Local chef Brittanny Anderson just keeps adding to her list of accolades. Already this year she’s been nominated for a James Beard Foundation award, and her 2017 restaurant Brenner Pass was named Restaurant of the Year by our critics here at Style. Today Anderson announced that in January of this year, she competed against chef Alex Guarnaschelli in the Food Network’s popular, long-running show Iron Chef.

“I grew up watching it and loved it,” says Anderson of the show, which has been trying to convince her to compete for a while. “My friend Kristin Kish did an episode last season that kind of inspired me to say yes and buck up and do it.”

Anderson and her two sous chefs, Michael Ashley and Lilly Clem, trained for about three weeks before filming the episode in Los Angeles. They practiced menus using possible secret ingredients, timing themselves to prepare for the competition’s strict time restraints.

“It was definitely hard, but worth the effort, and we got so much stronger as a team because of it,” Anderson says.

The episode airs on Wednesday, May 16, and the team will hold a viewing party at Chairlift that evening.