The Milford Daily News
FRAMINGHAM – When Ted Allen, the host of the Food Network show Chopped, lifted the lid off a silver cloche to reveal a puff pastry on the chopping block, Saba Wahid felt like time stood still.
The moment she saw that it wasn t the pastry she d made, she realized she had won the title of Chopped Grand Champion and the grand prize of $50,000 on the popular competitive cooking show.
“I was thinking, ‘Holy cow, I won?’ I was still processing it, she said about her May 11 win on national television. She suppressed her excitement as the judges talked to runner-up Jennifer Normant, a chef from Newburyport, about why she lost.
PORTSMOUTH Cure restaurant chef and owner Julie Cutting-Kelly was ready to go home after being eliminated on her episode of Chopped: Martha Rules, which aired on April 20, but right after filming that episode in September, she received an unexpected call from the producers.
“I went back to my room and I was all excited to go home. I was packing up, ready to see my baby and the producer called and said, ‘Hang around.’ And I said, ‘What do you mean hang around?’ The next day I woke up kind of slow, went for a run and then that night they called me and said ‘Hang around. We’re going to bring you back.’ So I knew fairly soon after I got cut the first time that I was going to be brought back.”
FRAMINGHAM There were a few careers Saba Wahid’s traditional Pakistani parents had in mind for her: a lawyer, doctor or maybe an engineer but not a chef.
On Tuesday, she ll be showcasing the career skills she was told wouldn t make her successful to millions nationwide on Food Network’s “Chopped: Martha Rules tournament featuring Wahid and 15 other professional chefs from across New England.
Wahid, who was born and raised in Framingham and is a resident chef and culinary educator at Yale Appliance in Framingham, will compete on an episode set to air at 9 p.m. Tuesday. The episode features Martha Stewart and was filmed in Kennebunkport, Maine, which is close to Stewart s home, said Wahid.