What were Jasper’s top chefs doing with cherry Twizzlers, Oreos, Slurpees and Doritos on Feb. 24? An Iron Chef competition, of course. 

In a twist on the top chef competition held at Earl’s in the Rockies on Feb. 24, the final round between Evil Dave’s and Earl’s (nicknamed the Old Guys) saw the two teams trying to figure out what to do with $15 worth of snacks from Mac’s. 

After the initial two rounds to decide the final competitors, Rob Olson, owner of Earl’s, announced that the two losing teams would get their revenge on the winners – each team got $15 to spend at Mac’s to bring in the special ingredients. The result was a tray each containing items such as onion ring and ketchup-flavoured Doritos, cheezies, black and cherry licorice, hot dogs, Slurpees, Oreos, pepperoni and more. A coin toss was held in favour of the Old Guys, which allowed team leader Miguel Goncalves to pick which tray he would use. 

The results were surprisingly creative, despite the odd ingredients. Olson said the idea was inspired by one of the judges commenting that a good chef can make a good meal out of an orange crush-flavoured Slurpee. 

“I think that worked out really well,” Olson said of the strange ingredients. He was happy that the convenience store idea forced the chefs to really use their imagination. 

The winning team was the Old Guys in the end, led by Goncalves and including Paul Kowalsky as sous chef and Chris Sorenson making drinks to compliment each dish. 

A panel of three judges tried frog’s legs, swordfish, a hot dog and Spam tower and more. 

The event was a fundraiser for a charity of the winning team’s choosing. In the end, the silent auction raised over $3,000 for the Jasper Food Bank. 

Olson sees the event as a huge success, despite five teams having to drop out at the last minute as restaurants around Jasper filled up due to post secondary Reading Week falling a week earlier than anticipated. “It’s too bad it ended up being such a busy week,” he said.