The Lawrence girls raced against the clock and each other on Tuesday's episode of "Chopped Junior."
Despite their best efforts, the "Kitchen Twins" found themselves on the chopping block, but for them, the experience was just as rewarding.
"It wasn't about winning," Lyla said. "It was about the experience and it was great."
The popular "Food Network" cooking competition show starts out with four hopefuls, who face a mystery basket of ingredients designed to confound them and put their creativity to the test. One competitor is eliminated after each 30-minute round -- appetizer, entree and dessert -- until one chef is left standing.
Lyla said though she preferred some ingredients over others, it didn't take her long to come up with a dish.
"Once you see the ingredients, you know what you're going to make," she said. "You pull it out of the basket, feel it and think in your mind what you could do with this," she said.
And they spent hours at home practicing with their own "Chopped"-inspired baskets. Just on Wednesday, they each teamed up with two friends who slept over to make breakfast from a basket of ingredients.
For the appetizer round, they had to use vegetable fried rice, oven-roasted tomatoes, firm tofu and gingerbread cookie people.
The girls, who cook a lot of Mexican food at home, whipped up similar dishes. Emily made a tofu and rice burrito with a gingerbread and roasted tomato sauce, while Lyla went with a rice and tofu taco with gingerbread topping.
Emily said she knew the sourness of the tomatoes and the sweetness of the gingerbread would complement each other, but acknowledged that she should've added more cheese to the burritos like the judges pointed out.
The twins and Kobena Sey, who went on to win the $10,000 prize, moved onto the entree round, where they were given a basket with scallops, chickpea chips, watercress and birthday cake.
Lawrence twins launch kale chip product
The girls both went with a pasta dish: Emily with a pasta salad with seared scallops and a watercress-cake cream sauce and Lyla with linguine with a coconut cake sauce and scallops and watercress.
Emily said she had never tried watercress but knew it was bitter so wanted to combine it with the sweet frosting from the cake.
Lyla ended up being sent home after the round and said she wished she would have made more sauce and less pasta and seasoned the tofu in the appetizer a little more.
"I think when Lyla got out, Emily could not have had a bigger cheerleader," their mom, Cricket Allen, said. "As competitive as they are, they absolutely got each other's backs and cheer each other on."
In the final round, Emily and Kobena had to make a dessert with pretzel bites, cream cheese, candy dots and chocolate-covered bananas. Emily went with a banana and pretzel cookie topped with mascarpone and a candy dot-cream cheese hot chocolate.
The judges said they were impressed with Emily's technique but enjoyed the Ghana-inspired flavors in Kobena's food.
"It has been amazing to see you cook today in the kitchen and you will go very far," judge Laila Ali told Emily, adding that the pasta was dry and lacked seasoning and the cookie tasted more like a biscuit. "For those reasons, we had to chop you."
Emily said she enjoyed competing against her sister and said had they been on the same team, they probably would have squabbled over what to make.
"It was awesome to be on something like that," she said of the show.
Allen, who sat with the other parents in a room during the taping, said the parents were nothing but impressed.
"There's a general enjoyment of food among all the parents because that's what influenced the children, but we're all sitting there in awe of what these kids are doing under the clock," she said. "These kids are doing stuff that you have no idea how they came up it."
Allen said the girls learned so much from the show and left with no regrets.
"I feel as though they did their best," she said. "This was the exclamation point to everything they've worked on so far. I think it'll keep getting better as they get more exposure and share their passion on a broader stage."
Cristina Rojas may be reached at crojas@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @CristinaRojasTT. Find The Times of Trenton on Facebook.
