Guy Fieri’s population culinary competition show Guy’s Grocery Games forces contestants to make all manner of elevated dishes using the most basic ingredients that anyone can find in any grocery store — and loves to throw wrenches in the works like “only frozen food” or “only things that start with the letter M.”
Most of the time, the episodes are one-offs, but every so often, the celebrity chef hosts in-season mini-tournaments. For the latest season, Fieri brought back eight of the winningest chefs in the show’s history to compete for its biggest prize so far, $70,000. The cheftestants included Damaris Phillips and Beau MacMillan, who were both eliminated in the first episode of the tournament. They were followed by Maneet Chauhan, a two-time Tournament of Champions winner who was rather shockingly eliminated in the second episode. Episode three saw Aaron May get bounced, and then last week in episode four, Christa Luedtke saw her run come to an end.
The tournament has been going on for the past four weeks, and on Wednesday, June 4, a winner was crowned, earning the title of GOAT (Greatest of All Time) for Guy’s Grocery Games.
Read on to find out how it all went down, but be warned of spoilers ahead. Don’t keep reading if you don’t want to be spoiled.
Who won Guy’s Grocery Games GOAT (Greatest of All Time) Tournament?
The finale came down to Food Network Star winner Justin Warner, Iron Chef Gauntlet and Top Chef winner Stephanie Izard and The Next Iron Chef contestant Eric Greenspan, all of whom have won a lot of money on Guy’s Grocery Games in the past.
After the first challenge, Justin was sent home, and he was quite emotional about the elimination. You could tell he wanted to win so badly. Eric was “so stoked” to take on Steph in the final challenge because to be the best, you gotta beat the best.
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Challenge details from Guy’s Grocery Games GOAT tournament
The first challenge involved the chefs finding envelopes throughout the store with instructions for three different games. Whichever envelope they each found, that was what they had to cook.
Justin found “Think Small,” which made him make his best chicken dish, and he could only shop for items that he could fit in a small bag. Steph found “ABC,” so she had to make her best chicken dish using only ingredients that start with the letter C. Eric found “Budget Battle,” so he had to make his best chicken dish using items that come in under $20 total.
Steph made a tortilla chicken soup with crema and corn, Justin made fried chicken wings, and Eric made a fried chicken sandwich. The judges definitely seemed to prefer Eric’s dish the best, so he was an easy choice to advance. The second spot in the final face-off was awarded to Steph, sending Justin home.
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The final challenge involved the chefs having to create a Celebration Dinner, and the game they were given was “Closing Time,” which meant they only had four minutes to shop. But wait! There was a second game! The second one was Cart Swap, which meant they had to swap carts full of ingredients.
Steph was particularly upset because she managed to get so many more ingredients than Greenspan did, though he maintained that he left her a “road map” to his dish, and her dish was a “kaleidoscope” full of randomness.
