Ready to go to the WFC!

I have some obsessive compulsive behavioral traits, and because of that my moto in most things is to over-prepare, and then go with the flow. I planned, typed out, and printed my itinerary  in triplicate. Same with my recipes, ingredients lists, and equipment lists for Friday and also (just in case) Saturday. I had my contacts list for the butcher, the wine representative, and also maps printed out for the grocery stores. I had 2 checked bags, 1 carry-on and a large purse and I was about to fly alone, then travel on a bus and check into a hotel and then sleep there, by myself. While I have flown by myself before, I had never stayed alone in a hotel before. I was Nervous! I was Excited! I was Nervocited!!

Beautiful flight.

Quiet too.

And now the adventure begins! 

WFC my 3rd Build

Well I had my 2 first day burgers set in stone and I practiced and tweaked them several times a week on the phone with my friend Julie, who would be joining me in Vegas to help me cook, hold my hand, and talk me off the ledge as needed.

 We planned out our cooking and began to develop a time table for the allotted time frame. We were comfortable with our plan, and began to think the possibility of making the top ten cut. What if? What if out of 50 chefs, professional competitors and restauranteurs and a few home cooks.. What IF we make the cut and cook again on the second day? What if? Well. I'm a lucky girl and stranger things have happened so just in case I need to develop a recipe for the day 2 requirements. The challenge for the finals  was to make a steakhouse burger with the infused ingredient of A-1 Sauce. I came up with an idea to make a fancy mushroom Swiss with Marsala wine reduction topped with onion straws. 

So yes, this is fabulous!

Mushroom Swiss Marsala Burger with A-1 Sauce

 

Marsala Reduction, solids set aside (recipe included)

Sautéed Mushroom Mix 

4 lbs 80/20 ground chuck

½ to ¾ cup A-1 Sauce

½ cup ground shitake mushroom powder, divided

2 tsp garlic powder

Salt

16 slices of thin-sliced baby Swiss cheese

 Onion Straws 

 4 King’s Hawaiian sandwich rolls, toasted

 

Mix meat with reserved solids from Marsala reduction, A-1 Sauce, and enough ground shitake mushrooms to form patties. Season each side of patties with garlic powder and salt, then remaining dried shitake mushroom powder, pressing into each patty.

Refrigerate for 15 min. Brush each patty with Marsala Reduction then grill until cooked, basting every few minutes. Turn off grill, Top with cheese, Set aside.

 

 

To assemble, brush Bun top and bottom with Marsala Reduction, top with beef patty, cheese, mushroom mixture, marsala reduction, onion straws, drizzle with marsala reduction and top with bun top.

 

 Marsala Reduction

 

1 T Olive Oil

4 minced shallots

6 cloves garlic, smashed

1 cup finely diced white mushrooms

¼ cup ground dried shitake mushrooms

¼ cup parsley

1 T Tomato Paste

3 T A-1 Sauce

2 to 3 Cups Marsala Wine, divided

½ to 1 Cup Beef Stock

2 T butter

 

 

Sautee shallots and garlic and mushrooms in olive oil until mushrooms release moisture, and begin to brown. Add dried mushrooms and continue to cook for 1 minute.

 

Add tomato paste and A-1 Sauce, cook until stuck to pan.

 

Deglaze with ½ cup wine, bring to boil andscrape pan while slowly adding rest of wine,beef stock and butter. Simmer until reduced. Strain and set aside solids for beef patties.

 

The World Food Championships - Practice Practice Practice!

I found a sponsor company who prefers to remain anonymous. ok. I cant really figure out why they want to be anonymous, but they do, so we'll leave it at that. They agreed to pay for my hotel and airfare, and after a lot of emails back and forth we had a contract signed and my airfare and hotel booked. I would be staying at The Golden Nugget, arriving on the night of the 5th and leaving on the 11th. 
I needed to Practice my signature dish, which is that grilled pico burger, and also create what the WFC calls a structured build. This is a burger that the WFC wants you to create according to guidelines. Each catagory had a different set of guidelines. For burgers we had to create a patty melt using a sponsor product, and TNT beef patty. This is my first attempt at a patty melt:

So. Yeah . It came out, ok burned the bread a little but I just didn't like it. I don't like fried rye bread. I don't like yucky frozen beef patties on my grilled cheese, and while I do like caramelized onions, I dont like them on my burger. I needed a new plan! 

So into the picture steps my darling friend, Linda. A JAP friend, a FB Foodie friend and an inspiration! She was also going to the WFC, qualified in two different catagories even! She talked me off the ledge! She helped me develop a plan for a new burger, if you dont like what you're making, make something NEW! I was inspired by her Cinco De Mayo Burger, shown on JAP:

http://www.justapinch.com/recipes/main-course/beef/cinco-de-mayo-burger.html?p=1

I really loved the idea of this burger! It embraces my new life in Texas, while also filling the bill of the structured build. It was a patty, and a melt, but it was NOT a traditional patty melt! She used a corn tortilla and quacamole on her creation, but I wanted to use flour tortillas, since I make them often, and add an extra kick with my peach salsa. This was what I came up with; Quesadilla Patty Melt:

So during the month of October I made this dish about 3 times a week, tortillas, salsa, guacamole, and grilled frozen beef patties (ew). My family is so sick of burgers right now.... 

The World Food Championships - Getting There

Once the excitement had died down a bit, and I decided I was going to make this happen, I spoke to my husband about how we could fit the costs into our budget, and he was so supportive! He offered to tighten the belt as tight as it would go, and gave me some ideas on how we could adjust our spending to make a few pennies squeeze out. My kids too offered to chip in. My foodie friends suggested I post on FB to my friends and family for some help in the form of donations. I wrote a post and got a lot of encouragement. Also, I started reading the WFC website for info on what to expect. I like to keep myself informed and I could use any help I could get! On the WFC site I fould the blogs page, most particularly Beth's Blog. Beth is an accomplished food competitor and blogger for the WFC,  She wrote an article on getting sponsorship.
http://worldfoodchampionships.com/blog/beth/2013/09/world-food-championships-tips-securing-a-sponsorship
I read the article, printed the article and made it a bible for what I was going to do. I learned that if you want help you have to ask for it, and ask for it I did. I composed this letter:

Dear so and so company,
Hello, my  name is Helene, I'm a home cook, wife, mother of 3, and I recently won a burger recipe contest using your product; such and such, I'm writing to ask you if you'd be interested in sponsoring me for my trip to Las Vegas Nevada, where I will be competing in The World Food Championships for the title of World Burger Champion. 
This event is the worlds largest food competition, and is an invitational event. There will be thousands of foodies, chefs, restaurateurs and fans to witness 400 competitors over 4 days with 7 events. 
I was encouraged to contact you after hearing many other competitors have sponsors helping them fund their trips. I hope you will agree to help me with sponship, I would be honored to represent your product, and hope we can benefit one another at the upcoming competition.
Regards.

I left off the name of the company and the product for now, but will make every effort to share that down the line. 
I sent the letter to one company. Just one. Just a "feeler" to see what would happen. I sent it at night, and I went to bed. When I woke up there was a response email from the marketing director! Wow!!! She congratulated me and asked for more information. With my heart racing I gave her every contact name and number that I had, and omg, ran to tell my foodie friends right away! I was on my way to sponsorship, I needed to make lists, prepare, practice, fret and fidget, stress and obsess! omg! I was going to Vegas!!! 

My Face Book Foodie Friends

 I have some friends from JAP that are dear to me and we have bonded and crossed over from JAP to FB friends. we see pics of family and friends, talk on the phone, send goodie packages from time to time, and generally grow closer and a few have formed secret groups on FB where we talk about food, family, life, and bacon. A lot of bacon. Anyway, these groups are private and I don't want to reveal anybodies personal information so I'll give a few first names, but otherwise will in general call them my Foodie Friends. There is Lynn, and Dee, and Linda, and Jane, and Aurora, and Kim and Wendy, and Laurie and Dan and Didi and Sherri and and and. I see I've made a mistake to name names here, so lets go back to foodies. 

So, I'm blown away that I've won the burger contest on JAP, I mean BLOWN AWAY! there are 3 other burger winners too, and winners from Chili, Recipes, BBQ, Desserts, ect. In total there were 21 winners in the contest and the prize was entry into The World Food Championships. I was invited to compete in the Burgers category in Las Vegas Nevada from Nov 6th to the 10th, very exciting, but of course I'm not going but still really excited. 
You see, when I first posted my burger recipe on JAP nobody really noticed it. It went unnoticed. I was disappointed because I thought it was really good, so, when the recipe contest was announced I was excited to enter my recipe, just for someone to notice it, and they did! so that was really exciting to me. Here is my burger, its called a Grilled Pico Burger and I used left-over pico de gillo from veggies from my garden to make it.

ok so, here is the link to the recipe on JAP: 

http://www.justapinch.com/recipes/main-course/beef/grilled-pico-burgers.html?p=1

So, I was excited and I went on to my foodie friends group and told them and they were just as excited as I was, which is a really good indicator of why I love these people and keep them in my life, they're always so supportive and encouraging. I shared the recipe with them, shared the news with them, and they advised me to go. To make every effort, to make it happen, they would help, they would chip in, they would. It got me thinking, that I really wanted to give it a go. I mean, WOW! The World Food Championships! WOW! Las Vegas! WOW! Alot of money.... wow.

So I accepted the invitation, JAP paid my entry fee, and I had only to find a way to get there. 

Just A Pinch Recipe Club

I joined an on-line recipe club about 3 years ago. http://www.justapinch.com/ its a website where you can post recipes and pictures. I thought it would be a great place to store my family recipes for easy access, nothing more. Little did I realize that over time I'd connect with other cooks and make wonderful on-line friends that would turn into real world friends and have some really incredible experiences too! 
A little FYI about Just A Pinch, or JAP as we like to call it for short. Its the largest on-line database of recipes there is, run by some fabulous people called The Kitchen Crew. They review and award ribbons for outstanding recipes, run contests, have chat groups where folks post questions and information, there are even coupons, make-your-own recipe books and tons of other features. Here is a little pic of the mobile app for JAP:

I highly recommend Just a Pinch Recipe Club. Its changed my life but, dont be afraid, it doesnt have to change YOUR life. It can just enhance it. Anyway, I am a member there and I entered a contest for Burgers. It was this one....

I entered and I WON! woot woot! But geesh, I cant go to Vegas cause I just got back from my brothers wedding in New Jersey, which was awesome, by the way, and we couldnt afford for me to go on another trip already! wow! so, thats nice I won, but I'm not going. Or am I? 

Getting Ready for the World Food Championships!

I recently won a recipe contest at www.JustAPinch.com and it qualified me to compete in The World Food Championships for the title of World Burger Champion! What an absolutely INCREDIBLE experience! It inspired me to pick up where I last left-off, 2 yrs ago, with my long forgotten blog. I am eager to share with everyone the incredible experiences that I had leading up to, and including my trip to Las Vegas to compete in the #WFC2013 but I wont tell you the outcome just yet, because I dont want to spoil the trip for you. Ready? here we go!