Announcing the Foodista Ingredient of the Day Contest

We love a good food contest or challenge, and there are some great ones out there, such as the Bread Baker's Apprentice Challenge, Tuesdays with Dorie, and You Want Pies with That?, which we eagerly follow through participants' blog posts and tweets.

With this in mind, we've created our own, the Foodista Ingredient of the Day Contest. Every morning, we post a different ingredient on our Facebook page. You have 24 hours to submit recipes using that ingredient; the recipes can be from any source, though original recipes definitely earn bonus points. Every Tuesday afternoon, we select a winner from the week's submission, then send that winner a prize and feature the recipe on the contest homepage.

Comparing recipes like, say, French Apple Pie and Orange Cashew Chicken is about as fair as comparing the proverbial apples and oranges. We'll select the winning recipes based on writing, image quality, and originality, plus the recipe's contribution to Foodista as a whole. We're not looking for just another version of apple pie: get creative, though if you have an apple pie recipe that you think will really knock everyone's socks off, by all means submit it.

Are you ready? Today's secret ingredient is-  well, you'll just have to visit Facebook to find out. Don't worry, the first one's an easy one.