Me, Myself and the Chef - A Personal Challenge !!

I and my friend, Muthu were talking about how difficult it is to manage our day jobs and spend enough time thinking/working on our passion/hobby: mine being anything related to food and his movie making. During our conversation, my friend got this brilliant idea where he said he'd give me one ingredient that I have to use to make a dish, publish in my blog and that he'd try it out and give his "expert" comment on the recipe. The idea being that this would keep me motivated and it will be fun for him to test/recreate my recipes in his kitchen. I accepted his challenge thinking it'd be just a one-and-done thing and that I could do it. But in a matter of hours I get the following email from him, giving me a set of rules to follow and making it a series in itself. I was game for some fun and challenge. And am hoping this would keep me motivated to be a regular at blogging and also provide something different for my readers. So I should thank my friend for this creative idea and here is the challenge in his own words .....
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Me, Myself and the Chef - a personal challenge.

Following are the rules for this challenge:

1. As a part of Series One, you will be provided with in total 16 ingredients, as one ingredient at a time per dish.
2. You will use this ingredient as the main ingredient of the recipe thatyou propose, which you can then publish in your blog.
3. The challenger committee (yep, me) will then try the recipe and produce the final judgment.

Of course a challenge needs twists and turns, here are some

1. The total amount taken for making this dish should be maximum 1 earth hour, meaning, no pre soaking before night etc. Of course you can cheat this rule for example by using canned beans instead of soaking beans before hand.
2. All ingredients should be commonly available, meaning, no region specific secret ingredients
or mom's special flavoring powder etc.,
3. The final 16 dishes should have
4 appetizers,
4 entrees ( meaning dish with significant protein content ),
4 side dishes and
4 desserts.
It is totally up to you to choose the order in which/ the ingredient with which you want to make them.
4. Last but not least, every dish should have a uniqueness attached to it, whether it is to do with
method of cooking, method of eating, or just some interesting story behind it. How else it could be your own dish?

Evaluation system

1. All dishes will be evaluated for a total of 20 points.
2. Taste counts for 8, Easy to cook counts for 6, How healthy the dish is counts for 4, and uniqueness factor counts for 2 points.

And of course of course, Judge's statement is always final. :)

We would like to thank you for participating in this challenge.

Good luck,
MMC Challenge Committee.
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Hope this challenge proves to be fun and interesting for both me the cook and you guys the readers. And hope I live up to my friend's expectations :-)

Here's the challenge ingredient:

Ingredient 1 - Fennel Bulb - Verdict
Ingredient 2 - Pearl Onion - Verdict
Ingredient 3 - Beets - Verdict
Ingredient 4 - Popcorn
Ingredient 5 - Dates, Jaggery, Coffee (Ground)
Ingredient 6 - Moringa pods/Drumstick
Ingredient 7 - Curry Leaves
Ingredient 8 - Green Peas
Ingredient 9 - White Bread
Ingredient 10 - Turnips
Ingredient 11 - Crystallized Ginger, Vanilla Wafers and Molasses

Enjoy !!