Posted by Fort Worth Star Telegram, TX on April 09, 2008 at 15:03:55:
One in $1 million
Can they take the heat . . . in the Pillsbury Bake-Off kitchens?
By AMY CULBERTSONStar-Telegram staff writer
Could one of these North Texas women win big in the 43rd Pillsbury Bake-Off next week?
The world's most famous cooking contest comes to Dallas on Monday, with more than 100 finalists vying for the grand prize of $1 million and kitchen appliances. Contestants will have five hours to prepare their dishes in a mini-kitchen in a Fairmount hotel ballroom. Their recipes must use at least two products from a specific list of about two dozen; recipe categories include Breakfast & Brunches, Pizza Creations, Entertaining Appetizers, Mexican Favorites and Sweet Treats. A panel of nine judges will consider taste, appearance and creativity, as well as consumer appeal.
To see all 100 finalists' recipes and vote for your favorite, go to www.pillsbury.com and click on "Bake-Off Contest."
The winner will be announced 7:30 a.m. Tuesday; find out who won that day on www.star-telegram.com.
The finals are not open to the public, but here's a look at the four local finalists and their recipes.
Gwen Beauchamp, Lancaster
The cook
Like many of the Bake-Off finalists, Beauchamp, 54, is a cooking-contest veteran.
"I've been entering cooking contests about 10 or 15 years now," she says. The first one was a Woman's Day cookie contest. "I nearly fell over when I got a check for a thousand dollars. I'd won third place."
She was the brownie champion at the State Fair of Texas in 2001 and 2002, and she has made it to the finals in some high-profile national contests.
"I grilled on Wall Street in a grilling contest," she says. "I didn't win that one either, but honestly, I just love the trips they send me on."
For Beauchamp, an information specialist in the Cox School of Business at Southern Methodist University, baking is her preferred kitchen activity. She's known for her banana pudding tart with a crust of coconut, pecans and vanilla wafers.
"I've actually had grown men fight over it at the church auction."
The contest
Beauchamp isn't nervous about cooking under pressure at the Bake-Off.
"All of the cooking contests up to now have helped a lot," she says. "I'll be a bit cooler under pressure.
"I have such a simple recipe, I don't think I could blow these if I tried."
The dish
Beauchamp has never forgotten the advice Chicago dessert guru Gale Gand gave her at one of the national cook-offs she competed in: "'Take something that people already like and give it a twist.' That's kind of what I did with my brownies."
Her toffee-banana brownies were developed for her husband, for whom "chocolate rules the world."
"I had a bunch of leftover bananas and I thought, 'I'm going to put them in the brownies.'"
Toffee-banana brownies
Yields 2 dozen brownies
1 box (19.5 ounces) Pillsbury Traditional Fudge Brownie Mix
1/2 cup Crisco Pure Vegetable Oil
1/4 cup water
3 Eggland's Best eggs
1 1/2 cups toffee bits, divided
1 cup Fisher macadamia nuts, chopped
2 firm ripe medium bananas, cut into 1/4-inch pieces (2 cups)
1/3 cup Smucker's Caramel Ice Cream Topping
1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Generously spray a 13-by-9-inch pan with nonstick cooking spray.
2. In medium bowl, stir brownie mix, oil, water and eggs 50 strokes with spoon. Add 1 cup of the toffee bits, the nuts and bananas; stir just until well blended. Pour into pan. Sprinkle remaining 1/2 cup toffee bits over top.
3. Bake 38 to 48 minutes, or until center is set when lightly touched, top is slightly dry and edges just start to pull away from sides of pan. Cool completely, about 2 hours. For brownies, cut into 6 rows by 4 rows. To serve, drizzle each brownie with caramel topping. Cover and refrigerate any remaining brownies.
Nutritional analysis per brownie: 260 calories, 15 grams fat, 30 grams carbohydrates, 2 grams protein, 105 milligrams cholesterol, 75 milligrams sodium and 0 grams fiber.
Robin Hill, Arlington
The cook
Hill entered the 2008 Bake-Off on a whim.
After some success in the National Beef Cook-Off in the early '90s, she hadn't entered any contests in a while and had never entered the Pillsbury Bake-Off.
"It was a last-minute deal," she says. "I didn't even tell my husband I was entering. I figured if nothing happened, nobody would be the wiser."
Hill, 56, works as a senior engineering technician for Nexen Petroleum in Dallas. She favors the savory side of cooking. "I have absolutely no skills with baking," she says.
"I've cooked since I was about 8 years old," she says. "I had to earn a cooking badge in Girl Scouts, and that was it. I really enjoy it."
The contest
As for cooking under fire, "I'm not anticipating that to be a problem," Hill says.
"Hopefully I'll be able to stay cool, calm and keep my head together. The way I work in my own kitchen is I prep everything first, and that's probably the way I'll approach it."
The dish
Hill thinks her recipe for spinach and mushroom enchiladas with creamy red sauce "addresses the needs of a lot of people these days."
"It's easy to make. It's a good vegetarian alternative. It's a good way to get your kids to eat vegetables."
Spinach and mushroom enchiladas with creamy red sauce
Serves 5
1 can (10 ounces) Old El Paso mild enchilada sauce
1 cup crema Mexicana table cream or sour cream, divided
1 tablespoon Crisco Pure Olive Oil
1 medium onion, chopped ( 1/2 cup)
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
8-ounce package sliced fresh baby portobello mushrooms
9-ounce box Green Giant frozen spinach, thawed, squeezed to drain
1/3 cup chopped drained roasted red bell peppers (from 7.25-ounce jar)
2 tablespoons Old El Paso taco seasoning mix (from 1.25-ounce package)
1/4 cup lightly packed fresh cilantro sprigs, divided
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1 1/4 cups shredded pepper jack or salsa jack cheese (5 ounces)
2 cups shredded quesadilla or mozzarella cheese (8 ounces), divided
10 Old El Paso flour tortillas for soft tacos and fajitas (from a 10.5-ounce package)
1/2 cup crumbled Cotija cheese or fresh mozzarella cheese
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a 13-by-9-inch (3-quart) glass baking dish with nonstick cooking spray.
2. To make sauce, in a 1-quart saucepan, heat enchilada sauce and 1/2 cup of the crema Mexicana over medium heat 2 to 3 minutes, stirring occasionally, until warm. Spread 1/4 cup of the sauce mixture on bottom of baking dish. Set aside remaining sauce.
3. Meanwhile, make the vegetable filling: In 12-inch nonstick skillet, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add onion and garlic; cook 2 to 3 minutes, stirring occasionally, until onion is tender. Stir in mushrooms; cook 7 to 8 minutes, stirring occasionally, until mushrooms are tender.
4. Transfer vegetable mixture to food processor bowl with metal blade. Add spinach, roasted peppers, taco seasoning mix, 2 tablespoons of the cilantro, the cumin and the remaining 1/2 cup crema Mexicana. Cover; process with on-and-off pulses 6 to 8 times, or until mushrooms are coarsely chopped. Pour mixture into large bowl; stir in pepper jack cheese and 1 1/4 cups of the quesadilla cheese.
5. Spoon 1/3 cup of the vegetable filling down the center of each tortilla. Roll up tortillas; place seam-sides-down on sauce in baking dish. Pour remaining sauce evenly over tortillas; sprinkle with remaining 3/4 cup quesadilla cheese and the Cotija cheese. Spray a sheet of foil with nonstick cooking spray and cover baking dish tightly with foil, sprayed side down.
6. Bake 35 to 40 minutes or until thoroughly heated. Chop remaining 2 tablespoons cilantro; sprinkle over enchiladas before serving.
Nutritional analysis per serving: 660 calories, 43 grams fat, 41 grams carbohydrates, 29 grams protein, 110 milligrams cholesterol, 1,660 milligrams sodium and 3 grams fiber.
Stephanie Hollowell, Dallas
The cook
Hollowell, 45, takes a scientific approach to baking.
"When it comes to sweets, I know exactly what people like and don't like," she says.
"My favorite thing about baking is the R&D -- research and development," says Hollowell, an air traffic controller at Addison Airport. "I love the science behind baking.
"I'm one of those scratch bakers that it's not any big deal to take three days to make a cake."
Hollowell and her mother are longtime veterans of the State Fair of Texas' baking contests; the first one they entered was in 1984, when Hollowell was 21. But the Bake-Off is the only national contest that Hollowell has entered.
"You're competing at the best there at the Texas State Fair," she says. "You have to be better than just good."
The contest
Does the prospect of cooking with $1 million at stake scare her?
"Being what I do for a living? Naaah," she says. "I actually find baking relaxing, almost like Zen."
The dish
"Everybody loves peanut butter and chocolate, and this is a perfect balance of those two flavors," Hollowell says of her chocolate-peanut butter thumbprints.
For the contest, she says, she was trying to duplicate a recipe she made for a newspaper cookie contest. "Over a couple of weeks it evolved from whoopie pies to thumbprints."
Fudgy chocolate-peanut butter thumbprints
Yields 2 dozen cookies
Cookies:
20-ounce box Pillsbury Chocolate Frosted Brownie Mix
1/2 cup Jif Extra Crunchy Peanut Butter
2 Eggland's Best eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2/3 cup milk-chocolate chips
Filling:
Frosting packet from brownie mix
1/3 cup Jif Extra Crunchy Peanut Butter
1/4 cup Land O Lakes unsalted or salted butter, softened
2 tablespoons Fisher dry-roasted peanuts, finely chopped
Cookies:
1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly spray large cookie sheets with nonstick cooking spray, or line with parchment paper.
2. Reserve frosting packet from brownie mix. In large bowl, beat brownie mix, peanut butter, eggs and vanilla with electric mixer on low speed 20 seconds. Beat on high speed 30 to 40 seconds or until completely mixed. Stir in chocolate chips.
3. Drop 24 heaping tablespoons of dough 2 inches apart onto cookie sheets. Press thumb into center of each cookie to make indentation, but do not press all the way to the cookie sheet (if dough sticks to thumb, spray thumb with cooking spray). Bake 9 to 11 minutes. Cool 1 minute; remove from cookie sheets to cooling rack. Cool completely, about 20 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, in small bowl, beat contents of reserved frosting packet, peanut butter and butter with electric mixer on medium speed until smooth. Fill each thumbprint indentation with 2 teaspoons frosting mixture, spreading slightly; sprinkle with peanuts. Let stand until frosting mixture is set. Store loosely covered in single layer.
Nutritional analysis per cookie: 120 calories, 9 grams fat, 6 grams carbohydrates, 3 grams protein, 20 milligrams cholesterol, 60 milligrams sodium and 0 grams fiber.
Frances Pietsch, Flower Mound
The cook
In the five years since she has discovered cooking contests, Pietsch has found entering them "very addictive for me."
Pietsch, 43, a stay-at-home mom with three boys, says she has entered eight or 10 contests this year, but this is her first time to be a finalist.
She has practiced her mango-jalapeņo-chicken salad so much that "I'm a little tired of eating it," she says. "I've been passing it out to my neighbors, and I think they're getting tired of eating it."
Pietsch chose a savory dish rather than a sweet one.
"I'm not much of a baker," she says. "I think you have to be more of a perfectionist to be a baker, and I'm not."
The contest
"I'm very nervous because I've never done it. There's no running water, and the space you have is much smaller ... I think it's going to be nerve-wracking, but it's very exciting."
Her main concern is the quality of the avocados and mangos she is given, as finalists aren't allowed to bring in their own ingredients, and she knows it's difficult to judge the ripeness of an avocado or mango until you cut into them.
"I did ask for extras, in the event that I don't like one."
The dish
Pietsch considers her tropical salad a very contemporary dish.
"It's got a lot of Mexican, a little bit of Asian fusion, and it's very nutritious, very healthy and simple to make."
Mango-jalapeņo-chicken salad in cumin tortilla bowls
Serves 4
Vinaigrette:
1/2 cup cubed, peeled mango (1 large mango will yield enough for the vinaigrette and the salad)
2 tablespoons mango nectar (from 12.5-ounce can)
2 tablespoons white-wine vinegar
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon fresh orange juice
1 tablespoon honey
1/3 cup Crisco Pure Canola Oil
Salad:
4 Old El Paso flour tortillas for burritos (from 11.5-ounce package)
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 cups cubed cooked chicken breast
1 1/3 cups cubed peeled mango
1 tablespoon fresh lime juice
1 1/2 cups cubed peeled avocado (from 2 medium avocados)
1/2 cup finely chopped red bell pepper
1/2 cup finely chopped red onion
1/4 cup finely chopped seeded jalapeņo chiles, about 2 medium chiles
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1 cup shredded iceberg lettuce
1/2 teaspoon salt
Vinaigrette:
1. In food processor bowl with metal blade or blender, place all vinaigrette ingredients, except oil. Cover; process until smooth. With food processor running, slowly pour oil through feed tube until mixture is thickened. Set aside.
Salad:
1. Heat oven to 400 degrees. Spray insides of 4 ovenproof 2-cup soup bowls with nonstick cooking spray.
2. Spray 1 side of each tortilla with cooking spray. Sprinkle cumin and 1/2 teaspoon salt evenly over sprayed sides of tortillas. Press tortillas, seasoned sides up, into bowls. Place bowls in 15-by-10-by-1-inch pan and bake 5 to 7 minutes, or until edges are golden brown. Remove tortillas from bowls; place upside down on cooling rack. Cool completely. (Foil balls can be used instead of bowls to shape the tortilla cups: Cut 4 25-by-12-inch pieces of foil. Slightly crush each to make a 4-inch ball; flatten slightly. Place on ungreased cookie sheet. Spray and season tortillas as directed; gently shape to fit over each foil ball, seasoned side toward foil.)
3. In large bowl, mix chicken and mango. In small bowl, mix 1 tablespoon lime juice and avocado. Add avocado and remaining salad ingredients to chicken mixture; mix well. Add vinaigrette; mix well.
4. To serve, spoon chicken salad into tortilla bowls. (Bowls will be full.) Serve immediately.
Nutritional analysis per serving: 740 calories, 40 grams fat, 48 grams carbohydrates, 47 grams protein, 115 milligrams cholesterol, 1,000 milligrams sodium and 6 grams fiber.
10 fun facts about the Pillsbury Bake-Off
1 The Pillsbury Bake-Off, held every two years, is the country's best-known and most lucrative cooking contest, with a grand prize of $1 million and GE kitchen appliances worth about $10,000. Each of four other category winners gets $5,000 and a GE double-oven range.
2 Pillsbury won't reveal how many recipes are submitted, saying only that it's "tens of thousands," but widespread speculation puts the number closer to hundreds of thousands. The recipes are winnowed down through screenings and several levels of kitchen testing, plus a search to make sure they are original.
3 Pillsbury runs an online contest, America's Favorite Recipe Sweepstakes, in which the public can vote for their favorite recipe at www.bakeoff.com. The finalist with the highest-scoring recipe will win $5,000. One voter's name will be drawn, and if he or she votes for the recipe that wins the Pillsbury Bake-Off grand prize, the voter will win $1 million.
4 Each finalist is assigned a minikitchen containing a 30-inch-high free-standing electric range and a 36-by-24-inch cabinet with countertop and drawer. A Fairmont ballroom of almost 18,000 square feet accommodates the kitchens, along with 29 refrigerators, eight microwaves, a viewing area for guests, a recipe display table for all 100 dishes and a photo studio.
5 There are no sinks in the minikitchens, but a team washes all produce beforehand, and water is supplied in pitchers that are refilled as needed.
6 Finalists are not allowed to bring in any equipment or ingredients. Pillsbury supplies all cookware and utensils required for the recipes.
7 Pillsbury also supplies all the ingredients, giving each finalist enough ingredients to make his or her recipe three times. For ingredients that might not be widely available, such as ground ancho chile powder, or unsweetened shredded coconut, Pillsbury orders online to have plenty on hand at the contest. Perishable ingredients are bought at Dallas' Mockingbird Lane Kroger, which begins delivering orders to the Fairmont two days before the contest. In case a finalist is missing an ingredient or needs more of something, Pillsbury stations a buyer with a cellphone at the Kroger on contest day. Missing ingredients are quickly couriered to the contest floor.
8 Finalists have five hours to prepare their dishes.
9 Nine food professionals, sequestered as a jury would be, will taste the Bake-Off dishes in blind judging.
10 This year's Bake-Off will take place Monday at the Fairmont hotel in Dallas, with winners announced at 7:30 a.m. Tuesday. The finals are not open to the public.
-- Amy Culbertson
Source: Jann Atkins, Pillsbury Bake-Off contest-kitchens manager
aculbertson@star-telegram.com
Amy Culbertson is the Star-Telegram food editor, 817-390-7421