The Truth About Hilda Ike From Worst Cooks In America Season 24

The latest season of Food Network's "Worst Cooks in America" premiered on the Food Network and began streaming on Discovery+ on January 5, 2022, and it's shaping up to be a uniquely entertaining entry in the uber-popular amateur (at best) cooking competition oeuvre (via Broadway World). Although this may be a function of the buzzy new vibe between hosts Anne Burrell and Cliff Crooks, who joined the franchise this season, it also appears to be attributable to some brilliant casting moves on the part of the show. 

Most of this season's 12 contestants came in "pairs," and judging by the interactions captured in the first episode (which sees the pairs together working side-by-side over the course of 90 minutes), many of these pairs know each other so well that they bounce off of one another with comic stylings that could rival those of classic comedic pairs like Cheech and Chong, Pryor and Wilder, and Laurel and Hardy. One of those pairs, comprised of best friends, Hilda Ike and Deneise White, both of whom live in one of Poinciana, Florida's 55+ communities, as the two explain straight away. But don't let that fact mislead you. Despite living in a retirement community, Ike, for her part, isn't even retired. The truth about Ike from "Worst Cooks in America" is that she actually has two careers, not to mention a wicked sense of humor.

Hilda Ike, a contestant on the current season of "Worst Cooks In America," lives in Poinciana, Florida, a retirement condo community (via New Home Source) known for attracting adults ages 55+, thanks to its country club lifestyle. But the truth about Ike is that she's a far cry from what you might picture in your mind when you imagine what Florida retirement community residents are like. For one thing, Ike is not retired. She's both a Zumba instructor and real estate professional, according to her Facebook page. And from what she puts out there thus far on this season's "Worst Cooks In America," it would appear that Ike may well bring to those careers — and to all that she does, in fact, a mischievous and highly infectious sense of humor. 

Certainly, Ike brings that humor on the first episode, during which, among other things, she gets things going by engaging in a bit of sardonic banter with her bestie and fellow "worst cook," Deneice White, over the "right" way to refer to where the two live. For Ike's first dish, she prepares a spicy chicken curry, using two ghost peppers — that's pretty much the maximum number of this uber-spicy capsaicin delivery system that any dish should have, co-host Cliff Crooks points out. And when Burrell cracks up at Ike's resulting "evil" laughter, Ike responds by pouring on more from where that came from. Laughter, that is.