The 15th Global Culinary Masters International Competition begins. Zhou Chi arrives late in greasy kitchen work clothes and is stopped at the entrance by security. His entire team looks down on him for coming from humble street-food roots and bringing shame on the team. In the first round, a timed creative home-style cooking quiz, chefs from around the world pile on expensive ingredients. Zhou Chi alone uses inexpensive tofu to create a Taiji-style Wensi tofu soup, stunning everyone with his extraordinary knife skills and publicly humiliating those who underestimated him. During the draw, everyone urges him to avoid the three-time champion Stars and Stripes team. Zhou Chi instead challenges them head-on, crushing the entire American team with the down-to-earth artistry of Chinese cooking. He pulls off an upset to advance from the first round, making Chinese cuisine famous with a single battle.