Suggestions for Iron Chef Ingredient

How about this...let's ditch the okra for this week. Instead, let's do something different... Secret ingredient!

Make whatever you want, but the secret ingredient should be the backbone of the item...like you cannot make baklava or spanikopita without phyllo... And then, after the week's entries, we all take guesses on what your secret ingredient is. You could even mail your secret ingredient to Doc or some other willing moderator to act as holder of the grail.

Now, with a 'secret ingredient' IC just about anyone who makes dinner this week should have something to enter.

And, in another thread, how about we start a new round of Iron Chef ingredients?

Wanna change the name for the next go 'round? If we do the cut and paste blog, should not our forum name somehow be involved?? How about NCT Ingredient Challenge or NCT Cooking Challenge?? or Culinary Challenge?? or Kitchen Challenge?? Or Cooks Challenge?? All with NCT preceeding, of course??

So, whaddya say??

I bought some new plates and a better camera (which I am still trying to master) JUST for having the fun of posting along with everyone else in both the dinner threads AND the IC (when I participate).

Gosh, as far as I've always seen it, this is more than just a food website.

A lot of people here- I am sure.. do this type of thing as a profession and take it very seriously.

For me, it's been a learning experience in many ways.

It’s really great to see IC is still going, but it seems it has hit that wall I feared it would. You eventually run out of ingredients, and it gets difficult or stagnant.

How about creating a new list for the number generator, and it will be a broader list that does not fade. A list like:

Beef
Chicken
Pork
Lamb
Other Fowl (besides chicken)
Wild Game
Seafood
Root Vegetable
Leaf Vegetable
Pasta
Dessert
Drink

Basically, a list of all the major basics without so much stipulation on what you use. Broad categories that allow everyone to pick and choose how they cook. Vegetables coming up would allow everything from Grilled Corn On The Cob to Fried Okra. Wild Game would be Rabbit to Bear, and Other Fowl would be Cornish Hen to Quail and beyond.

The master list would never fade (delete items from it) but instead, we would just randomly pick from the master again and again. The only stipulation being that, if the number generator picks the same ingredient as last week, then roll again to get a different item. Also, items should be unique for at least 2 weeks, so if pork comes up, then we shouldn’t do pork again until we have done at least two other items: Pork, Chicken, Pasta, Pork - that would be acceptable.

All we need do is agree on what is on the master list. All entries on that master list should be distinct yet broad at the same time to allow for freedom of movement will holding to the theme.

Hi there Keltin, and so nice to see you!

We've been running this around for most of the week already. After the anniversary of IC we're going to change the name of the challenge and move forward with a whole new list. Indeed, it is much broader than the original list. Pretty sure it's all posted in the NCT Cook's Challenge Volume 2010 thread. Come take a look..