Portage Optometrist 'Dr. Matt' Wins Food Network Competition

I don't know why I get hooked on these shows all the time. They just make me hungry, and make me think I, too, can cook with 5 random ingredients from my pantry. Except, the random ingredients in my cabinets are tortillas, grape jelly, olives, a can of corn, and doritos.

BUT, my guess is, as bad as I am at cooking, Portage native Matt Houck could come up with something, because he's really good at it. SO good, he just won an episode of Food Network's Chopped.

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Houck was on season 9 of Master Chef, and isn't actually a chef by trade...he's an optometrist. So clearly, he can see what others can't when it comes to cooking with strange ingredients.

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A post shared by Dr. Matt Houck (@dinnerwithdrmatt)

If you missed the episode, Episodes of Chopped can be found streaming on HBO's streaming platform "Max," and episodes are on Hulu and Discovery+.

This wasn't Houck's first time on a cooking show. In fact, Chopped probably felt low key compared to his first time on television cooking, as he was a contestant on Season 9 of MasterChef with Gordon Ramsay.

During one episode, Gordon started calling him "Clark" as in Clark Kent, and asking him to "spin 'round" in hopes he would become Superman after waiting to cook his fish.

Ultimately, Houck would be eliminated on that same episode, which was a mystery box of cajun seafood. Clearly, he learned his lesson about cooking with mystery ingredients, and will bring home the $10,000 prize from his episode of Chopped.

When he's not checking people's eyes, Houck actually does a lot of cooking at home, and posts his creations on his instagram account @dinnerwithdrmatt. But really, the guy could easily open a high-end restaurant in the area, and you'd never know the guy actually prescribes contacts and eyeglasses for people.