Hello Caption Contest fans! Lawrence Wood is off enjoying the Irish coast and I’m filling in this week. Last month’s contest featured a drawing by cartoonist Nathan Cooper. Here we have a woman opening the door to two chefs and one is clearly speaking. The Chefs may be identical but clearly are visiting the woman at her residence. When we discuss that a caption contest creates a ‘problem to solve’ I believe in this case a large issue is why are they going door to door and why are there multiple chefs.
Nathan Cooper was able to join the judging panel for this contest and his original caption was one that had several variations by the entrants- “Do you have a moment to talk about cheese n’ rice?”
Someone nearly got it exactly “We represent the Church of Cheese and Rice.”
This theme, door to door religious missionaries or proselytizers (I believe in pop culture most commonly Jehovah’s Witnesses), had several variations of Nathan’s original such as-
- “Do you have a minute to talk about the gourd?”
- “Do you have a moment to talk about soufflé?“
- “Hello, do you have a moment to talk about our Lard and Flavor?”
Another trope, asking a neighbor for a cup of sugar, was also explored. There were over 20 variations, often dealing with large and larger amounts of sugar requested, presumably because of the multiple chefs.
- “Could we borrow a cup of sugar?”
- “Could we borrow 14 cups of sugar?”
- “Could we borrow 100 pounds of sugar?”
- “Could we borrow 300 cups of sugar?”
- “Can we borrow 3,482 cups of sugar?”And on and on…
There were entries that suggest the chefs were mob collectors and summons issuers-
- “You’ve been served.”
- “We serve and collect.”
- “We’re here for the dough.”
Another theme I wanted to highlight is the trope of a child asking someone to come out and play.
- “Can Johnny come out and sauté?”
- “Can Tommy come out to fillet?”
- “Can Timmy come out and flay?”
- “Can your husband come out and soufflé?”
What better way to solve the problem of 3 people than a sex joke? “We’d like to propose a méringue à trois.”
Here is my list of worst and best puns-
- “Our savior has never been savorier.”
- “We’re here to save your sole.”
- “Do you believe in a higher cuisine?”
- “I’m sorry we didn’t come earlier. We ran our of thyme.” GROAN
One last pattern in this month’s contest was that the chefs were sent by her husband and family to help her terrible cooking. These were very popular with the online voting.
- “We’re here at the request of your family.”
- “Your mother-in-law sent us.”
- “I’m sure your mother-in-law exaggerated, but could we see you boil water?”
- “Your husband sent us.”
Overall, this contest yielded 6 solid finalists and it was hard to get down to pick a winner.
I think either “Would you say we’re too many or a reasonable amount?”, “Have you smelled the good news?” and “When you sent your compliments, were they for me or him?” would have made a satisfying Grand Prize winner but congratulations to Patrick Foley, who submitted this month’s winning caption: “We’re with Chefs Without Restaurants.”
The other 2 runners-up for this contest are:
- “We’d like to propose a méringue à trois.”
- “We’re promoting our Three Brothers restaurant and we’re also looking for our brother.”
Watch the Judging Process
You can watch our deliberations with Nate below
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