t turn out quite crisp enough. Apparently, pumpkin doesn’t do crisp.
Finally, the judges re-entered the tasting room. There was a drumroll, a pregnant pause. Team Sakai High wins! Amid cheers, Saeyoon Baik ‘08 of Slow Food Convivium presented Olds, Caine, and Breitbach with ceremonial (and styling) chef hats.
Carleton can expect to see the revelry again next year, as Baik plans to make this Iron Chef competition an annual event.
Cheers!
