Chopped - Season 50

First aired: 6/1/2021 16 episodes
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Episodes

1. Time Capsule: '60s Foods!

Aired: 6/1/2021

This Chopped episode dives into retro chaos, starting with an appetizer basket of 60s-style cookies, grape jelly meatballs, peas, and grapefruit soda. The entrée round pushes chefs further with wieneroni casserole, mushrooms, fondue, and salmon competing for coherence. In dessert, melon balls, fudge cake, rocket lollipops, and chips force a strange balance of sweet and salty.

2. Time Capsule: '90s Foods!

Aired: 6/8/2021

In this 90s themed episode, the appetizer round mixes a lunch kit, sun-dried tomatoes, Chinese chicken salad, and an appletini into a clash of convenience and confusion. Entrées get even stranger with canned pasta, strawberry fruit leather, portobello mushrooms, and flank steak forcing chefs to bridge sweet and savory in questionable ways. Dessert goes fully unhinged with frosted mini cookies, chocolate-covered strawberries, drinkable cereal yogurt, and corn dogs.

3. Time Capsule: Future Foods!

Aired: 6/15/2021

This episode leans hard into sustainable, futuristic foods. The appetizer basket pairs squash, Little Neck clams, algae oil, and black ants, testing both creativity and bravery. In the entrée round, ostrich fillet meets sunflowers, fonio, and solar farm honey in a challenge that feels equal parts futuristic and rustic. Dessert closes things out with meatless breakfast sausage, pea protein milk, astronaut peaches, and cacao powder.

4. Alton's Maniacal Baskets: Part 1

Aired: 6/22/2021

Alton Brown delivers ingredients that feel designed to test the chef's limits. The appetizer round mixes bean sprouts, pasture-raised eggs, spinach lasagna, and canned chicken into an awkward start. Entrée turns intense with blood soup, parsnips, venison osso buco, and an M.R.E. Dessert doesn’t let up, featuring livermush pudding, pickled garlic, Bartlett pears, and tawny port.

5. Alton's Maniacal Baskets: Part 2

Aired: 6/29/2021

Alton Brown continues to dish out challenging ingredients in “Alton’s Maniacal Baskets: Part 2.” The appetizer round pairs an English breakfast with chanterelles, raspberry lambic, and the ever-threatening surströmming. Entrée puts chefs to the test with ground beef apple pie, guinea hen legs, cardoons, and salty licorice pulling chefs in opposite directions. For dessert, Alton gives the contestants bagel and lox cake, frozen cherries, mimolette, and chitterlings.

6. Alton's Maniacal Baskets: Part 3

Aired: 7/6/2021

Alton Brown continues his culinary endurance test in “Alton’s Maniacal Baskets: Part 3.” The appetizer round opens with black radishes, tuna noodle casserole, pickle jelly beans, and lutefisk. Entrée piles on with BBQ cottage cheese salad, rack of elk, cauliflower leaves, and natto, forcing chefs to wrestle with bold, clashing flavors. Dessert brings a strange finish with musk stick marshmallow tart, frozen rhubarb, rock candy, and black limes.

7. Alton's Maniacal Baskets: Part 4

Aired: 7/13/2021

Alton Brown returns with baskets designed to break spirits. The Appetizer round pairs head-on shrimp with canned haggis and blueberry waffles—a sugary, offal-filled trap. Things turn "maniacal" in the Entrée as chefs battle fermented banana peels and the salty funk of shiokara to save their wild boar. The Dessert finale is a texture war: savory pork floss meets medicinal wormwood liqueur and pizza cookie cake.

8. Alton's Maniacal Baskets: Finale

Aired: 7/20/2021

Alton Brown’s gauntlet concludes with a $50,000 finale. Chefs begin with pickled pig lips and gooseneck barnacles, testing their mastery. The Entrée round demands culinary perfection as contestants use meat from a roasted lamb head to pair with capon and chocolate-covered onions. Finally, the Dessert basket: durian, vegan ham, and kale candy canes.

9. Chef's Best Friend

Aired: 7/27/2021

It's a doggone Chopped event! In addition to competing with appetizers, entrees and desserts, dog-loving chefs make treats for a canine judge! Things could get "ruff" if the golden retriever with the golden palate turns up its nose at their hard work. The chefs are literally thrown a bone in the first basket, and a dog-friendly beverage and a pasta dish must be combined in the second round. The dessert round finds the competitors figuring out what to do with bananas and a certain nose-to-tail treasure before this Chopped dog show reaches its exciting conclusion.

10. Ballpark Baskets

Aired: 8/3/2021

Simple concession stand snacks are so old-school! The latest stadium fare is substantial and out-of-the-park sensational and substantial, so when four bold competitors get ballpark foods in every basket, the judges have high expectations. Cheesy, fruity and doughy appetizers are in the lineup for round one, and the entree basket contains some basic finger foods that the chefs must turn into home runs. The remaining chefs in the dessert round face no shortage of sweet surprises in the final ballpark basket.

11. Playing with Fire: Wild Things

Aired: 8/10/2021

In a live-fire Chopped tournament to show what hot ideas, techniques and flavors chefs bring to the table, the competitors take a walk on the wild side with wild game in every basket. In the appetizer basket, a crispy Korean snack food is a creepy-crawly shocker. The judges wonder what to expect when they chomp down on alligator entrees, and in the dessert round, the two chefs left fighting for a spot in the finale wrestle with a basket that includes wild sandwiches and daring dairy.

12. Playing with Fire: Hog Heaven

Aired: 8/17/2021

Four phenomenal live-fire cooks stand tall, ready to claim the last remaining spot in the tournament's finale. They get lucky with a promise of perfectly porky baskets, but only one chef will take the judges to hog heaven. One of nature's sweetest gifts is a part of the appetizer basket, but it may not be a treat to the competitors. A prized piece of pork seems like a gimme in the entree basket, and as the last two competitors race the clock in the dessert round, the $25,000 grand prize begins to feel within reach. But only one chef will still be in the running after the last cloche is lifted.

13. Playing with Fire: High Stakes

Aired: 8/24/2021

Playing with fire is serious business in this "high-steaks" preliminary battle of Chopped's thrilling, flame-filled tournament. The four competitors are excited about the delicious possibilities of a steak-centric meal, but a weird watermelon adds to the challenge in round one. The entree round finds the chefs wondering what to do with a giant slab of meat in just 30 minutes, and the two chefs who make it to the dessert round compete with humility, passion and grilled pizza as they face off for a spot in the finale.

14. Playing with Fire: Surf and Turf

Aired: 8/31/2021

Four talented chefs push themselves to the limit in order to impress the judges and win a spot in the $25,000 live-fire tournament finale. They must make flame-kissed dishes that celebrate the treasures of both land and sea, and the judges want to see them modernize an old concept. In the first basket, strange sushi requires raw talent, and a bowl of cheese could be an unwelcome addition to the entree basket. The two finalists discover what's lurking inside the surf-and-turf dessert basket.

15. Playing with Fire: Finale

Aired: 9/7/2021

In this fiery tournament finale, four winners return with their sights set on taking the title of Chopped Grand Champion. The baskets contain ingredients reminiscent of the preliminary battle themes: wild game, steaks, surf and turf and pork. The appetizer round has the chefs working with a meat not found in the grocery store. A bucket of something frozen is part of the entree basket puzzle, and the two finalists who make it to the dessert round endeavor to give it their all with corn on the cob and an unconventional cheesecake. Only one chef can score the life-changing grand prize and walk away knowing they triumphed while 15 other skilled chefs went down in flames.

16. Shakes and Fries

Aired: 9/14/2021

Two diner favorites find a home in the ingredient baskets, and the competitors are challenged to make the most of milkshakes and French fries. First, they must make berry and basil work together in the appetizer round. A city's signature dish is part of the challenge in round two, and a toaster treat meets a fun fry variation in the dessert basket.