The cooking contest I entered and won 2nd place last November was also part of a documentary that aired on Christmas Day. It’s here in three parts. It’s in Korean, but you can get the idea of what’s going on.
Part 1
[dailymotion]http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xgwrfb_cj-cooking-contest-1-of-3_shortfilms[/dailymotion]
(Not working? View here.)
This is a quick introduction of the food expo at the COEX and the contests. The contest featured here was for spouses of Koreans–multicultural families. There were forty contestants. The theme was making a “global” dish using gochujang. A friend called me in late October asking me to participate in this contest and documentary. I was about to decline.
“The winner gets ten million won.”
That helped a bit. Besides, I’d been wanting to try my chops at a cooking contest. I’ve talked smack in the past. I was pretty swamped in November, and EJ was due to give birth on the day of the finals. But who gives birth on the due date? Really?
Part 2
[dailymotion]http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xgx5jj_cj-cooking-contest-2-of-3_shortfilms[/dailymotion]
(Not working? View here.)
This section featured the three male contestants. The video was taken a couple of weeks before the contest. It starts with me making some French bread pizzas. My Facebook friends know that I was hooked on them for a while. Then the video crew is at a Nanoomi party, which actually was taken the week before. You see Simon from Eat Your Kimchi, Charles from KTLit (the one with the nametag on his forehead), Cynthia (our fearless small-faced leader). You may even catch a glimpse of Robert Neff.
Part 3
[dailymotion]http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xh0foq_cj-cooking-contest-3-of-3_shortfilms[/dailymotion]
(Not working? View here.)
I was not expecting to make it to the finals. But it was nuts because after the finals, I gave EJ a call, and she told me she was going into labor.
This is why I’m glad we did this. The documentary crew showed up at the hospital a few days later as we were getting ready to leave after Jian’s birth. They filmed the very first time I held Jian in my arms.
Oh, and I also got second place and W1,000,000, a watch, some gift certificates and tons of CJ products, like cooking oil and gochujang. Yeah, more gochujang!