Chopped - "In Da 'Hood Edition"

Last night was one of those perfect evenings that came together without any planning or advance notice.  We had talked about the details of this night in the past, but conflicts kept getting in the way.  So when my girlfriend texted me Friday night to see if we were available on Saturday night, I said yes, and hoped it would come together.  And yep, it did - we were able to launch "our suburban version" of Chopped.

My friend Paul and I both love to cook, while his wife Lisa and my husband are not big fans of the culinary stuff.  Add in our other friends Chris and Jay who are awesome to be around, and we were ready to do what we had talked about a month ago.  Chris and Lisa gave Paul and I 4 "secret basket ingredients" at 4:45 PM.  We had 15 minutes to figure out our menu and an hour to shop, with a $50 budget.  Since the event would be at our house, I also let Paul know what we had on hand so that those ingredients would not be purchased with our small budget which had to feed 6 adults and 4 kids.

When I was given goat cheese, pecans, cilantro and spinach, my wheels started to turn - in a MILLION different directions.  I learned quickly that I am not a "off the top of my head" kind of gal.  Finally, I started to figure out some options (no internet access allowed) and off to the store, my daughter and I went.  We were only 50 cents over budget, which I was UBER proud of...until of course I found out that somehow Paul was $12 UNDER budget.  Show off :)

We all met up at our house at 6 PM and started the appetizer round at 7 or so.  I finally landed on something not as creative as I really wanted, but something that would use all 4 ingredients in a half hour time frame.  I made a spinach salad with chopped red and orange peppers, strawberry slices, goat cheese crumbles, and some candied pecans.  I had never candied pecans and had no idea of what I was doing, but I basically melted some brown sugar, butter and a tad of water.  From there, I coated the pecans and baked them.  They could have used a bit of extra sweetness, maybe cinnamon should be included next time, but at least they worked.

I also made a homemade dressing with goat cheese, olive oil, cilantro, key lime jelly, and some of the "sauce" from the candied pecans.  It was fabulous - as Jay said "I don't love many salad dressings, but I could drink this!"  Hindsight 20/20,  I wish the dressing would have been thicker as this picture would have looked much better!

Paul's appetizer was incredible.  He sliced a baguette (I also had bread but had not a chance of getting it in the oven within the time), and though I don't know exactly what he did, I know it was a topping with mushrooms, pureed cilantro, chopped pecans, garlic, goat cheese, etc.  It was so flipping YUMMY and he did an amazing job of "repurposing" the ingredients, which is what "Chopped" is all about.  I hate that we didn't get a picture of it!  but it was CHAOS!

We took some time to enjoy the appetizer round, Lisa was a huge help and did the dishes, and from there, we were ready for the entree round.  This one was MUCH easier for me as I could work from a recipe I already make.  I was going to stuff chicken breasts with a mixture of goat cheese, cilantro, spinach, and sundried tomatoes.  I would also make a topping of chopped pecans, bread crumbs and melted butter, coat the top of the chicken breasts and bake.  Let's just say that my time management skills SUCK as to bake the chicken alone took 25 minutes.  So add in my prep time and let's just say - I did NOT finish this round anywhere close to the 30 minutes we had allotted. 

In addition, I decided to do some quinoa, using my leftover chopped peppers, leftover salad dressing, some chicken broth, and some different herbs.  Added in a bit of my "crema" and it ended up super tasty and healthy to boot.  Wish I had done a prettier presentation!  I actually did add on 2 cherry tomato slices with a sprig of cilantro for the future plates.

Paul did a very creative version of reconstructing Chicken Florentine.  He took small pieces of chicken and sauteed them, while making a pot of fettucine and a delicious alfredo sauce.  It was tasty and oh so flavorful.

For dessert, Paul made an AMAZING lemon goat cheese cheesecake which he "whipped up" before our friendly competition ever began.  Let's just say that I'm happy that a few of those slices remain in OUR fridge. 

We are talking about doing this on a more regular basis, like once a month.  I honestly (and this will sound SO NERDY) felt like I grew in our culinary experience.  It actually inspired tonight's dinner (will do that post tomorrow).  I have a lot to learn and want to learn it.  These are people that we love spending time with, so I hope that we can do it more often.  For the next time, I suggested that our sophomores are our sous chefs - so that I can offload some of the prep work that weighed me down!  It was such a fun evening, complete with time hanging out on the deck as well as doing some dancing in the great room!  Here's to good friends.  And NEITHER of us was chopped!