In May, an over-prepared team of Downer food servers will head to Los Angeles to challenge The Food Channel’s Iron Chef. They feel like they’ve been in training for years.”Every day in the life of a Downer food server is an ultimate challenge,” said Donna Krippner, head of Lawrence Food Services. “I can’t imagine that anything could be as difficult as what we do here, day in and day out. We can turn anything into a meal.”
The Downer Seven go into the competition with high confidence. Most of that confidence is based on their belief that whatever ingredients the judges throw at them, they have the creativity to deal with the situation.
According to the show’s rules, the judges give the Iron Chef’s team and the challengers a set of surprise ingredients and require each team to make a four-course meal that uses every ingredient.
“The most difficult part is not what to make for the main courses, it’s what to do with the leftovers,” said Judy, one of the chosen challengers. “That’s our ticket, y’know, leftovers. That’s right, we sure know what to do with those.”
Although they would not divulge many of their strategies, one of the Downer Seven hinted that if they find themselves in a corner, they have several emergency recipes, including “Winter Blend.”
There is a possibility that the show might surprise the teams by requiring them to turn their resources into a four-course vegetarian meal. If this happens, the odds of the Downer Seven winning are expected to double.