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Brave chefs slice up competition

Fresh Slice, Bradley’s hospitality student organization, brought out all the ingredients to serve students at the third annual Brave Chef competition last Sunday in the Student Center Ballroom.

Four teams competed and were tasked with making an appetizer, entree and dessert for judges to taste.

Every year, Fresh Slice changes the secret ingredient and judging panel. The judges this year were Vice President of Student Affairs Nathan Thomas, Biaggi’s chef Lisa Johnston-Dixon, and Kara Wolfe, director of the Hospitality Leadership program.

Baker’s Without Ovens won the contest against The Beaters, Pi Cooka Phi and The Catholic Braves. The winning team received a golden-colored spatula, gift cards to various restaurants and a chance to have their meal prepared and served at a Bradley dining hall.

“When we won our awards, I was just elated for our team, as we had put a good amount of effort preparing and planning what we wanted to make,” Alex Bojdak, a member of Baker’s Without Ovens, said. “My teammates knew what had to get done and how to lead me through the competition. They were able to maintain a calm demeanor throughout the preparation hour and help lead the group to the victory.”

Staying calm was a key component throughout the contest, as team members only had an hour to cook all three dishes. In addition, a secret ingredient was announced that the teams had to incorporate into each of the meals. Fresh Slice president Carolyn Stewart decided on canned pumpkin because this is the first time the contest was held during the fall.

“The competition itself is very stressful, forcing participants to think quickly and minimize mistakes,” Derrick Compas, Pi Cooka Phi member, said. “At the beginning of the cook-off, the secret ingredient is revealed, essentially sending all the teams into chaos. After hearing that pumpkin was our special ingredient, we immediately had to rethink each of our dishes.”

Student team Bakers Without Ovens compete in the third annual Brave Chef cooking competition hosted by Fresh Slice. Photo by Anna Foley.
Student team Bakers Without Ovens compete in the third annual Brave Chef cooking competition hosted by Fresh Slice. Photo by Anna Foley.

Stewart was pleased with the chefs being able to quickly adapt to the secret ingredient that was assigned.

“My favorite part of Brave Chef is seeing how creative the teams are with their dishes,” Stewart said. “When we did the secret ingredient reveal, I saw a couple of worried faces, but all four teams seemed to do a great job including the pumpkin in every dish.”

The event is based off of Food Network’s TV show “Iron Chef.” Before the contest, all teams must attend an orientation with a cooking demonstration and food safety lesson.

“We had seven teams come to the Brave Chef orientation,” Stewart said. “We decided to choose the teams based off of voting on the BU Fresh Slice Facebook page. Since [only] four teams decided to try to compete, we instead used the Facebook voting to determine which team would gain an advantage in the competition.”

Bradley students had the opportunity to vote for which team they wanted to receive help at the contest. Baker’s Without Ovens earned the most votes and won an extra five minutes of cooking time.

“We had practiced our routine the Thursday before the competition and timing ourselves, we were about eight minutes over the mark,” Bojdak said. “We managed to successfully plate everything and have it all finished by the end of the competition thanks to the five minute bonus we won in the Facebook competition.”

Some teams were more competitive than others, but most contestants focused on the enjoyable aspects of the challenge.

“We were just excited to be cooking food and competing with each other,” Tessa Rasmussen, Pi Cooka Phi member, said. “We went into the competition not knowing what we were going to cook and [kind of] winged it. It was a lot of fun.”

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