Ah, how I miss living in a big city. At least I feel the longing for a big city when I’m craving some interesting food choices. Allow me to fill you in.

I live in a city that on a good day has the population of 49 000 souls. Not only is Brandon the 2nd largest city in Manitoba but it is an exact 2 hour drive from Winnipeg, the largest and capital city of Manitoba. To get out of Brandon in any direction, one has to drive past limitless fields of grain or pastures filled with cows. Yes exciting stuff. As beautiful as the rural setting can be, the area is not known for being daring or fast paced. When it comes to shopping and dining in Brandon, in most cases Walmart and chain restaurants rule with a steady influence.

I don’t have any issues with chain stores or restaurants, or at least not most of them. There are pockets of individuality here and there where the small local shop or restaurant has been able to carve out a spot and survive in among the chain giants. But sadly they are few and far between.

As a result, my husband and I have gotten together with some friends and hatched a cunning plan to help satisfy our cravings for food adventure and to explore our kitchen creativity outside the box so to speak. We have dubbed ourselves “The Aluminum Cooks” and we are a group of foodies where our vice is to create and consume interesting food creations and to try out different ingredients.

The name of our group was born out of the idea that we all aspire to be as talented as the chefs from Iron Chef, the TV series on the Food Network. Our inaugural Aluminum Cook was over the Canada Day weekend, 3 years ago. What could be more Canadian then featuring an entire 7 course menu on nothing but bacon? Yes even the dessert had bacon in it (apple Betty with maple smoked bacon ice cream. And yes, it was delish.)

Since then we have featured entire menu’s on tomatoes (I made rice pudding with candied tomatoes), squash, ginger, whiskey (I made the stickiest ribs), cheese, BBQ anything, chocolate, corn, coffee, beer and oranges. I’m sure I’m forgetting an ingredient or two. We originally started with 6 members and from a time or two, it has grown up to 30 members. With every person being responsible for bringing a dish, that translates to A LOT OF FOOD and perhaps a fair share of booze.

The only rules we insist upon are: everybody is responsible for making an item with the feature ingredient being the main ingredient, one can include a boozy drink for the masses if they so desire, and we vote at the end of the gorge-fest. The food/drink item that receives the most votes, wins and the “aluminum cook” walks away with a snappy chefs hat with pictures and dates of the previous winning entries.

Because of the revolving membership from dinner to dinner, it has also led us to adjust the rules somewhat. I mean people don’t regularly sit down and eat a 7 course meal. We make it a point to eat over 3 to 4 hours with each dish being recognized and appreciated. The key is to pace yourself and take small portions of things. For most of us, we are out of our food comfort zone and the effort it takes to create needs to be respected. Although I am a pastry chef, I don’t automatically create the desserts for the aluminum cook evenings. I can cook other things and I usually do. (Just in case you were wondering.)

Our cooking events take place at one of the members house. The last two Canada Day Aluminum Cook’s took place at our house, out on the patio. Once the dishes are cleaned up, and the extra food is put away, we decide when and where the next one will be and also which ingredient to use next.

The original idea was to do this once a month. So far, we haven’t had the problem with repeating an ingredient as I’m sure you can understand why. We have been careful though to stay away from obvious ingredients such as potatoes, sugar and rice. Until it is revealed at the shindig, nobody knows what you will be making. So sometimes we can have 3 soups, or 5 desserts or 7 entrees with no vegetable in sight. That’s the fun part.

Our membership does not require a fee, nor that you speak about the many characteristics of the latest bottle of wine or that you have to be the most successful person at your job. (Are we even members?)

All we ask is for you to show up with a dish that you created, can handle a good dose of sarcasm (okay a large does of sarcasm) and are ready to share a drink or two. We don’t even care if you don’t know how to cook. Just try.

If you are a friend of a friend or a relative of a friend, you are most welcome. We are just a group of friends with all sorts of different backgrounds who really enjoy each-others company, great tasting food and frankly are bored to tears with what’s offered in the local restaurants (Not that some of them don’t try. But does every single restaurant really need to put spinach dip on their menu? Really?) So we have taken it upon ourselves to do something about it and while we are sitting around the table pigging out, we also solve the world’s problems.

I’m always amazed with what I see members come up with. And I’m happy to say I have enjoyed every dish. The Aluminum Cook evenings are just for fun but everybody does put a lot of effort into their dish. It’s a great way to pass the time and another outlet for creativity and learning new things for me. We are in the process of planning our next Aluminum Cook and I can only guess what the ingredient will be as we need to finalize things.

Who knows, you may just be invited. Just remember to bring the tums.