Chopped is one of my all-time favourite cooking shows. For those unfamiliar, it is the cooking competition that pits industry chefs against one another, in attempts to make gourmet dishes out of random ingredients; of which there is always a curveball. When I watch, I like imagining what I would prepare if in their shoes, then to see what they actually come up with. Therefore, when I was asked to be one of the judges for the Rio Mare cooking competition, I jumped at the opportunity to play judge for the day.
Rio Mare is a brand of Italian canned tunafish served in olive oil. I wasn’t aware that tuna was a commodity in Italy, let alone there was enough of it to be an industry. Rio Mare has an entire collection that included flavoured tuna and ready to eat tuna snack options.
Truthfully, the whole competition is a curve ball as tuna is not a protein that you immediately think of when you think Italian. Nor is tuna in a can an ingredient that you feature or reach for when preparing a two course meal.
The competition was held at a Vancouver Community College’s Culinary Institute. It was open for all their student chefs to apply. To be done outside of their regular curriculum, where a few of the instructors were available for council and did give the competitors some in class time to practice. However, this was very much so considered an extracurricular activity, especially as there was a prize attached.
Six teams of two would be competing for a scholarship to ALMA culinary school. This is one of Italy‘s most prestigious culinary schools, and the program would be an intensive two weeks. However, from what I understand getting there and accommodations would be solely the responsibility of the winning students.
Each team prepared one cold appetizer and one hot main course, drawing inspiration from their background and global flavours, featuring Rio Mare tuna as the star ingredient.
I would be one of two tasting judges, scoring them alongside two kitchen judges from VCC. My responsibility as judge was try each dish and score it based on appearance, taste, creativity, and how cohesive the two courses were to one another. Additional factors to consider were appropriate garnish with ideal amount and quality, appropriate portion size, ideal balance of shapes and colours, balance in flavour, if the accompaniments complimented and enhanced the main item, if the dishes were served at the right temperature, and if all components were cooked perfectly.
All the dishes were brought out to us in a private room, with duplicates put on display for photo taking. Each full dish for two judges to share, a 12 course meal for two.
I scored based on what I knew, judging each dish as if I ordered it at a restaurant. I did not read their description, but merely took each for what it was in front of me.
The following are notes of each participant, as per their assigned numerical designation. Cold appetizer to start, followed by their hot entrée. Sadly, two teams lost points on the latter due to not submitting their dishes in on time.
The following are the notes I took and delivered directly to the student competitors. The judging actually ended with us answering questions and giving our feedback face-to-face. The competitors wanted specific critiques to learn, and asked how they could improve. In retrospect, I felt a little bad given how direct I was, being as forward as I am in person as I am in my writing. I even joked at the end that I am a tiger mom and asked if I broke anyone’s hearts. I think they took it all in stride as this was the first competition for most.
Dish no.1 from team no.1 was definitely the most striking. You can tell they put a lot of time into the presentation. A multi-petaled flower of tunafish and seaweed, surrounded by stunning colours of fresh fruit and vegetable. However, the dish felt untreated. I have never had Rio Mare tuna, but do know that it comes in flavours, but didn’t get any of them in this. It appeared that they merely mashed it further, then moulded it into the shape before us. The dish tasted exactly as it looked: tunafish and seaweed. Given the size of the piece you would expect to slice into it, however the seaweed was tough, and you are better off picking it up and pulling off chunk with teeth. Fibrous strands of dry and bland tunafish, this was tastier for the eyes than it was for the mouth. Similarly, the garnish was unseasoned and uncooked. This is basically a salad without any dressing. A sauce would have helped to bring some cohesiveness to each individual element. Maybe a cream based mayonnaise, one to have this mimic an ambrosia salad.
The second dish showed just as much visual finesse. However, it did have a shelf life and the pasta sauce was quick to congeal. Thankfully everything still held its own striking colour. Forest green olive oil contrasting mustard yellow squash purée, surrounding blocks of black squid ink ravioli. I appreciated the fulness of the plate and its generous portion, this is the sort of dish I would order at a restaurant. However, I found the elements disjointed. Tuna is such a distinct flavour and one that you don’t often stuff into a pasta, so it would have been nice to have another accompanying filling to help cut into it. The richness of the fish was doubled with the heavy flavours of squash. Each item bold, and all of it battling it out on the plate. Here, I asked them to reflect on the typical fish accompaniments. Advising that they want to go lighter to balance out the fish, and that I would suggest trying to make parings based on what would hold a candle to white wine. The fish is cold, the squash is hot. The fish would go with a dry Pinot Grigio, whereas the squash an acidic Syrah red. A simple dill cream sauce and the lighter flavours of turnip, sun choke, or celeriac would’ve been more complimentary for a canned tuna stuffed ravioli.
Group two would be our grand winner garnering the most votes between us two tasting judges, and the two kitchen judges scoring them on their technique and ability. Not only did we find the flavours cohesive between both individual dishes, hot and cold; but they transformed the tuna, being mindful of its textural challenges and reinventing it.
Each chef is asked to bring their personality and heritage onto the plate and not simply create Italian dishes from Italian tuna. Our two aspiring chefs spoke to their Asian backgrounds with Thai and Chinese influences. The first was a tuna cup, where you can see, taste, and feel the tuna. Much of the fishy flavour was washed with the full brightness of Thai chillies and citrus. A sweet, sour, and tangy mix that was harmonious and further along by the crisp of chopped fresh vegetable and a crunchy fried chip base. This was a colourful and fun appetizer in two bites.
The dish that truly sold it for us was their main, they did the best job of transforming tuna. They completely took away canned fibrous texture by making it into a paste along with potato, and using that as a filling to a deep fried dumpling. It reminded me of the taro filled ones at dim sum, and I thought it was incredibly creative. That was until one of the kitchen judges revealed that it was a take a dish the contestant saw on a Korean cooking competition. I was a little disappointed, but at the same time understood that a lot of food preparation is influenced by others, and you teach and repurpose as needed.
The texture of this was whipped wonderful, while still giving you the flavour of tuna. I liked the tangy sauce that came with it more as a highlight, and not necessarily as something I needed. What was unnecessary, although stunning, was the pickled vegetable and fruit garnish. They did not lend their flavour to the dumpling, but instead distracted from the main with its sharp pickling. We left them, otherwise they could have been used as a palate cleanser in between courses, much like pickled radish in Korean ones. The chef was really proud of her use of gold flake to dress the plate, but I told her that it did not match the tone or the pretence of the dish.
Group number three had a similar idea to the group before, having the tuna in a cup and utilizing crispy textures to balance out the flaky fish. A great idea, but the execution was off. The cream wasn’t fully incorporated into the tuna, and with an additional dollop as a topping, the bite felt top heavy. You got overwhelming cream on the first bite, hitting your teeth and palate, then dry and ashy tuna on the last. However, the flavour was well developed and this is one that I would like to revisit.
Their hot appetizer was a bit of a mish-match. It was a good example of more is not necessarily more. Described as a kimchi lettuce wrap, I did not get the needed acidity of the pickled cabbage for that description to stick. It didn’t even have the telltale neon orange hue. Instead, it was green bok choy, fibrous and hard to chew through stewed cabbage. Given the filling of fish and raw veg this would have been an ideal kimbap. Although having it with the broth, crispy fried noodle, and gnocchi would not have made it any more fluid. There were too many individual parts trying to make this a whole.
The gnocchi in specific was the outlier. I liked it the most, it was perfectly done, whereas my fellow judge found it pan cooked burnt. They didn’t need anything else and could stand alone. So it would have been interesting if they somehow were able to grind the canned tuna and incorporate it into the gnocchi dough, and then have it resting in the warming clear broth that they had here. Or remove the gnocchi and make tuna nugget bits to have with the crispy noodle. Although having it sit in a pool of broth seemed counter intuitive. Sadly this dish as a whole lacked cohesion for me.
Group number four gave us tuna fish sushi roll for a cold appetizer. This is basically a California roll, but instead of sweet crab it was tuna fish untreated. A little ironic considering Japan is known for their fresh fish, so seeing as this had to be canned fish, they might as well have leaned in and made this a funky fusion roll. I would have turned the tuna into a croquet style patty to tempura it and have it as a filling along side unexpected acid agent like mango and/or oshinko pickle. Or maybe batter and deep fry the whole thing, serving it with a tangy dip. As is, you can’t help but compare this to a California roll and it fell short with soy and wasabi.
For hot entrée the team prepared a kimchi rice served in a tomato wedge. This was a clever way to have a rice dish hands free. Although they didn’t do anything to the tomato, it was left raw and as a result, its texture overwhelmingly mushy. It could have used a nice blistering if not an even char and/or light roasting. They also could have used the more popular sweet pepper as their base instead, offering its naturally crisp and firm texture. As for the rice filling, it was under seasoned, it did not taste or read kimchi. There was no heat, no spice, and no vibrancy. If you are going to serve a raw fruit on the plate, your main needs to be boldly seasoned to overcompensate for that. The goal is to have the raw element as a breath of fresh air. Having a sticky rice, fried rice, or risotto would have helped to breathe some life into this. I would like to see this redone and on an Asian fusion comfort menu. And lastly, it could have also used a crunchy element. A topping of deep fried shallots or a cheese crisp.
Competitors no.5 gave us a beautiful and delicate cucumber tart to start. Cucumber curls expertly sliced and twirled for an eye-catching presentation. This is definitely something I would pick up from a rotating tray of canapés. However, they forgot that this was a tunafish competition. There was no mention of the tuna in taste or texture. The fact that cucumber was the dominating flavour and masking the fish meant that there is not a lot of it to begin with. Similarly the fish roe stole the show, if you are trying to highlight tuna fish, the roe only takes away its attention.
We were impressed with their tuna cake main. Outside of the winners, they were the only other team to transform the texture of canned tuna. This was essentially a crab-cake, but make with tuna. They did well to transform its texture within the shell of crispy breading. My notes for them here were to have less garnish distracting from the main event. It felt like a cake topper, peacocking and not adding much to its flavour. I could have also used more sauce given the portion size. You definitely need some to add moisture and give this cake some personality. The two smears did not offer much and just made things a dryer. A nice cream sauce on the side to drizzle over or served pooled over the top would have been a nice to remedy this. And similar to a crabcake I was looking for something fresh and tangy to cut into the one toned block. Maybe a fresh and fragrant chive and dill number or a cheese sauce with aged cheddar, Swiss, and gruyère.
Group six went wild card. What they ended up serving was not what they intended. They had difficulties in the kitchen and had to make a big edits for both dishes. Something we were not informed of until the very end of the competition. Just as well, as once again, I do not read the description, trying to match that expectation to the dish.
Therefore, I was surprised by how much I liked their take on what a devilled egg. A boiled egg sliced in half and stuffed with sliced strawberry and a mixture of tuna, mayonnaise, and raw red onion. Altogether the flavours worked: the peppery freshness of the onion, the tartness of strawberry, and the sweetness of the mayo coating the mashed tuna. There was also enough differentiation of textures that I was willing to go back for a second bite to wrap my head around it all. For the record, this was supposed to be a tuna egg roll, deep-fried.
Their second dish was supposed to be a ravioli, but it came out as a lump of mixed tuna in broth with a crispy chip garnish. Here I didn’t mind the taste. I thought the broth had a wonderful sour and spicy tang to it, a familiar fusion of Indian spices and southeast Asian citrus. Although this is not what they intended. My suggestion was to turn the tuna paste into a matzah ball to have with the soup.
As is, taking a scoop of the tuna mash, resulted in a lot of it disintegrating, creating a fairly unappealing murky broth. Although photogenic, the extra large, one sheet of cracker was hard to eat, you couldn’t simply pinch off a section to scoop the tuna with. Not that it was strong enough to support the heavier mash of tuna anyways. This was out of place and should have been part of a lighter dish.
This afternoon, also coincided with an awards ceremony presented by the Italian Chamber of Commerce in Canada-West. They were celebrating local Italian restauranteurs and Italian businesses. There were awards and speeches as well as door prizes. Guests were welcomed with an open bar and the ability to graze from Italian influenced small bites, prepared by the VCC culinary team of chef/instructors. From what I heard it was a wonderful ceremony and a great reception. However, I was busy doing my judging duties and giving the groups firing line style feedback; so missed out on the majority of this.
We did join the assembly to present the competition winner with certificates.
We missed out on food and drinks, but this was just as well, as I was stuffed from my responsibilities anyways. I more grateful to have been able to judge, and I had so much fun doing so. It was such a pleasure to be able to showcase my experience and learned expertise from all the eating and blogging that I have done over the last 12 years. Getting a taste of live judging and critiquing has only made me want to do more, and I might get to too, as a few of the chefs and organizers said they would love to have me back to the future.
Vancouver Community College, Downtown Campus
250 W Pender Street, Vancouver, BC
