In a Park in Suburban Toronto

It is not surprising that Ed and Brian have somewhat conflicting views of the famous “Iron Chef Battle Monkfish” contest. After all, I married Ed fifteen years later and Brian remains a very good family friend. So, it is probably politic to give greater weight to Ed’s version. Mostly, but not always.

To explain. The Famous Iron Chef Monkfish contest was a cooking challenge designed by our mutual friend Curtis — a replica of the then popular television cooking series: Iron Chef. The idea was that two teams would arrive at the venue, be given a secret ingredient and tasked with preparing a multi-course meal using the secret ingredient in every dish. After a specified amount of time — it is not clear whether it was one hour or one and a half hours — a panel of judges would decide which team made the most innovative and delectable meal

The venue was a park in the Toronto suburb of Scarborough. The park was equipped with picnic benches and BBQ pits and according to Ed, Curtis had reserved a picnic area. Again, a point of contention. Brian recalls that we had to arrive extra early to be sure we found an empty picnic area. Also of some confusion is the nature of the park. Was it a sculpture park or simply a park? We may never know because both have forgotten which park it was actually in.