Tin Pan Chef

What a blast!

Yesterday I had the honour to represent the Lookout Society at the Tin Pan Chef cooking competition. This is an awesome event that raises awareness about food security issues in the Downtown East Side.

The Tin Pan Chef is part of the the 9th annual Heart of the City Festival that aims to celebrate and showcase talented DTESers as well as serve as a forum for the issues many people have to deal with here on a regular basis.

Food security issues are huge in the DTES where many residents don't have proper cooking facilities, have very limited income, and rely on charity for meals as a result. Many also face challenges like HIV/AIDS, Hep C, diabetes, cancer, food allergens, mental health issues and heart problems. These health issues are in large part caused and made worse by poverty and could be avoided or at the very least managed through regular access to healthy, tasty food.

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My team mate Jordan and I competed against Anna and Andrea from the Carnegie Centre and Kevin and Marliene from VANDU (Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users). Our food was rated by three judges from the DTES Community who awarded points based on taste, presentation, and creativity.

We were given 1 hour to cook as many courses possible with items from sealed boxes donated by the Food Bank.

Here is the catch--we did not know what we were getting until the timer was set for the hour! And we only had a two hotplates and very little running water to make the magic happen, much like those many folks living in the single room occupancy hotels down here.

Tin Pan Chef aptly demonstrates the challenge of meeting nutritional needs through charity since all the food used was donated by the Food Bank, save for three dollars worth of secret ingredients. This mirrors the food situation at many local non-profits including the kitchen I work at since we purchase less than 15% of the food we serve--not a whole lot.

The secret ingredients we asked for  were cilantro, limes, chilies and ginger which are staples in my own pantry as they pack a lot of flavour and health punch! But something tells me these ingredients would be considered real luxuries down here where the majority of residents only have 26 dollars a week to feed themselves with, and this is if they are able to find housing under $375 a month--highly unlikely in Vancouver.

After ripping the boxes open with gusto and excitement we discovered an array of often donated items like canned beans, tuna, corn and tomatoes, as well as cream of mushroom soup, taco seasoning and of course Kraft dinner. We also had access to a pantry that provided staples like oil, potatoes, eggs, carrots, onions, garlic, packets of soy  and hot sauce, jam and peanut butter, as well as a loaf of bread.

The three teams turned out some pretty interesting dishes.

Team Carnegie placed third and created three dishes:

1. Mexican black bean salad with rice, corn and cilantro
2. Salmon and potato pancakes with a mushroom gravy
3. French toast with icing sugar and raspberry jam

Team Lookout (mine!) place second (by only .3) and made three dishes that were similar to the Carnegie:

1. Rice, bean, corn, tomato, cilantro salad with a lime chile corn chowder vinaigrette 
2. Food Bank pad thai
3. Egg battered peanut butter and jam sandwich

Team VANDU made two dishes and blew us all away with their creativity:

1. Tuna Sunrise: a groovy looking loaf made with Kraft dinner noodles, mushroom soup gravy, tuna, and hard boiled eggs
2. A carrot soup, which rocked considering they only had an hour to develop flavors!

I could not believe my eyes when I saw VANDU wrapping their loaf in a bunch of tinfoil to create a makeshift oven with the hotplates. Amazing. 

The atmosphere was  terrific with a super supportive audience, fabulous MCs, kind yet non-sugarcoating judges and friendliness between the teams.  Team Carnegie were even nice enough to give us some of their basil which we used to garnish our plate earning us a few points for presentation, I am sure!

Check out some more awesome video and photos of the event by AHA media

The Tin Pan Chef would not be possible without the boxes provided by the Greater Vancouver Food Bank, the hardworking crew at the Carnegie, the DTES Neighbourhood House and Diane Brown of the awesome Carnegie kitchen. Diane is kind of my hero and the author of the One Pot Cookbook, a terrific resource for people living in single room occupancy hotels who must feed themselves with Food Bank staples and hot plates every single day.

Check out Diane's website:

http://onepot.ca/wordpress/