Wooden Chef's Introduction to

       Home                        Cooking Along with the Iron Chefs

                                          Here is a fun game that you would-be chefs and your family can

       News                          play while watching the Food Networks Iron Chef Challenge:

                                            Try to duplicate the Iron Chef's and Challenger's menu during

  Introduction                  the program and complete enough dishes by the time the

                                            judging starts to get an idea of what the judges taste.

     Recipes                        How to play:

                                           First: Look on www.ironfans.com at the TV Schedule to find out

     Diary                            what the Theme Ingredient will be.

                                            Second: Look at www.ironchef.com/ironbytheme.shtml

 Write Wooden Chef       for Stephanie Masumura's review.

                                            Third: Look back here to find recipes for the theme ingredient.

                                            Fourth: Try to cook along with the Iron Chefs during the program.

    

                               This idea started on March 16th, 2001 when I was watching Iron Chef Battle Foie Gras

                          with my granddaughters. They asked what it tasted like. Of course I didn't have any goose

                          liver, but it looked like bologna and from the descriptions it is very bland. The key was

                          when the piece of soft meat was cut into slices that looked like sandwich meat. I spread

                          mayonnaise on pieces of baloney and sprinkled garlic powder on them. I sliced celery

                          sticks about a half-inch wide and as long as the bologna. I rolled the celery up in the

                          bologna and rolled the bologna and celery up in a piece of bread.  I put them on plates

                          with the seam down and micro waved them for two minutes each. Then I cut the rolls

                          into quarters and served them sushi style on pieces of lettuce with horseradish mustard.


                           Long time fans of Iron Chef know that the Challenger is allowed to prepare ingredients

                      before the contest in anticipation of the secret main ingredient. If you wait until the program

                      starts to find out what the main ingredient is you won't be able to make enough of the

                      dishes.

                           You will be looking at about 4 hours work. Look up the ingredients and basic recipes,

                      spend an hour at the store trying to find the right stuff, another hour chopping and slicing, an

                      hour of pre-cooking, then 40 minutes of madness, trying to do what you see the Iron Chef

                      and Challenger doing. Try to have your TV in the kitchen or in the dining room where you

                      can see it. You'll need lots of help, I have three granddaughters who are becoming good

                      cooks. They help to do a lot of the preparation. Probably 5 or 6 people would be the best

                      group for the challenge.

                           Get someone to take notes. I take a piece of paper with 3 holes punched in it and fold

                      it over to the holes, then draw a line down the crease on both sides. I take notes on the

                      Challenger in the left column and Iron Chef in the right column. I usually get notes on about

                      one side of the paper. When they give the quick views of the dishes before tasting, I turn the

                      paper over and use colored pencils to get the general layout of the dish. Then we dish it up

                      and sit down to taste along with the panel. I haven't had anyone come over to help in this

                      madness, and sometimes the girls get mad at me, if it's some ingredient they don't like.

                           My wife, Elaine, does most of the shopping.

 

                    Notes: In the Recipes (IC) following a title means that was the title given on Iron Chef.

                     (SM) following a title means that was the title given by Stephanie Masumura. The titles

                     are frequently different. Ms. Masumura's titles are often more descriptive of the dishes.

 

DISCLAIMER: Iron Chef is the property of FujiTV and all opinions expressed herein do not reflect those of FujiTV. The author is in no way affiliated with FujiTV or Food Network. The recipes presented here are loosely based on the dishes appearing on "Iron Chef", but are in no way supposed to be accurate copies. Use of copyrighted images is covered under the fair use section of the Copyright Law. This site is not responsible for the content of any other site to which it is linked. All text and graphics are ©Copyright 2001 by Brett Pijan, unless otherwise noted.