Yesterday’s “Iron Chef” Competition

Normally, my coworkers at Microsoft Canada’s Developer and Platform Evangelism team are scattered across the country – many of us are here in Accordion City, but we’re also in Vancouver, Calgary, Ottawa and Montreal. Twice a year, we get together to have a two- or three-day long “offsite meeting” where we get a lot of work done, but we also get a lot of play done.

Yesterday, once we’d gotten through all our planning meetings, brainstorming sessions and other assorted business, we made our way to Cirillo’s Cooking Academy where we were split into two teams to compete in an cooking competition. I was the leader of one of the teams while Rick Claus led the other. The dishes were:

• Three types of tapas: chorizo and onions, calamari with olives and tomatoes and a vegetable casserole
• Chicken breasts stuffed with red peppers and rice
• Molten chocolate cake

In the end, my team was the first to complete their assignments, but Rick’s team edged us out on flavour (they weren’t shy with the salt) and getting their cakes to rise a little higher. Perhaps I should’ve done my Gordon Ramsay impression and yelled a little more (NSFW, swearing).

My coworker Julie James took some photos; they’re in the slideshow below and well as in this Flickr photoset:

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

I also shot some photos — they’re of my team putting together their food. You can see them in the slideshow below or in this Flickr photoset:

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

I had a great time and great food with great coworkers, and yes, I broke out the accordion. Even Gladstone Grant – he’s the Developer and Platform Evangelism Lead – took the accordion out for a spin: