In the second Nickel City Chef battle of 2013, Lloyd Taco Truck’s Teddy Bryant trumped the Mansion on Delaware’s Jennifer Boye in a battle featuring lardo and pancetta from COPPA Artisan-cured Meats.

Carmelo’s Bruce Wieszala, Encore’s Chris Daigler and New York City food writer Regina Schrambling were on hand to judge the two competitors out of five categories: taste and flavor; creativity; plating and presentation; technical execution and use of the secret ingredient.

Bryant was declared the winner, 54-50, igniting a celebration from a legion of lime-and-black clad Lloyd supporters in attendance. With class, Bryant shook Boye’s hand and showed rather little emotion in pulling off the upset.

The trio of experts lauded Bryant—aided by sous chef Dave Miller—for his “taste and flavor” and use of the secret ingredients, while Boye’s eight points in the secret ingredient category may have been her undoing.

Bryant’s dishes were as follows:

Carbonara: Fresh pasta, Pecorino romano, Painted Meadow egg.
Sea bass: Escarole, pancetta sausage, littleneck clams, roasted tomatoes, Pinot Grigio-pancetta broth.
Maple-pancetta ice cream: Toasted walnuts, candied pancetta, waffle pizzelle, confit orange, fresh orange, maple-orange gastrique.

If you’re unfamiliar with the secret ingredients involved in the contest, here’s a quick description with links:

Pancetta: Sometimes referred to as the “Italian bacon,” pancetta is un-smoked pork belly that’s been cured and dressed with peppercorns.
Lardo: Not exactly for the faint of heart, lardo is cured pork fat from just inside the pig’s skin. Its age is preserved through the curing process, and it can be melted down into a pork fat butter—not unlike the pan remnants after you’ve cooked yourself a delightful pork sausage.

It’s fitting that Wieszala was a judge in a contest involving his own products, as the Carmelo’s chef and cured-meat entrepreneur knows pigs inside and out (literally).

Tickets for Nickel City Chef battles have sold out for the 2013 season, but you can follow the organization on Twitter and Facebook—there are always scrumptious food in photo-form, and the videos are exceptionally produced.