ESCANABA — Students at the Escanaba Student Success Center (ESSC) competed in the final round of their “Chopped Challenge” Thursday — a cooking competition involving five mystery ingredients, a panel of three hungry judges, and a time-limit of 30 minutes. Linda Beauchamp, student monitor at the ESSC, introduced the challenge to the students after creating a cooking class a couple years ago.

“I started the cooking class to teach kids basic cooking skills,” Beauchamp said. “We have a lot of students in our school that are in need of learning life skills and are food challenged. So just some basic cooking skills, recipes, and stuff like that.”

The Chopped Challenge was created as a fun, yet competitive, learning exercise that required hands-on engagement by the students. The challenge, modeled exactly like the TV show “Chopped” on the Food Network, pitted eight teams of two students head-to-head. The teams were given a variety of mystery ingredients by Beauchamp, and were then tasked to create a meal including each ingredient in some way.

“The students have to come up with recipes for these random ingredients. There are some items in our ‘pantry’ and some refrigerated items they can use,” Beauchamp said. “But everything is very limited. I like to throw a curveball in there too that they may not expect.”

The Chopped Challenge set out to teach students not only basic cooking skills, but how to shop for groceries on a budget as well. Beauchamp took the students on a field trip to Elmer’s County Market where they were taught the layout of the store and how to shop for quality ingredients at an affordable price.

Through their cooking lessons, students were taught how to transform fridge and pantry staples into quality meals. From turning a can of tomatoes into tomato soup, or how to hard boil eggs and make an egg salad sandwich, students were taught how to elevate “boring” items into delicious meals.

Beauchamp asked students to put their newly-acquired skills to the test in the Chopped Challenge. After watching an episode of the TV show, and advancing through the preliminary and semi-final rounds, Team Mystic Funk, Avianna Way and Rainah Beauvais, and Team Cheese Shredders, Jason Waltz and Odin Lee, faced-off in the finale.

“One of our judges a few weeks ago emailed us afterwards and was so impressed with what the students did,” Beauchamp said. “She told me they should be working in restaurants.”

After being presented with raw shrimp, zucchini, horseradish sauce, coconut flakes, and pork rinds, the student’s got to work on their dishes. The two teams had individual work stations with provided kitchen essentials, like spatulas, cutting boards, and a single-burner cooktop. Other kitchen utilities, like a toaster oven and blender, were available to the competitors as well.

“One of my favorite things is the ideas that people come up with using the ingredients they were given,” Lee said. “A lot of it you wouldn’t expect, but it all came out really well.”

After 30 minutes of developing, cooking, and plating a meal, the two teams presented their dishes to a panel of three judges. Team Mystic Funk presented pan-fried shrimp with a vegetable coulee and side salad. Team Cheese Shredders pan-friend their shrimp as well, which was battered with crushed pork rinds and coconut, along with a homemade sauce and side of pineapple. Both teams successfully included all five items into their dishes.

“I have really enjoyed just competing and having fun,” Waltz said. “Being able to get up there, cook, and get judged is great. If I do something wrong, the judges tell me so the next time I go to make that kind of meal I won’t do it again.”

The students’ meals were judged based on three separate categories, taste, presentation, and creativity. Using a one to five scale, with five being the best, Dr. Coby Fletcher, Escanaba Area Public Schools superintendent, Kristin Farkas, Escanaba athletic director, and Nancy LaFave, director of food service at Escanaba, judged the competition.

“[The competition] has been very fun. We have had to use so many different foods that I have never really used before to create something really yummy,” Way said.

After judges’ critiques and deliberation, it was decided that Team Mystic Funk had defeated Team Cheese Shredders. The judges said that Mystic Funk’s presentation and tasty coulee helped them edge out the competition.

“I really like to cook and it is so much fun,” Beauvais said. “Through the competition, I have learned that I am a good cook. That is something I am proud of.”

The finalists of the Chopped Challenge thanked Beauchamp for allowing them to learn how to cook in such a unique and fun way. However, the success of the program goes well beyond just acquiring the skills needed to be successful in the kitchen. After student’s presented on behalf of the ESSC at a recent school board meeting, they emphasized the importance of teamwork throughout the entire Chopped Challenge.

“What I had hoped for them to gain out of this whole thing was cooking skills and being able to think outside the box to come up with meals,” Beauchamp said. “Then the students presented on teamwork, working together, and now being able to use these skills in any setting. I was just like ‘Wow, that is not really what I was even thinking when I created this.'”

The success and level of student engagement in the Chopped Challenge has left most students eager for the event’s return next school year. After getting this first competition under her belt, Beauchamp is almost sure that the event will continue into the future school years.

“[The Chopped Challenge] is a really cool thing and the kids absolutely love it,” Moberg said. “We are so proud of our students and what they have done so far. They have come such a long way.”