I love Dish Cooking Studio! I've been here twice for corporate events and both times we did the Iron Chef format.
STARTERS AND COCKTAILS: They have an extensive list of cocktails, and recently put out a list of "Virtuous Cocktails" that are non-alcoholic but use botanicals and look delicious. They have a delicious spread of cheese, spreads, dips, crackers and pita. The cheese in my experience has always been fantastic.
COOKING: Essentially, they reveal a "secret ingredient" (which is usually more like a theme, as the ingredient is never a crazy ingredient, it is usually quite common (in my experience, it has been root vegetables and zucchini) and seasonal), you get split into teams, and then the team lead (staff) tells you what you're going to prepare and how you should do it. Within your teams, you each take on rolls, whether it is cutting, peeling, mashing, boiling, DEEP FRYING, roasting etc. When everything is prepped and cooked, you plate the dish and someone on the team presents it to the judge with a quick speech/description.
I like this format for corporate events - it's competitive, but not complicated. As a room full of lawyers (in my case), we are not the most creative and are also not necessarily the best cooks. For the team lead to tell us exactly what we are doing and how we are doing it is great - I can't imagine if they gave me a handful of root vegetables and told me to run with it!
EATING: Once the food has been presented to the judge, everyone sits down for dinner. The staff take the food that you prepared (and I imagine they have some emergency food prepared in the back in case we didn't do a good job) and plate it for everyone. They prepare the dessert, which is always in line with the theme. It ends up being a delicious four course meal, that you helped prepare!
At the end of dinner, they announce the winning team and award them with their in-house dry rub. read more