Awesome / Worst Cooks in America

• Over the course of just a month or two, the contestants cooking skills do greatly improve—the two finalists actually manage a cook restaurant quality meal for a trio of food experts, which is unbelievable compared to how they were in the first episode of that season. And even for the people who don't win, they do ultimately get something out of it in that their cooking skills do improve (if only somewhat in the cases of some contestants).
• Any time a contestants manage to produce a shockingly delicious and well presented dish during the earlier weeks of the competition (as they are still very green and haven't learned that much), specifically during the challenge where they are give creative freedom to produce anything they want with their own flavor combinations, such as in the third episode of season 4, when contestant Carla made an ice cream that the judges enjoyed so much, even Anne Burrell was doing a little dance after eating.
• So far, the only chefs to actually beat Anne Burrell (the host of the red team and the de facto host of WCIA) are Bobby Flay and Rachel Ray—and just why is this awesome? Anne Burrell has won every single season of the show except for Season 4, 5, 9 and 11, which are the seasons in which she lost to Bobby (4 and 5) and Rachel (9 and 11).
  • It's also awesome to see that Bobby was able to beat Anne multiple years in a row and how both he and Rachel were able to beat Anne after initially losing to her (Bobby had lost to Anne in Season 3 while Rachel had lost to Anne in Season 7 and 10).
• Season 13 proves to be a CMOA for La Toya Jackson from start to finish. She never let any fears or her picky eater habits get in the way of the competition and she went into every challenge with the determination to do well, being an incredibly fast learner and displaying quite an understanding of putting flavors together. She won at least one challenge in every single episode, went on to win the whole season, and gave Tyler a win over Anne after four times having lost to her.
• Season 4's Alina Bolshakova's journey was impressive from start to finish. From being on the chopping block in the first episode, she begins to improve, either being the best or one of the best on her team and to top it off, she ends up giving Bobby the win and causing Anne's first ever loss.