Competition Prep

I've been doing more culinary competitions lately, and as I have mentioned before, they require a lot of advance planning and practicing. There is writing out recipes, time management sheets, ingredient lists, and equipment lists. There is practicing and trying out recipes and tweaking techniques. One other task is gathering up stuff needed for the competition. For example, the competition I am doing tomorrow has fifteen teams of two people, in very limited kitchen space. Therefore, equipment will be limited and the kitchen will be hectic and crazy. So this took a little more advance planning to avoid using equipment I know will be tough to fight for, and to schedule in a little extra time for running around.

Just to be on the safe side, my partner and I decided to take some equipment with us. Any outside equipment is allowed in order to ensure there is enough of everything to go around, provided it is only equipment that would already be available.

Pictured here, we brought: plastic wrap, aluminum foil, masking tape, food labels, miniature kitchen scale, timer, butcher's twine, miniature food processor, miniature blender, stopwatch, plastic bags, piping bags and tips, plastic lids for containers, and our own knives and specialty tools. We're prepared for this. Bring it on.