Roll the Dice

Time to brag about Husband. And our friend. But mostly Husband... 

The Cooking Challenge:

Roll the ingredient dice and create a cohesive, delicious meal out of what comes up!!

These dice were a stocking stuffer gift for Husband. I knew he would love them. He's such a great cook and very creative. This turns cooking into a challenging game, sort of Iron-Chef-like. Out of these 14 dice is one with only protein. Most are primarily vegetables, one is only grains, a few are all herbs and one has more unique ingredients such as artichokes or beets.

Ha ha - I love how sippy cups randomly make their way into my photos

The Rules:

Saturday morning Husband & Friend began the challenge by rolling the 14 Dice. They were allowed to re-roll any dice up to 3 times. (This allows people to 'veto' ingredients such as beets in hopes that something better shows up in the next roll.)






The Results:

Ginger, Basil, Thyme, Cauliflower, Qinoa, Beef, Kohl Rabi, Tomato, Onion, Carrots, Collard Greens, Wild Mushrooms, Chilies and Green Beans

  And with that they left for the supermarkets... 

The toughest ingredient to find was Kohl Rabi. Do you know what it is? It's a German radish. The boys went to several high end grocery stores looking for it. And just before they were about to admit defeat, it was found at our local store. -Who knew??

But now I see it everywhere.

Final Menu

Appetizer: Pickled Vegetables (including CAULIFLOWER & CARROTS)
Heirloom TOMATOES with Mozzarella, BASIL and Balsamic

Soup: WILD MUSHROOM Bisque

Main Course: QUINOA with Caramelized Pancetta and KOHL RABI
Sauteed GREEN BEANS with CHILIES
Grilled Top SIRLOIN with THYME, Caramelized ONIONS and flash fried COLLARD GREENS

Dessert: GINGER BASIL Ice Cream

Close Ups of the Creativity:

Green Beans with Chilies
These were sauteed crunchy with red chilies

The guys later explained the hardest part of this challenge was to create a cohesive meal from beginning to end. Many of the ingredients shouted out "Asian" to them, but not all. So they needed to control that tendency. For instance their original instinct was to add the ginger to the green beans and make this a typical Asian green bean dish. It would have been easy to make the sirloin Asian as well. Because they didn't do that, sort of a last minute decision, they needed something else to do with the ginger.

Quinoa with caramelized pancetta and khol robi

This was the boys first time fixing quinoa. And not surprisingly so, they knocked it out of the park. The crunchy bits of khol robi and the salty pancetta perfectly complemented the nutty quinoa both in flavor and texture.

Flash Fried Collard Greens - for garnish 

While this garnish was meant for the sirloin, I personally enjoyed it with the quinoa dish as well.

Husband always grills a perfect steak...

Grilled Sirloin with Caramelized Onions and Thyme

The Ginger Basil Ice Cream didn't photograph well, but it might have been my favorite course. They made a simple syrup with the ginger and added it to ice cream. Then before refreezing the ice cream they threw in pieces of basil. It was inspirational. 

Ginger Basil Ice Cream served alongside a
salted caramel brownie

Secrets from our amazingly talented chefs: The menu evolved throughout the day as the men began compiling ingredients. They said the evolution of the menu as they worked through issues together was the best part. But in my opinion the food was the best part!

Because you can't have a fabulous meal without fabulous wine!

Bravo Boys! Bravo!