All right, Hunter, tonight we have some excellent Triple D chefs that
we've recently met on the road
doing Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.
And I want to see how well you remember these joints.
So Chef Cuevas Taqueria that we visited.
-That is amazing. -Delicious.
-Boise, Idaho. -Chef Sarah Cai.
Lights out.
The Pan-Asian joint with the dumplings.
Oh, Memphis, Tennessee.
-Come on. -You're doing good.
Chef Jacob Towns. He made the scratch-made bologna.
-That's worth a pilgrimage. -Rover Beach, come on now.
-Ah. -How did I do?
Hunter, you get a Triple D plus.
Tonight, chefs may not know the geography of Flavortown Market,
-but they sure know how to cook. -Wow.
And we're going to introduce them to Triple G's devious games.
We're going to roll dice of pain.
-Yeah. -No.
-Let's go. -Big John, what do you think?
-You going to be tough? -Not at all.
All day long.
-[humming] -Whoo.
Lots of flavor in the house tonight.
This dish is just gorgeous.
-This makes me want to come to your restaurant. -Yes.
Tonight on Triple G.
All right, let's meet our chefs.
Now, first up, we got Jacob Towne, who worked at
everything from Michelin Star restaurants
to mom and pop joints before opening his own Central California eatery.
You have legitimized bologna and cheese.
What's up, Guy?
Big man, where's that bologna sandwich?
Good to see you again.
Next, we have Sarah Cai, who serves up
the scratch-made dumplings and noodles she learned from her grandmother
at her restaurant in Memphis.
Lights out dumplings, by the way.
I'd eat that all day.
If you want to win right now, you show me a dumpling.
-You show me one dumpling. -Yeah!
That was not a dumpling.
And finally, John Cuevas, who's chefed up birria and carnitas tacos,
brings south of the border flavors to Boise, Idaho.
-Plating birria. -This is really chefed.
-Outstanding. -Brother man, welcome aboard.
Here we go.
Do you think this is where you're going to end up
when Triple D rolled in?
You're going to be standing here at Guy's Grocery Games?
But I know your talent, I know your style,
I know your attitude, and it's something that I'm looking for.
So tonight we've got two tough rounds of games
that will call on all of your culinary skills.
Chef that makes the least successful dish in the first round,
unfortunately, is bye bye.
But the chef that makes the best dish in the second round
has a chance to shop Flavortown for $20,000.
I'm going to make this introduction to Triple G
really nice and easy for you.
Make him your best seller.
That menu favorite that people drive over the state lines for.
Whatever you want.
And imagine that you're cooking at your own joint.
Because the odds are the next round
will be even more nerve wracking.
-The odds are even more. The odds are even more. -[music slows down]
That's right, I remind myself.
We're gonna play one of our simplest games ever.
We're gonna play odd even.
It's gonna be as easy as flipping a coin. Garcon?
-Gar son. -[all laughing]
The question is, would you like to make your best dish
using items only from the odd aisles?
Plenty of produce, but no fresh meat or seafood or dairy?
Or would you make it from the even aisles?
A lot of fresh meat and seafood and dairy,
-but you get no produce. -No bread either.
And no bread.
So you get one or the other.
Here we go.
Odd or even?
It's gonna be even.
So that means you can only shop the even numbered aisles.
You can shop for meat, seafood, and dairy in aisle 10.
Produce in aisle one is off limits,
as well as fresh bread in aisle nine.
-Okay. -30 minutes to create your best seller using
only ingredients from the even aisles.
When I think about how I don't want to go through this,
losing three, you won't lose two.
But losing one, you go and you have to find yourself
in a whole different space...
-No? -...than if you went just four, five, six,
seven, eight, nine, ten.
She almost had it. She's starting to go.
Odd even. This is an oldie but a goodie.
Start getting this idea of what item you're going to make,
and all of a sudden you come around the corner and you're like...
Oh.
I can't go there.
Coconut curry ramen with the shrimp is one of
our best sellers, but I can't shop the odd aisles.
At Good Fortune Co, because of my travels
from all over Asia, we take those flavors
and we incorporate them into noodle dishes.
Gosh, this is good.
Not having that fresh produce or the freezer section,
it's definitely a tough challenge.
What you're going to really wow the judges
with would probably be the even.
Where is the international?
It's really gonna be a combination
between the meat, the dairy, the seafood, and the ethnic aisle
and the condiment aisle.
Now I need noodles. We'll use this one.
I'm looking for a curry paste.
At Good Fortune, we make the curry paste in-house,
so we're able to incorporate a lot of aromatics, a lot of spices.
I have curry.
And so I think about what I'm going to use to build
the flavor in the broth.
Where is tamarind?
Tamarind to add some acidity to the dish.
This is better. Okay.
Freshness would have to come out of some of your pickled veg.
Okay.
This is where I'm going to get jarred garlic.
Chicken and dumplings is definitely one of our most comforting,
best-selling dishes.
Let's do that.
I can make chicken and dumplings in my sleep,
but only shopping in the even aisles was pretty tough.
I can't go there, huh? That's nine. [exhales]
Typically at the restaurant when we make it,
we use a stock that's been fortified twice and boiled for 12 hours.
So I wanted to emulate that by boiling a whole chicken
from raw, but also can't use chicken stock from aisle five.
Those stocks are not boiling.
So I found some chicken powder bouillon on aisle four.
For my dumplings, I'm going to make buttermilk biscuits.
Buttermilk.
Luckily, there are pantry items.
I can make a dumpling on that station.
No fresh produce, that's a tough one.
[Jacob] I wish I had some fresh herbs to sprinkle over the top,
chopped parsley, chopped chives,
and it would be more relevant to what we serve at the restaurant.
Doesn't have very much.
Change this up here.
To go a different route.
At Madre, everyone comes in and orders the queso birria.
They need this everywhere. This is a new level of taco.
He was very impressed.
Queso birria is classically a stew of beef.
Anything goes well in between a corn or flour tortilla.
But no tortillas, no fresh produce.
Oh, boy.
[sighs]
As an alternative for tortilla,
you can do a tortilla made out of cheese.
So I grab Oaxaca cheese and Jack cheese
to enhance the consomme, canned enchilada,
the jalapenos, kimchi.
Cool.
We'll see if even was a winner winner.
Chicken dinner. I don't know how to make chicken.
All right, I got my ramen noodles.
So here to judge the new class of our Triple D stars
are three of my favorite OG Triple G judges.
Acclaimed cookbook author, founder of Weelicious,
mother of three, the OG herself, Catherine McCord.
Triple D icon and Triple G's winningest chef,
the only mayhem himself, Chef Aaron May.
And New York culinary icon and my wife's favorite chef.
I resent that, by the way.
[laughs]
Chef Marc Murphy.
These Triple D chefs are no joke.
But I don't think that we're getting to see all of
their best when I cut the aisles in half.
Yeah, that wasn't very nice.
[Guy] 25 minutes.
-A chicken. -I feel like Jacob has
three things on his station right now.
Is he expecting a delivery of food?
Chef, what's on the menu? Chicken and dumplings, you know?
-Yeah. -Let's go with what you know.
I love it. I love it.
Right now, I'm getting that broth going.
-What else we got in the broth? -We got chicken bouillon
to help kind of make it a little bit more chicken flavored.
-Got it. -I'm going to make those dumplings right now.
We've been making biscuits since the restaurant opened.
To me, the perfect biscuit is pantry items with buttermilk.
And then getting that butter in there just right
is where you get all that flavor.
Dumplings made. Get them in the oven.
While I'm making chicken and dumplings,
I'm thinking about my wife, Brooke.
Kind of one of the dishes that she made for me
and kind of showed me how to make.
I knew that it would be a winner in order
to take us all on a nice little vacation,
but very concerned about the lack of ingredients that I had.
Chef, what else do you have for the chicken and dumplings?
Sometimes we'll do, like, some seasonal veggies in it.
And you didn't want to go with any veggies?
This is just going to be chicken?
Well, I'm even.
-There's stuff in cans. -Right on.
Yeah, I'll go grab something. I'll be back.
I've been nervous about going too simple.
I'm really worried I'm not going to make that happen
-in the time allotted. -Let's see.
-You got peas. -Peas.
I wonder if I'll get better veggies in here.
-That's aisle five. -Jacob is back in the grocery store.
Time is clicking. Let's go.
There's probably some canned artichokes somewhere.
23 and a half minute, chefs.
Jacob is spending a lot of time running around.
A game like odd even, you're cut at the knees.
It's so hard.
You don't have the aisle that you can get the real stuff.
A lot of these things are in cans.
[Jacob] Kind of canned veggies. I wish I had some fresh produce,
but I had to go canned.
Aisle six is not just for baby food and diapers.
There's a clearance section there.
Some green beans, maybe.
Oh, here we go, baby corn.
Okay, let's go.
[Guy] 23 minutes, 23 to go.
Okay.
First thing we're going to do,
we are going to marinate the shrimp.
This one, going in with oil.
-What's on the menu, chef? -Chef, I am making a ramen noodle dish
with some awesome curry paste.
Ramen is actually one of our best sellers.
What do we have in this?
[Sarah] I didn't have anything for toppings,
so I'm going to do some eggs, some shrimp.
Now I need to start working on the broth.
I have my coconut milk.
Hon Dashi for a little bit of fish flavor.
Tamarind will help with acidity.
Hopefully that wasn't too much.
And I also put fish sauce because I like that funky stuff.
Great.
It was really fun when Guy came to film Diners, Drivers, and Dives.
We did a dish with Guy, but it was our Japanese-style shoyu.
That's amazing.
So today I'm showing a little bit of flavor
from Southeast Asia.
This is a very personal dish to me.
I am the child of two hardworking immigrants.
Part of the reason we chose to bring good fortune
to Memphis, Tennessee is also because my parents
live there now, and they are my support team.
[coughing]
It's spicy.
What are you making, Chef John?
Birria. I'm making birria.
[Sarah] Oh, hell yeah.
[Guy] Chef, what's on the menu?
We're going to do Korean beef, birria for the marinade,
some of the kimchi juice, some of this enchilada sauce,
jalapeno.
So this is going right into the birria?
[John] Oh, yeah.
What would you like to have from the odd aisles, if you could?
Tortillas.
We're going to make a keto tortilla
with just straight cheese.
Looks like you're doing pretty good without them.
[John] Yeah, we're trying.
Next, I'm going to work on my consomme.
Enchilada sauce.
Spice it up with some jalapeno juice.
Because I don't get to work with a stock, I had to fake one.
Kimchi juice.
I definitely need a little bit of orange juice.
I set that on a low heat and let it just simmer
until it's dipping sauce consistency.
Next, I'm going to cook the meat
on the grill to get the char.
Guy visiting Madre was probably the greatest gift
I've received in this industry.
Has not slowed down since we aired.
See what happens.
Chefs, you're at the halfway point.
15 minutes to go. Fifteen.
Right now, I'm getting that broth going.
-And you got biscuits working? -Biscuits are in the oven.
-Right. Let's get this open. -What's in this sausage?
Cumin, paprika, just kind of what's lying around.
Got it.
You want to do little meatballs,
right?
I got some baby corn and green beans.
Make it a little bit more version of
what we serve at the restaurant.
A little nervous at this point.
The veggies being in a can, it's not going to taste like anything.
I mean, it looks like we're over at Spoon Trade.
All right, let's get cooked.
My curry's working.
My chili looks like it's doing good.
How are we feeling on this dish?
I do wish I had some more fresh vegetables
to work with for topping.
[Guy] I think you did good with your sweet banana peppers.
If you could have one thing, what would you wish it was?
I would like Thai basil, cilantro, and bean sprouts.
-Wouldn't that be nice? -Please, chef.
Do you know that people in hell want ice water?
And if you have ice water, you should give it to them.
[laughs]
Touche.
I'm going to sear my shrimp.
To win Triple G would be incredible.
Noodles are going in the water.
I'm going to use that money to take my team on
an amazing trip to Asia.
If it wasn't for my team's hard work,
we wouldn't be here today.
Sarah has a lot of big flavors.
Hon Dashi, fish sauce, tamarind, curry paste.
There's a lot to balance there.
And I'm a little bit nervous for her.
It's got a lot of vinegar. Did you put vinegar in there?
I put no vinegar, Chef.
-That's all coming from the tamarind? -Yes, Chef.
Dang.
Should I put butter in it? Is that crazy?
We're going to put some.
Ooh.
I just started getting heartburn randomly.
We are making curry.
And I hope that they're going to cut through the acidity.
Breathing, breathing, breathing, breathing.
-How's that coming for you, buddy? -Good.
Seared off the meat.
What else we got working?
Seared off, I got my consomme right here.
Dice the meat up.
It's got a nice char on it. It's tender.
And put it in the pan.
Consomme, orange juice, lemon juice,
jalapeno.
We're going to go kimchi in there.
It's getting there.
Are you going to make your gigantic Frico tortilla
of cheese in the oven?
I'm going to have to do it on this plancha here.
If I win the $20,000, I want to give it to
my wife's business, which is Infant Survival Resources,
teaching young children how to save their lives
if they fall in water.
When my son experienced a fall in the river
and had been taught this and survived it,
and we read about young children not so lucky.
[indistinct chatter]
I'm playing for my family and trying to give back.
And that Frico's burning over there.
[John] Ah!
Oh.
And I don't have time to make more.
We're going for it.
Chefs, we've got four minutes to be plated. Four minutes.
Open my oven to check the biscuits.
Tastes pretty good.
I put my dumplings down in the base.
There we go.
-Check the broth. -Let's taste it.
Hmm.
I put my sausages down in the base.
How'd that broth turn out?
Pretty darn good.
Ridiculous.
I had this when it was at his restaurant pretty darn close in flavor.
I'm really bummed I'm not getting that.
Three minutes.
[John] Now that the meat is ready, I taste it.
It tastes good.
I'm going to stuff my taco tortillas,
and then I'll add my cheese.
My consomme, I taste it.
Score.
Dipping sauce.
Ooh, I am so here for it.
[Guy] Two minutes.
Take them out.
They are done.
Next, my broth.
I think I need to taste it again.
Oh, my God, my hand is shaking.
Flavors taste good.
The butter worked, thank goodness.
Woo!
Jeez Louise.
Sarah is going off the rails a little bit.
30 seconds.
All right, got to get noodles in the bowl.
The shrimp are seared absolutely perfectly.
[Guy] Get them on the plate. Get them on the plate.
-Go, Sarah, go. -10 seconds, chefs.
-Next, sliced banana peppers. -Go, Sarah.
Five, four, three, two, one.
That's it. Stop working, chefs.
Hoo-wee.
Yo, yo.
Lots of flavor in the house tonight.
I'm telling you, lots of flavor.
All right, judges, this is it.
This is game one of the Triple D New School.
Our chefs had to make their best seller,
shopping only the even aisles.
Up first, Chef Jacob.
Today I made chicken and dumplings,
and then a handmade buttermilk biscuit.
And we usually use some fresh veggies,
some baby corn, and some green beans.
I feel like you have made this time and time again.
This broth tastes like you've just been
-stewing chicken for days. -Thank you.
Well, this makes me want to come to your restaurant. Very, very tasty.
The vegetables, I wish you would maybe put
a little bit more in there.
Okay.
Overall, this is really, I believe this is a bestseller.
Amazing use of the market. I got nervous.
You were shopping a lot back and forth.
Maybe be careful of that in round two
if you make it that far.
But great dish.
Thank you.
You didn't make him one? Because this is good.
[laughs]
Up next, Chef John.
Our best seller is queso birria.
It's a variation of it today.
I used hanger steak and then marinated it with
kimchi juice, a little bit of enchilada sauce.
There's a few jalapenos and pickled juice in there as well.
I made the tortillas keto style
with Oaxaca and Jack cheese.
I believe you've made this dish before.
I understand why it's one of your best sellers.
The steak is cooked really nicely.
It's very tender. It's seasoned well.
The dipping sauce is money.
And I love the way you went in hard with this frico.
You were playing odd and even the best way you knew how.
And I think doing a keto style is great.
Cheese and meat and doubling on the cheese, 100%.
But it needs something fresh, something bright.
That's what makes odd even so tough,
is you're begging for something else.
-Thank you. -I have to agree.
I think the odd even here really, it hurt you.
You did a great job with what you had.
The sauce is great. Everything's good.
The actual frito, a little overcooked,
a little burnt on some of it.
But yeah, this would have really benefited from some herbs.
Thank you.
Not to be outdone, Chef Sarah.
This is a coconut curry ramen
and seared shrimp.
Since I was not able to use the produce aisle,
I leaned heavily on the international aisle.
But you make all your own curries.
You make everything. You're scratch house.
-Yes. -Wow.
I think you shopped better than I've seen anybody shop
odd even before.
I would never guess that you were limited in ingredients here.
I've got a little bit of produce in here.
I've got this really dynamic sauce.
It's sweet. It's spicy.
Thank you.
The acidity that you got some, like you'd want some lemon.
or some lime in here or something.
And I don't know where you're getting that acidity from,
but it's just perfect.
Really, really nice balance to it.
This is gorgeous.
It is bright and colorful, but I know it's traditional.
I wish the tails were off the shrimp.
It just makes it a little bit more challenging to eat,
but the sear is beautiful.
Also, I love heat.
I would say this is teetering on, like, hot,
and I really want that broth itself to just sing.
-Thank you. -[Guy] Great.
Thank you very much, judges.
I know I invited the right people.
Rookies or not, I'm going to send you back to the kitchens.
These folks are going to deliberate
and probably make fun of me that I didn't get to have any.
Thank you very much. Back to the kitchens.
Thank you.
-Who's safe? -Anybody?
This feels like such a clear cut.
Jacob is 100%.
The broth was amazing. The meatballs were amazing.
[Guy] Who's going home?
[Catherine] John gave us probably the most interesting dish of the day.
His dish that he really wanted to make,
he needed other ingredients that were not able to shop.
[Catherine] Sarah's was colorful and bright and textures
and flavors and all the things.
I wish the tails were off the shrimp.
[Guy] Who's it going to be?
Chefs, you should be proud.
Odd even's not an easy one.
Before I send somebody home, I am going to say
that, Jacob,
you have the best dish.
You have a key advantage in the next round.
-Congratulations. -Thank you.
Delicious dish.
Unfortunately, it's down to the two of you.
[dramatic music playing]
The chef that will be checking out in the first round will be...
It's Triple D. It's my show. You're not going home.
[all clapping]
All right.
No, I'm not going to do it. I know how good you are.
We're going to see what you can do in the next round,
but it's going to get more gnarly.
This is anybody's game. Chefs, back to your carts. Good luck.
-I know. I'm a softie. -[all laughing]
Chefs, whoever prepares the best dish in this round is
gonna get to shop Flavortown Market for 20,000 bucks.
Yes.
I want you to showcase your impressive bandwidth.
I want you to make an elevated comfort classic.
Make something familiar and comfortable,
but use your impressive culinary chops
to just kind of elevate it to the next level.
Good news is you can roll those carts through
the entire market, okay?
Roll.
That's right.
-Got to remember, there's a game. -No.
We're playing somebody's favorite, not mine.
Not probably going to be yours,
but we're going to play Let It Roll.
Hunter?
-Well, you talked about roll. -Roll.
-What else do you roll? -The barrel.
-No. -No.
-Come on. -Hunter, what do you have for them?
Oh, remember these?
-We're going to roll dice of pain. -Yeah.
That's right.
These dice are going to help determine your dish.
Whichever one of these items that lands face up,
you will have to use in the preparation of your dish.
-Okay. -We are going to be rolling kitchen equipment.
Yes.
So we have things like waffle maker, smoking gun,
standing mixer, spiralizer, French fry press,
and food mill.
Anyone want to roll it?
I'll roll it.
[Guy] Fantastic. There you go, John.
Right there in the middle about to see.
Whoa.
Standing mixer.
-[Hunter] Nice. -[Guy] Must be used.
Good. Good roll.
Thank you.
Next, adjectives that start with the letter G for Triple G.
Grilled, glazed,
golden brown,
garlicky, gingery,
or gooey.
-I like some of those words. -Fantastic.
Right there to the C.
-Gingery. -Yes.
Oh, you couldn't have picked that for yourself any better.
It's all part of the plan.
And last for the D of Triple D,
dates, daikon,
dark rum,
dill pickle, dragon fruit,
and dandelion greens.
Mandatory ingredient gotta be used. Big man.
-Dragon. -Dragon fruit.
So dragon fruit, stand mixer, gingery.
And gingery, Chef Jacob, because you have the best dish,
the key advantage, I could either let you roll
one of these again, or you don't have to use one of them.
I'll not use one.
You can tell me later what that's gonna be.
30 minutes to shop, prepare, and plate
your elevated comfort classic.
Remember, don't forget, these are three mandatories.
Get after these three. Two, one.
Hang on, hang on. Before I say go, I want you to think.
He said go.
She's on it.
Elevated comfort classic.
I had to make the dish gingery.
I had to use a stand mixer and then use dragon fruit.
Going into round two, I wanted to have a showstopper.
I'm making halibut almondine, classic French comfort dish.
Here we go.
With toasted brown butter almonds.
Luckily, I got to drop one of the challenges.
-Jacob, which dice are you not using? -Dragon fruit.
-Not using dragon fruit. -Wow.
-Oh, interesting. -I like that.
[Jacob] I've never cooked a dragon fruit before,
and I can't even tell you what it tastes like.
It's got to be gingery, so I'm putting ginger everywhere I can in this dish.
Sour cream, sour cream.
Creme fraiche, I put ginger in there.
That same creme fraiche I used in my whipped mashed potatoes.
Elevated comfort.
That's a big part of the experience.
It's not just consuming the food.
It's all the things you feel.
[Sarah] To me, dumplings are my number one comfort food.
With pork and cabbage, my grandma would teach me
how to make them.
We made them together as a family.
Where's the ginger?
I'm grabbing a ton of ginger, which is perfect.
I was going to use that anyways.
Dragon fruit is not a typical ingredient in dumplings.
I'm not thrilled about this.
It has a pretty soft texture, and it's going to add
a lot of sweetness.
I know I need to elevate this dish.
I really want to highlight mushrooms.
Chanterelles, as well as these blue mushrooms,
are absolutely gorgeous.
What else?
I need to use the stand mixer.
And I'm thinking to myself, this is perfect
because it's exactly what I need to use to make my dumpling filling.
If I were scallions, where would I be?
-Scallion? Right there, top left. -Yes.
You don't look very hard, do you?
Are you the kind of person at home that, "Oh, my gosh,
I can't find my socks." "Oh, the ones on your feet?"
"Oh, yeah, there they are."
You wait to see what John can do.
Big John, what do you think? Ginger, you gonna be tough?
-Not at all. -All day long.
I am known as a birria guy in Boise,
but we also do burger pop-ups.
We're doing a burger.
And our burgers have been voted
the best burger in Boise.
I'm gonna grind my own meat using hanger steak,
short rib, and New York strip with all the fat.
Bone marrow is known as God's butter,
so that makes it luxurious and elevated on its own.
I want to do a pickled slaw because I know that
I have a very fatty burger.
Gingery is the furthest thing from anything that I do,
but I think it'll work perfect in my slaw.
Pickled ginger.
-Pickled ginger. -Awesome.
-There you go, sunshine. -Thank you.
I have to use dragon fruit.
Right here, perfect.
Got some dragon fruit.
Chef, I thought I'd grab you some dragon fruit
-since you grabbed star fruit. -Oh, thank you.
You're welcome, bud.
I don't think John knows what he's doing with dragon fruit.
[John] Never had a dragon fruit.
It's very nerve-wracking.
This is fun. We've got three incredible Triple D chefs
making an elevated comfort classic
using the dragon fruit, the ginger, the standing mixer.
It's so exciting to watch these chefs go at it now.
I'm glad Guy kept all three of them.
-They want gingery. -Chef, making dumplings.
-Yes, Chef. -Ah.
Pork and cabbage and ginger dumpling.
I love dumplings. They are my number one comfort food.
We're gonna put ginger in here,
and I'm going to elevate it by using blue mushrooms and chanterelles.
Talk to me about dragon fruit.
Chef, I enjoy eating dragon fruit,
but I've never used it in a savory application.
The red ones tend to be sweeter.
Sweeter. Got it.
I am going to incorporate the dragon fruit
into my dumpling filling.
I'm also going to make a dragon fruit pickle
to garnish the plate, which I think ties into the elevated part.
[Guy] Red wine vinegar.
-Some sugar? -Yes, Chef.
-There better be extra. -With extra time, I can make extra dumps.
Oh, yeah.
I like how that little sales pitch happened.
Next is this, dumpling filling,
mushrooms, cabbage, and ginger, and cork.
Sesame oil, soy.
I start working on these dumplings
because the clock is ticking,
and this is probably the most challenging part to execute.
[exhales]
When I was a kid, we would sit around a table
and create this kind of like dumpling assembly line.
My Nai Nai, she only speaks Mandarin Chinese.
We were able to really connect with each other
through making dumplings.
[Guy] Look at you knocking these out.
How many do you make a day?
We make around 500 a day.
And so it means a lot playing to take my team
on an amazing trip to Asia and share some of
the inspiration that has fueled my passion for food
and for the industry.
Oh wait, I forgot to put this in there.
I realized that I forgot to add the dragon fruit
to the dumpling filling.
I've made a grave mistake.
I'm a little bit worried about
the dragon fruit component of the dish.
I need to bring an extra element of the dragon fruit
to show the judges that I know how to play the game.
The pickle.
Pickled dragon fruit for garnish.
It's not going to be enough.
Oh, my hands are shaking.
Don't burn your almonds.
Jacob, what's on the menu?
We're doing halibut almondine, classic French comfort food.
-We serve it every day. -And what are you not using?
-Not using the dragon fruit. -And where are you going to use the ginger?
I think it'll play well with the brown butter almonds.
I'm also going to use it as an ingredient in
my mashed potato.
-Got it. -Let's get these potatoes done.
Once they were cooked enough to turn into mashed potatoes,
I strained them out
in my stand mixer,
got them whipped up really quickly.
Sour cream, the mashed potatoes
will have the ginger in it also.
Don't just bury that thing. Make sure it gets some highlight.
Got it. Super gingery.
Trying to get more in there now.
My wife Brooke and I have been working
really, really hard for the past 30 years in this industry.
And it would be nice to take this $20,000
and give her a nice little vacation.
Going somewhere like Portugal, really explore some food
I've never been a part of.
[Guy] How are those potatoes coming, chef?
-I'm not mad at it. -Very good.
[Jacob] It turned out gingery. Wonderful.
Stand mixer, not a problem.
I'm going to use it to grind my meat.
I take it that you're making some burgers.
-Yes, sir. -Short ribs, New Yorks, and what else?
Hanger.
[Guy] Nice little variety.
And I like to elevate it with bone marrow.
Some good white fat in there. Okay.
The carrot and the daikon are going to get pickled?
-Yes, pickled in a slaw. -Got it.
-Pickled ginger. -Pretty big pieces to be throwing in like that,
don't you think?
You're not going to julienne those?
-It's going to act like a pickle. -Okay.
[John] I'm going to add my red wine vinegar and pickling liquid.
Chop up and add my napa cabbage.
Have you worked with dragon fruit before, chef?
[Jacob] No, I have never worked with dragon fruit.
Lightly pickled pickle.
The dragon fruit had a very sour,
pickly kind of flavor to it.
I think it'll work perfect in my slaw.
Little slaw going.
The slaw is going to help balance out the fatty burger.
Jacob, John, Sarah, 18 minutes, 18 to go.
[Sarah] My dumplings are cooking.
Back to my dragon fruit.
Okay.
I'm going to incorporate it into this dumpling sauce. Ah!
White dragon fruit. It has a very, like, neutral taste to it.
I use the white dragon fruit as a vessel
to carry other flavors.
Sugar, black vinegar, soy sauce.
I'm going to add more ginger.
Where is the? Oh.
[Guy] What do you got there, Chef?
Chef, it is a dragon fruit sauce for the dumplings.
Oh, good idea.
And it's gingery.
-That's delicious. -Thank you.
Asparagus.
All right, Chef, when's the almondine gonna get started?
I got almonds in the oven. Thanks for reminding me.
Yeah, right. Almonds are toasted.
And add a little brown butter.
And then some real fresh ginger.
At that point, they just rested until the end.
So we're ready for them?
-Then put it in the pan. -Halibut.
I love it.
-You've got to really time this, right? -You're right.
-Halibut does overcook very easily. -Very fast.
20 seconds.
[John] Time to make my patties.
-Chef, how much salt's on those? -Good amount.
Put it on the plancha.
I have put my blood, sweat, and tear into my restaurant,
into this craft.
Lots of things that you can do with $20,000.
Some of it is to give back to others.
My wife and I have five children.
We want to give free swim lessons
to people that can't afford them because we had
an experience with our young child.
That's my way of paying it forward.
Never crossed my mind to do a side dish.
I thought with bone marrow dripping down your face,
you didn't need French fries.
Very nice.
[Guy] Four minutes, four to go.
[Jacob] Opened my oven to check the halibut.
I believe that fish was very nicely cooked.
Getting hungry looking at this.
Put down a dollop of those gingery,
whipped potatoes, rested halibut right on top.
After that, my perfectly toasted crunchy almondine
with ginger.
[Guy] Two and a half minutes.
[John] Now my patties are done. They look perfect.
I put my hamburger on.
I taste my slaw. Ginger, pickly.
I am very happy with it.
-Good looking food. -Wow.
[Guy] 90 seconds.
Woo!
[Sarah] So I start by putting my dragon fruit sauce
at the base of the plate.
Dumplings have floated to the top of the water,
so I know that they're done.
No, I lost the dumpling.
I taste them.
Yes, flavor is good.
30 seconds, chefs, 30 seconds.
I add my boiled dumplings.
Next is this.
[humming]
Five, four, three, two, one.
That's it, folks.
-Done. -Wow.
-Nice. Nice, guys. -Great job, Triple D team.
Judges, this is it.
Our chefs had to make an elevated cup for classic,
and the Dice of Doom, well, they decided
that it would be gingery, it would incorporate dragon fruit,
and the use of a stand mixer.
Up first, Chef John, what do you got for us, bud?
I know I'm a taco joint, but we also have been nominated
-Best Burger in Boise on our pop-ups. -What?
Yes, sir.
I made the elevated burger with New York, short rib,
and hanger steak.
The garnish is a little pickled slaw with dragon fruit.
Pickled ginger I used in that instead of regular ginger.
You're the Birria King of Boise,
and yet you also do pop-up burger joints.
-Pop-up burger, pop-up ramen. -Pop-up ramen?
Yes, sir.
Okay, United Nations, slow your roll.
Chef John, the burgers, dynamite,
elevated comfort classic. I think you nailed it.
That bone marrow is coming through.
I feel like I'm really rich and lucky right now
to be eating this bone marrow burger.
One of your things was the stand mixer,
and you used it for the meat grinder.
Super smart gameplay.
I mean, this burger is delicious.
But when we go back to the dice,
I was eating the first two bites.
I didn't get any ginger.
-And then I got the ginger in the third bite. -Okay.
So there's a little ginger with the ginger.
-Yeah. -Got it.
Chef John, I'm not getting the dragon fruit at all.
Where is it?
It's julienne in there. It's very subtle.
With let it roll, I got to see these ingredients.
Heard.
All right, up next, Chef Jacob, what do you got for us?
When I thought elevated comfort food,
I thought French food.
So I made halibut almondine,
sauteed asparagus, classic combo.
And then to kind of throw a little American twist in there,
I made mashed potatoes as well.
There is a little ginger in the brown butter almonds.
There is ginger in the mashed potatoes.
Chef Jacob, your dish in the first round was so good,
you earned your advantage.
And giving back the dragon fruit was awesome,
because this dish couldn't take the dragon fruit.
I think you created a beautiful elevated comfort classic.
Thank you.
Jacob, buttery almond sauce is just beautiful.
It adds a luscious quality to the entire dish.
The one thing, I'm not loving the skins on the potatoes.
They feel like almost a little chalky.
-And I think you had the time to go ahead and peel them. -Mm-hmm.
[Marc] Talk about technique.
I am incredibly impressed with your range.
The halibut is not overcooked. Really, really nice.
The ginger is turned down a little bit.
I mean, it was one of the dice.
I think you could have gone a little farther with the ginger.
Thank you.
Great to save me some.
Hang on. Let me just get a bite.
[laughs]
-All right, nice job, Chef. -Thank you.
Last but not least, Chef Sarah, what do you have for us?
Today, for my elevated comfort classic,
I have made dumplings, made the filling using
the stand mixer with pork, blue mushrooms, chanterelles,
and ginger.
-Here, I used the dragon fruit in two ways. -Wow.
Pickled red dragon fruit.
At the base of the plate is a ginger and dragon fruit sauce.
Is this the type of dumpling you do? Do you do a pork?
We do a pork and cabbage and ginger dumpling,
and it's our most popular dumpling.
-Did you bring me any? -I did not.
Sarah, starting off by looking at it,
when you think of elevated, it was a beautiful dish.
The color of the dragon fruit, the gameplay here,
the mixer, the ginger, dragon fruit used two ways.
-You nailed the game. -Thank you.
Chef Sarah, I'm getting lots of ginger,
lots of ginger, and that is the challenge.
But I want more filling.
I'm not sure if they were just tough to fill,
but it feels like that part is just like off just a teeny bit.
Thank you.
That sauce with the dragon fruit is
a really nice contrast to the richness of the pork dumpling.
I wish the dragon fruit was a little less sweet.
I think you used a lot of sugar in there.
A little vinegar forward, a little bit more of that sour
would have been nice for me.
Thank you.
Chefs, what a tough discussion coming up.
We're going to send you back to the kitchens.
We'll call you back when we have a decision.
-Thank you. -Thank you.
Judges whose elevated comfort food is going down,
-going down hard. -[Catherine] It's tough.
Jacob's dish was phenomenal.
[Catherine] He really, like, went for it across the board.
For me, that, like, Sarah knocks this
out of the park is just the gameplay itself.
She did use dragon fruit in two different ways.
I think that's impressive.
And I thought John's burger was delicious.
-John's burger was delicious. -The bone marrow.
-This was spot on. -To me, it was elevated.
[Guy] Who's it going to be?
Chefs, it's nerve-wracking.
The judges did not decide on this unanimously.
But there is a winner.
Ladies and gentlemen, the winner of the Triple D
New School competition is...
Congratulations...
Chef Jacob.
-Wow. -[Guy] Well done.
-Thank you. Thank you. -[all clapping]
[Guy] Sarah and John, I'll say this to you.
Restaurants are awesome.
If you get a chance, if you're going to Boise
or you're going to Memphis, Tennessee,
these are must visits on the Triple D list.
And it was so great to have both of you.
-You're awesome. -Thank you.
I cooked my butt off, so I'm pretty proud of myself.
-Big man. -Thank you.
[John] It was a lot of fun using dragon fruit.
Haven't done that ever.
I'll probably go home and buy dragon fruit
because it was really good.
-Chef Jacob, well done. -Yay.
Thank you all.
We're gonna go after some money.
What are you gonna do with the cash?
Treat my wife to some downtime.
A nice little vacation would be good.
We've been working pretty hard for the past nine years,
so this will be well deserved.
[Guy] Give it up for the champ, congratulations.
Come on over and say hi to the judges.
[Catherine] Nice.
I've got a couple of ways
that you could win up to 20,000 bucks.
-Okay. -So, first thing we can do is the shopping spree.
Give you two minutes and I'll give you five clues
that are food clues.
And you go around the store,
you solve the clue, you find that food item,
you put it in your cart, I'll give you 4,000 bucks.
You get all five of them, you win $20,000.
Or you can skip the shenanigans
and you could go to the mystery check.
It's located right behind that door.
Mystery check's going to be available tonight
for anywhere between $14,000 to $20,000.
So what do you think you want to do?
-[sighs] I don't know. -What is your gut telling you?
Gut's telling me to try to not answer
too many questions at this point.
[laughing]
-What are you going to do? -Let's go for the check.
Okay.
Open those doors. Here we go.
The check for the champ, Chef Jacob.
$17,499.
Wow, that's amazing.
Doesn't get any better than that.
[Jacob] I just won Guy's Grocery Games.
Hey, Brooke, looks like we're going on that vacation
we've been wanting to go to. Feels great.
$17,499.
That will make a dynamite vacation.
There you see it happen.
Triple D on Triple G. Doesn't get any better.
See you next week, Guy's Grocery Games.
-Adios. -Yeah, thank you.
-Well done, my friends. -Wow.
-Congratulations. -Nice job.