D-48 days... Chopped

Living in a community is always fun. But having organized FUN on occasions... well, nothing compares to that! Today's D- post was originally about crazy on-board programs anyways; it just so happened that we had Chopped last night, LIVE from the crew galley :)

If you don't know what's Chopped (relax, before this video clip I had no idea either!) in short: a cooking competition with a twist. Ken, our resident Food Master decided to start the AFM-Chopped competition last year. It was very successful and a great night of fun for everybody, not just the contestants. Naturally, we had one this year as well. Here are some pictures of the fun night!

• 3 judges: a Swedish guy who compared everything to IKEA meat balls, the Chief Steward (and hobby chef daddy) and last year's winner, a cook herself from the galley.
• contestants: 5 random crew members from down the Engine room to a mother of 3 from deck 7 and anybody in between. 
• The goal: 1 main meal with the provided ingredients + one mystery item for the first round. After that 3 would be chopped and the remaining 2 would compete with a dessert item for the grand price. FUN!!!

For the rest of us, Ken and his amazing team provided snacks.
Oh, the and whole night was MC-ed by a Scottish fellow - what else can you ask for???

After the introduction of the judges and nervous contestants Ken presented the mystery item: a huge pumpkin each - leftover from our Fall Festival Decoration. :) Other items to be used were: chicken breasts, nuts and COFFEE! Now imagine that combination: chicken marinated in coffee and served with smashed pumpkins :)

While they ran off into the Crew Galley we had the opportunity to watch last year's episode (it had been filmed, but due to some technical difficulties we couldn't watch it live last year). We could also vote like last year - which I won by the way... TWICE!!! Both years I could predict who gets the first and the second price! :)

For the dessert I went into the crew galley to capture some great moments like Heidi already busy making pretzels while Nigel was still running around looking for a pan. The mystery item for this round was PLUMS together with pizza dough and peanut butter. Yuck...

Heidi ended up doing something like peanut butter balls rolled in cinnamon sugar and plum sauce, while Nigel went with the Peanut butter-Plum Pizza (he based his idea on Americans liking PB-J AND pizza. At the end poor Nigel got chopped, though I tasted his creation and I must say it was pretty good!

Anyhow, great evening, lots of good food, laughter with friends - another special thing I will miss greatly :((((

Here is the slideshow with all my pictures: