[1][2] Stephanie's friend Lula witnesses the murder (by decapitation) of celebrity chef Stanley Chipotle.

While Lula attempts to perfect her "skills" as a chef, she is attacked several times by Chipotle's (extremely inept) killers, but manages to escape each time, though she is forced to move in with Stephanie, and later with the Plum family, and her prized Pontiac Firebird is destroyed by a poorly-constructed car bomb.

He identifies his accomplice as the cook-off's emcee, a vice president of the sauce company that employed Chipotle.

The killing and the reward were intended to be a publicity stunt that would both rid them of Chipotle and generate media attention to the company.

After patient investigation, Stephanie identifies Ranger's thieves as two teenagers who were turned down for jobs at his company, then decided to finance their own company by robbing Ranger's clients, with hidden cameras planted over the clients' security keypads.