We always root for Iron Chef Chen Kenichi. We cheer when he appears to have a lock on the win (which any Iron Chef usually does ) and sympathize when the theme ingredient is something he doesn't quite know what to do with. Who knew that yogurt could stir such great fear in a grown man?

Like so many others Miguel and I are hooked on the Iron Chef, a Japanese import brought to us by the Food Network. It's all there: triumph, defeat, drama, dubbing (even the giggles) and pure television cheese.

For those who have never seen or heard of the show, here's the deal: The show's creators would have you believe that the bedazzled and wealthy Chairman Takeshi Kaga (Japan's answer to Liberace) designed and built kitchen stadium so the world's best chefs could have a suitable place to battle for honor and glory. Let's all believe that for fun. Forget the fact that Chairman Kaga is actually an actor and the whole storyline is a sham. It is television, people. So anyway, a challenger selects one of three iron chefs to battle (Iron Chef Chinese, Chen Kenichi; Iron Chef Japanese, Masahura Morimoto; Iron Chef Italian, Mashiko Kobe and Iron Chef French, Hiroyuki Sakai).

Once the selection is made, Kaga reveals, with great drama (his specialty), the battle's theme ingredient. Our favorites include squid, pork belly and bananas and chocolate. Where else would culinary philistines like us discover asexual salmon?

The contenders, with the help of assistants, have one hour to create dishes based on the theme ingredient. Often, the fare dives into the deep regions of experimental. Take squid ink ice cream, for instance.

While the cooking is taking place we are kept abreast of kitchen developments by commentators Dr. Hattori and Fukui, who are aided and interrupted often by on the floor reporter, Ota, who is known for the exclamation "Fukuisan!" Where would the viewer be without Ota? IE: "Yes," he exclaims. "The Iron Chef is using a blow torch!"

When the cooking is done, it is up to a "panel of judges" to critique and score the food. Regular judges have included actors and actresses, a food critic, a lower house member and a psychic.

The carefully-coifed Chairman then announces (again with great drama) whose cuisine reigns supreme. One walks away with honor, the other defeat. But let's face it, the Iron Chef rarely loses.

But then we got to thinking: Yes, they only have one hour to work, but how hard could it be to create culinary treasures when you're working with rare and often exorbitantly priced ingredients? Don't those things pretty much cook themselves? Wouldn't thousand dollar pieces of citrus taste fine on their own? Besides, would most judges really say, "Um, Iron Chef, this is gross?"

So what exactly puts the iron in these chefs?

A true test of culinary genious and skill, we decided, is the ability to make a thoroughly enjoyable meal from a main ingredient you can sweep off the shelf of your local 7-11.

Spam, we thought. Now that's a raw and rough ingredient. But then we remembered that somewhere there's a Spam cookbook and a Spam festival. Spam had indeed crossed the boundaries of trailer parks and balikbayan boxes. So, no, Spam wouldn't work. But it did lead us to thinking about its shapeless and less popular cousin, Potted Meat.

"Engh," said Miguel, naysaying something I hadn't yet suggested.

"Could you cook something up with it?" I challenged.

He paused before answering, I assume to ponder the possibilities of the pink, grainy substance of questionable origins.

Lightbulbs flicked on above our heads. We could be Iron Chefs. And so the great South Bay Potted Meat Battle was born. We set off to prepare.

Our Rules

"Don't make us sick," they warned in unison.

For lack of a kitchen stadium and the fact that the moms wouldn't let us touch their kitchens, the great battle would have to be fought in our apartment's miniscule kitchen. We would share the stove and each take two burners. The oven would be kept at a constant 350 degrees and we would each get one side. We'd like to see the real the Iron Chefs work under those limitations.

Because our budget could never rival the show's, we assembled some cheap, flexible staples like tomotoes, lettuce, milk, eggs, crackers and pasta sauce. We also picked up 20 cans of potted meat.

Anything currently in the cubboard, fridge and freezer was also up for grabs, including the Boboli pizza crust we put in there a year ago. Extra points also lay in items that had been in cold storage for over six months.

Unlike the Iron Chefs, we were competing for more than honor. The loser would clean the bathroom.

The Battle

Miguel heads straight for a bag of tomatoes I'd been eyeing and takes them all. I vow to be quicker. So I reach for the good stuff: a two-pack of salmon fillets from Trader Joe's.

It's tight in the kitchen. Since we have no counter space and our dining tabel is occupied by the judges, Miguel chops his tomatoes and other veggies on cuttting boards set on the living room floor.

I take this opportunity to steal one of his burners to fry up some eggs. I'm boiling water and heating up bottled spaggetti sauce on mine. But he returns sooner than I expected and I am forced to give up one of my salmon fillets as punishment. Judges' orders.

Soon, the schlurping sound of Potted Meat pop tops fill the kitchen. For time's sake, I dump the contents of my 10 cans into a pink, glass bowl--easier access. Miguel pops all of his tops, but leaves the potted meat in cans, neatly lining them up on the window sill. The moms nod their approval.

The moms begin to share photos of the grandkids and Christine paints her toe nails a silvery blue.

"We're watching, don't worry," they say when I raise a fuss about their lack of attention. Then I decide its OK, they need diversions. The stress is too much for them. As I scramble eggs in a bowl, I'm distracted by Miguel who is simultaneously mixing up a berry vinaigrette and dicing eggplant.

By 3:30 I have three dishes, which I have set on the dining table and covered with napkins. The judges ignore them.

Miguel has five and seems disappointed that he hasn't done more. I spill spagetti sauce on his white shirt. Accidentally, of course.

While Miguel is starting on his sixth dish, I start to get worried. Not only does he have more dishes than me, he's earned bonus points by using the Boboli pizza crust. He has also managed to use the fruit cocktail that had been swimming in a bowl on the bottom shelf of the fridge for a month. It looked the same way it did when it first slid out of the can.

The mothers take in the fare they've promised to sample. They exchange looks that hint of fear, but I'm sure it's just pride from the fact that their children grew up to be such creative individuals.

The timer goes off.

The Judging

"I aimed to keep it simple, yet profound (my favorite Iron Chefism)," I explain to the judges. Miguel rolls his eyes.

"Hmmm," the moms reply.

"Rather pedestrian, don't you think?" asks Christine, wiping a shinny bit of potted meat from the corner of her mouth.

I then present the rest of my dishes: baked salmon with a thin layer of potted meat, potted meat and mozarella quesadillas, spagetti with potted meat balls ( or rather what I intended to become balls), potted meat on a bed of spinach and ice berg lettuce with croutons and cucumbers and ranch dressing and scrambled eggs topped with potted meat.

"Interesting," the moms say stabbing at their plates with shiny forks.

"But you just spread the potted meat on everything," says Christine with a yawn.

I glare at her.

"Miguel's turn," she says.

Miguel decides to unveil all his dishes before serving the first one.

A collective "oooh" rises from the judges table.

"Pretty," says Christine.

"Good job Miguel," the moms say.

"But you haven't even tasted anything," I protest-- in vain, because no one is paying attention to me.

Miguel begins to serve his appetizer. A dollop of potted meat on sour dough, broiled and topped with a sun dried tomato.

"Sun dried tomatoes!" exclaim the impressed moms.

"Very inventive," chirps Christine helping herself to a second piece.

I throw myself on to the sofa and watch as they ooh and ahhh over his remaining dishes: potted meat finger sandwiches with thin slices of cucumber, potted meat spinach salad with berry vinaigrette, baked potted meat shaped into bears and topped with thin slices of braised eggplant with fruit cocktail on the side, cheese pizza with tiny potted meat balls (he actually formed balls with the stuff!), potted meat stuffed cherry tomatoes.

The final dish was the final nail in my culinary coffin: a plate of plain potted meat with diced tomatoes, a scrambled egg and white rice.

"How Filipino," exclaims Christine.

"I taught him that," I say, almost inaudibly.

"Great, Miguel wins," say the moms. "Let's go get dinner."

"But you didn't even taste his food," I exclaim. "You didn't taste any of it."

"Of course not, look what you two did with it," they reply. "But Miguel's dishes were the prettiest."

"So it's all about how things look on the outside," I whine, knowing how stupid I sound.

Miguel and Christine roll their eyes.

I give a brief concession speech, which again is largely ignored, and we head out for Mexican food.

I could've won, I tell myself in the car. All I needed was a kitchen statium, a Chairman Kaga and his prime theme ingredients. And perhaps some assistants, a color commentator and maybe some culinary talent.

The Aftermath

It seems Miguel was very confident about his eventual win. You see Miguel, whose responsibility it is to clean our two litter boxes (located in the bathroom and within my loser's cleaning domain), decided it would be funny if he didn't clean them out at all since our bet was made.

As I peer into the gravelly surface beneath the plastic blue cover, I cringe at the sight of lumps and clumps and wonder what the hell happens inside two indoor cats to produce that.

Miguel got me. Miguel got me good. Because I am a dog lover and a novice cat owner and I don't know the first thing about cleaning a litter box. But that's another story.