Guest Blogger: Justin (Erika's Husband)

We noticed a lot of our readers were asking us if our husbands ever planned any of the dates or did anything cute for us.....and we quickly realized that we weren't showing off the men who inspire us!!  We were already taking turns doing "Hubby Highlights" at least once a month but then one of the divas hit upon a brilliant idea!  Why not have our HUSBANDS on as Guest Bloggers??  Pretty brilliant, huh!   I am excited to "present" our very FIRST Diva Husband Guest Blogger....my super AMAZING husband, Justin!!

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The "Iron Chef" Date

I definitely don’t classify myself as a Dating Diva, however I am excited to be able to do a guest post as the husband of one of the Divas. I have to give advanced notice that my date is definitely not near as creative as those which have previously been posted. I am sure many of the male readers would agree that it can be hard to create a new and fun date idea amidst the business of work, school, or other duties. This past week when we did our date, it was one of the busiest times of my schooling career and because of everything going on, I admit I had to ask for my wife’s help to do a few things in preparation for the date. For us men, I don’t think we should feel like we can’t ask for help with little things as long as we take the lead, plan the date, and do everything else within our capabilities.

I love to cook, my wife likes to cook, and everyone likes good food, so I thought it would be a perfect to do an Iron Chef Date. I told some good friends of ours to meet at our place and bring aprons and prepare for a good time. For those of you who haven’t seen Iron Chef, it is a TV show with chefs who are given the challenge to create a dish using a secret ingredient previously decided but unknown to them. So this was the premise for our date. 

However, I threw a little twist into the challenge. For Iron Chef: Couple’s Edition, we went to the grocery store where each couple was given their secret ingredient form. Thanks to Erika for making it up - I ran out of time with school, so told her what I wanted it to look like. Love ya Ers. 

Download your scoring sheet here and your secret ingredient form here.

I had previously decided that we would have our main entrée be tacos. To compliment the tacos, I came up with a few ingredients that could easily be incorporated into a Mexican dish. When we each opened our secret ingredient, we had 15 minutes to come up with our idea and be to the checkout stand. In addition to the 15 minute time limit, I set a goal of not going over $10.00. This was a great addition to the challenge for those looking for an inexpensive date. With the time and cost limit in place, we were ready to go.

Team Banks’ Ingredient – Lime     Team Barrett’s Ingredient – Cilantro

When we started, we had to take a little time to organize ourselves and see what kinds of things we could make. After formulating our game plan, we took off trying to find the ingredients and the best possible price. I am not going to lie, it got really close on time. We actually probably went over a little. However we both ended up at the register at the same time. After checking out, here were our total costs.

Team Banks - $12.41   Team Barrett - $10.31

We then returned to our house to let the creations come to life. As a side note, we did allow the use of any spices or ingredients normally found in the kitchen or ones that we had. And working in our extra small kitchen was just a BONUS of the the fun night. :) And we each had a toddler there, but they played most of the time while we cooked. It worked out great.

Team Barrett whipped up a fantastic chunky salsa complete with corn, black beans, peppers, onions, and CILANTRO among other things. We ate that up real fast with our bag of chips.

We, Team Banks, came up with two dishes! (Bonus points?) We did a Key LIME pie as well as Virgin Margaritas. Seeing as we don't drink - we didn't have nice glasses on hand! And to be honest we scored high points on presentation, but the salt on the edges was nasty - dropping our taste score.

After completion of our individual dishes, we then graded them according to the grading sheet. Each category was worth 10 points, for a total possible amount of 40. You could create your sheet how ever you want, but for those of you who have seen “Who’s Line is it Anyway?”, it’s a game where points don’t really matter. That's how our night kind of ended up. It's just a lot of fun to see what other people come up with and enjoy good food, with good company. 

Thanks Divas for letting me be the first Diva Husband to put a man's idea out there.
-Justin
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Thank you, sweetie!!  We also need to give a big thanks to one of our readers, Megan, for sending in her "Iron Chef" date idea! She and her husband absolutely LOVE food network - especially Iron Chef America. So they wanted to recreate it at home once their toddler was in bed. They found Red Pears on sale at the grocery store and made that their 'secret ingredient.' They then competed against each other to create a dessert using the red pears. Megan came up with a pie of sorts with French vanilla pudding, cinnamon, the red pears, and some caramel on top. Her husband fried the pears in cinnamon and sugar and used it as a garnish on his homemade ice cream sandwich. They also created a judging sheet and scored each other.
Thank you Megan for letting us know about your date!  (You helped make my husband's DREAM of "being" on Iron Chef come true!)  We are SUCH Game Show fans!!  Remember THIS l'il date?!?