Isle contestant ousted after falling short on ‘MasterChef’

The TV cooking competition “MasterChef” has bid aloha to the young Honolulu woman who became a contestant by cooking Spam for Gordon Ramsay.

Let that sink in for a moment, in all its Monty Python-esque glory. Paige Jimenez, a Kaiser High School graduate, got into a cooking competition by preparing Spam for a Michelin-starred chef.

Jimenez initially won her competitor’s white apron by making eggs Benedict with an island touch, adding pineapple juice to the hollandaise sauce, using sweet bread instead of an English muffin and including Spam instead of Canadian bacon.

“Spam isn’t really respected in the culinary world,” she said in an earlier interview with the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. She thought “it would be interesting to cook that for Gordon Ramsay.”

Sadly, her time on the show is pau. She failed to impress the judges in an elimination test, after her team lost a fish-cooking challenge.

For the test, Jimenez and teammates were tasked with re-creating a dish by celebrity chef and show judge Aaron Sanchez: a thick-grilled pork chop; nopales picadillo, which combined sauteed cactus with other vegetables and chorizo; and a sauce made from prickly pear.

Jimenez said on the show that being half-Mexican, she is familiar with the spices and flavors Sanchez used “so it shouldn’t be too hard.”

Dishes by Jimenez and a contestant named Jennifer were the judges’ least favorites. In a possibly unprecedented move, Ramsay, show host and executive producer, polled other contestants as to who should remain in the competition. They all said “Jennifer,” unanimously ending Jimenez’s run.

On the show, Jimenez said, “I had too much confidence in my ability.”

But Ramsay had encouraging words: “Paige, young lady, you’re courageous, you’ve got a bright future ahead of you. Thank you,” before instructing her to remove her apron.

In the Star-Advertiser interview, Jimenez called the timed cooking challenges “very insane,” much more pressure than cooking at home for family and friends.

“Overall it was an amazing experience from start to finish. I met some amazing people that I keep in touch with, and I would not change anything I did,” Jimenez said. “I learned more on my time on ‘MasterChef’ than I did my entire life cooking.”

Jimenez is a model by trade, specializing in swimsuit modeling, but now, “I’m planning on going to culinary school next year,” she said. “I feel like there’s so much to learn, so many different cuisines. … There’s always more to learn.”

She would like to “incorporate being a spokesperson with cooking somehow, to further spread the word about making people fall in love with cooking.”

TALKING BUSINESS

More than 2,800 local products have been added to military bases’ store shelves since the American Logistics Association launched its Hawaii Expo decades ago.

Now gearing up for its 20th annual event, the association is accepting applications from returning and new vendors until July 10.

Defense Commissary Agency and combined military exchange buyers will review exhibitors’ offerings at the expo. Last year, 350 items were added to the commissary system in the islands, including some items from companies that were new exhibitors.

The expo is Aug. 15 at the Pacific Beach Hotel.

Booth space is $695, a fee that includes a pre-expo marketing class.

Registration forms are available at 808ne.ws/militaryshowcase, or by calling 277-5639.

Send restaurant news and notes to erika@staradvertiser.com or call 529-4303. Follow Erika Engle on Twitter @eriKaengle.