You've Been Chopped: Organizing a Kids' Cooking Contest

Final plating: Spinach Salad with Cranberry Croutons, Coriander Vinaigrette, and, inexplicably, Whole Coriander Seeds

I am returning with recipes, I am, I swear. (For scrambled eggs? A glass of beer? Three Finn Crisp crackers with cheddar and yellow mustard on them? I will have to try and make some actual food.) But I keep wanting to tell you this: you have to set up a Chopped contest for your kids. It's a lot like the Iron Chef Lunch that I have written about, but it is less open-ended and more contestish. If you haven't seen the Food Network show Chopped, it works like this: competitors are judged by famous chefs on the dishes they prepare, but they have to use all the ingredients in a specially presented basket. So, you're making an appetizer, only you have to make it with spelt vinegar and fresh tobacco leaves and Froot Loops. You can use other ingredients too, but you have to include the designated ones. Then you cry and tell the judges that your cousin's pet hedgehog is dying and you really need to win so that you can help pay the vet bills. And the judges scowl and tell you that you really didn't capture the essence of the Froot Loops in your raw-tuna carpaccio, which is why (sorry about your little paw, Mr. Curly) they have to "chop" you. If you try this at home, you can skip these last two elements.

However, for a pair of kids or a small group of kids or a large group of kids, playing Chopped is extremely fun, on the one hand, and, on the other, gets all or some of your dinner made. We've now done it loads of times (birthday parties, sleepovers, play dates, summer "camp") and kids get totally psyched, even if they're teenagers and you'd think they'd be too cool to get excited about celery seeds or almond extract. They'll surprise you.

An unretouched photograph of enthusiastic teenagers competing at salad. Bonus Ava sighting!

Here's what you do.

1) Come up with a game plan. For kids with limited or unknown cooking skills, plan for them to make just a salad or dessert (more experienced cooks can do more courses and/or an entree, but make sure you have enough time). Gather or buy the 3 or 4 special ingredients that the cooks will have to use, and make sure that you have others that they'll likely want or need. So, say you're doing a salad: put the weird or fun ingredients in the basket (we've done raw cranberries, dill pickles, bread, coriander seeds, pomegranate molasses, shallots, hearts of palm, dates, turmeric and vanilla extract, among others) and then make sure you have some basic salad stuff (greens, cukes, carrots) on-hand. (We did a dessert one on New Year's Eve with a huge group of kids, and I think they had to use baguette, cocoa powder, navel oranges, and heavy cream. Tofu is a great ingredient for entrees, since it's safe to eat even if it's cooked improperly). I usually put a small amount of each required ingredient in a shopping bag for each team, so they can grab-and-go when the contest starts.

Edited to add a comment from below: "LOVE IT!! Just think that my kids and the kids we know wouldn't be as adventurous as yours. We might need to use Cream cheese, peanut butter, mini chocolate chips and apples in order to get them to produce anything eatable. Thanks for the tip!" Of course! That's a great idea. Rice cakes or toast could be a great base for an easier assembly-type project.

A mortar and pestle is so great to have. Here, cranberries are getting shown what's what.

2) Gather the rest of the supplies. Each team will need a plate for each chef, plus an extra one for the judges to share. I put out cutting boards and knives, dish towels, and the mortar and pestle, but I'm always available to help them find whatever they need.

Shallots getting chopped, before being sauteed and added to a cranberry vinaigrette.

3) Divide the kids into teams. (This is easy if there are only two children.) We usually make sure to have at least one big kid and/or experienced cook on each team. We try to split up the littlest and rowdiest kids.

The littlest AND rowdiest kid, all rolled into one sharp-knife-wielding contestant! But look at that concentrating face. Those cranberries weren't going to cut themselves in half, after all.

4) Explain the ground rules. "You will be making a salad. You will have 30 minutes. You will need to use the ingredients in the basket. You can also use other ingredients, but you must use all the ingredients in the basket. You will need to 'plate' the dish, which means arranging it nicely on a plate. You will be judged on the presentation of your dish, as well as on its flavor and the successful incorporation of required elements. Nobody may cut themselves with a knife or burn themselves at the stove."

It is fine to make a "no heat" rule! There have definitely been some alarums, if you know what I mean. And what I mean is the smoke alarm going off.

5) Present the basket. Now, as you know if you've ever, say, played Candyland, this activity will be only as much fun as the energy you put into it. That means you have to take each ingredient out of the basket with a great deal of dramatic and/or comedic flourish. Think: Will Ferrel playing Liberace unpacking his weird groceries narratingly.

6) Start the timer. Then retire helpfully to some comfortable nearby corner, ideally where you have installed a kitchen couch, like I am always reminding you to do. The kids will need to know where things are, especially if there are kids who aren't your kids. Also, they might want advice about ratios of oil to vinegar, and you can give it to them or not, depending on the ground rules you've laid out. Do be sure to give them time alerts in a dramatic and threatening way. Address them continually and menacingly as "Chefs!"

The final plating.

7) When the time is up, each team should bring one plate over to the judging table. Now you (and the other judges, if there are any) will taste each dish, making encouraging and damning announcements as you see fit, and disagreeing extravagantly about whether whole scallions, say, or minced prunes are or aren't a pleasing addition to a salad. Now you can go in one of two directions: Theatrically announce a tie (which is what I personally wish we could do) or know that you have the kinds of kids on hand who will kill you if you do this, and announce a winner, first shaming all the other teams by recapping the flaws of their pathetic attempts at a winning dish and telling them, with woeful schadenfreude, "I'm sorry. The vinaigrette was nicely tart, and that was a compelling usage of torn salami, but you've been chopped."

8) Now the kids can each pick a plate from another team or their own and eat their amazing creations! Before cleaning up.