Retro-Review: Season One of Top Chef

I'm doing a Hulu free trial for a month, and lo and behold, I saw that they have several past seasons of Top Chef. So I decided to take a fresh look at Season One from 2006. I watched it back then, and remembered a lot of the contestants, including Harold, Dave, Tiffani, and Lee Anne. But there was something I'd forgotten: the judges were mean. Outright mean. Yes, I'm talking about Tom Collichio and Gail Simmons (who, by the way, haven't changed a bit in terms of appearance -- they still look as fantastic now as they did back then).

In the current Season 17, Top Chef All Stars in L.A., the judges tell the chefs who had their "least favorite dish." Back in Season 1, it was "You three had the worst dishes" and "I'd get rid of all three of you if I could." At multiple points, Tom deliberately tries to stoke arguments between chefs. Instead of saying, "Some of your teammates felt your performance was weak", Tom says "Dave, Tiffani says you should go home." During the deliberations, the judges also take past performance into consideration when judging on a current challenge, which they never do now. But mainly, it's the judges' tone that bothers me.

What I like about the more recent seasons of Top Chef is that there's a much more prevalent attitude of respect. Yes, the challenges are still tricky, with twists and last-minute curve balls, but they don't seem designed to make the chefs fail. In Season 1, there's an episode with Ted Allen from Queer Eye for the Straight Guy as a guest judge. He's holding a dinner party for his cookbook launch, and tells the chefs that it's very important to him, so they better do well or he'll be a cranky judge. The seven chefs excitedly plan fantastic dishes -- this, after weeks of having to cook with microwaves and ingredients purchased at gas stations -- and then Tom walks into the kitchen and says they have to draw knives to trade courses, and cook each other's planned dishes. And then he tells them they can choose to help each other succeed in those dishes or not, it's up to them.

As far as I'm concerned, Ted and Company deserved a crappy dinner party at that point.

Most of the competitors were as I remembered them, except Stephen. I did remember that he was an arrogant sommelier who felt it was his civic chef duty to educates the masses, which apparently meant everybody other than himself, whether they wanted to be educated or not. There's an episode where he rants at Candace, the youngest and least experienced competitor who was only halfway through culinary school when she went on the show (which would never happen now!), because she wanted to serve children food that was appropriate for children. But in rewatching, I found Stephen to be so over the top that he was almost a caricature, and I have to wonder how much of that "performance" was contrived.

Another detail from Season 1 that surprises me is the bare-bones stew room, where everyone drinks bottled water. Nowadays they're always drinking wine, usually in a slightly nicer setting, while they wait to hear what the judges have to say. And most shocking of all: in one episode, Stephen uses a laptop at the house to look up recipes online for the next day's challenge!

And I'd almost forgotten that Season 1 was hosted by Katie Lee Joel! No wonder, because for me the name Padma Lakshmi is practically synonymous with Top Chef. Poor Katie's delivery was absolutely wooden, and she didn't even taste the food or have any input in the Quickfire challenge decisions.

Obviously I liked Season 1 well enough at the time, because I watched it through back then, and eagerly awaited every new season as it came out. But boy, it's hard to like it now in comparison to later seasons.

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Top Chef: All-Stars L.A. - Playing "Ketchup" with Episodes 6 and 7

[The Walt Disney Concert Hall, where the Top Chef contestants cooked to celebrate the L.A. Philharmonic's 100th anniversary]

Episode 6: Get Your Phil

The Quickfire challenge this time around featured all kinds of flour, with the exception of all-purpose flour -- which of course threw the chefs for a loop. The guest judge was Chris Bianco, who looked to me like a nice version of the Heat Miser and Snow Miser's love child. Mr. Bianco is apparently famous as an artisan baker and pizza master, hence the flour challenge. And I had no idea there were so many types of flour! Quinoa flour, masa flour, blue corn flour, rice flour, rye flour....

So how did it go down? Bryan Voltaggio, having earlier remarked that he hasn't done well in the Quickfires, then makes a dish that he himself says "doesn't have much flour in it," whereas everyone else is featuring flour. Bryan did this before in the fried rice Quickfire challenge; if I recall correctly, he made something else (porridge? oatmeal?) with a little fried rice on top. I would think he'd know by now that the judges expect the highlighted ingredient to be a major component of the dish.

But he still did way better than Brian Malarkey, who envisioned making coconut ice cream and a coconut donut. Guess which half ended up on the plate? Not the part that uses flour! I really disliked his little "performance" apology to Padma and Chris Bianco, in which he asks them to envision a luscious donut, blah blah blah. I don't want to keep picking on him, but a little of his personality really goes a long way.

On the top end, we had Gregory, Nini, and Melissa, with Gregory taking home $5,000 for his nutty tapioca pancakes with blueberry maple syrup.

The Elimination challenge was certainly interesting. The chefs drew knives for the five flavor profiles: sweet, salty, sour, bitter, and umami. Then, they had to divide themeselves into pairs, with the caveat that partners could not have the same profile. Karen and Nini (umami/sour) immediately chose to work together, and Gregory and Stephanie (salty/sour), Melissa and Kevin (sweet/salty), and Bryan and Erik (sweet/bitter) quickly sorted themselves. That left Lee Anne and Marlarkey (umami/bitter) to work together. Note to producers: do you realize how much you give away in the editing? The minute we see the pre-commercial teasers of Lee Anne and Marlarkey butting heads, we know that they actually won't be going home. You're telegraphing it all over the place.

At any rate, the task was to cook a dish highlighting the two flavor profiles, and serve it to the judges, the conductor of the L.A. Phil, and 60 orchestra members, all to celebrate the Phil's 100th anniversary. As an aside, I loved conductor Gustavo Dudamel's anecdote about becoming his conductor's assistant at age eleven -- it reminded me of the character Rodrigo De Souza in the fabulous Amazon series Mozart in the Jungle. Back to the cooking: Kevin and Melissa won handily with a cabbage dish, while Padma noted that Lee Anne and Malarkey came close to winning themselves. On the bottom were Bryan V. and Erik, for not getting enough sweetness into their pork dish, and Karen and Nini, for introducing too much sweetness into what was supposed to be an umami/sour dish. Ultimately, Karen and Nini were eliminated. I thought it was the right decision, because it seems a lesser evil to have too little of one flavor profile, versus introducing an intrusive third flavor profile into the dish. They're told, however, that they'll be cooking on Last Chance Kitchen that very night.

One final question about this episode: How is it possible that Nini and Karen were allowed to dig into bins of fish with their bare hands at Whole Foods? Did the store have to throw away any fish they didn't take, or did they sell it to other customers? Gross!


Episode 7: Pitch Perfect

Right at the beginning of the episode, we find Karen back on Top Chef, which I was glad to see. The best moment of that LCK episode was when Joe Sasto, over in the peanut gallery, calls the competitors "girls." Karen, without missing a beat, retorts "Chefs would be better. Where I'm from, they call me Chef too." Boom!

This Quickfire was a little on the silly side. The Chefs had to make tacos in honor of guest judge Danny Trejo, which makes sense because he owns a line of taco restaurants, but the only "knife" they could use was a machete. Yes, yes, I know why, but as far as I'm concerned, that little gimmick was a severed finger waiting to happen. Fortunately, nobody cut anything off. Gregory had a terrible time because he'd never made a tortilla, and being flustered led him to oversalt his rockfish. Stephanie got her first win, with the all-important immunity, and her happiness was great to see. Lee Anne and Karen also showed well.

Okay, this was a terrific idea for an Elimination challenge. The chefs had to pitch their restaurant concepts, including a menu, a mood board, and sample dishes, and the two winners would have their concepts brought to life in the following week's Restaurant Wars. I'll be honest, I didn't know what a mood board was before this episode; I guess now I would describe it was a sophisticated collage that uses colors and textures to elicit a mood that you're trying to convey. Guest judges for this challenge were Stephanie Izard, who won Top Chef: Chicago in 2008, and restauranteur Kevin Boehm.

The concept that appealed the most to me was Melissa's "Sabrina", which she described as modern Asian California that was also romantic. The judges liked it; Kevin Boehn said that Melissa has "Michelin-star chops." But they were more impressed with the tightness of Gregory and Kevin's concepts. Gregory came up with "Kann" (the Haitian word for cane, as in sugar cane), a restaurant serving Haitian wood-fired food, and Kevin presented "The Country Captain", based on the dish of the same name. It's a dish I've never heard of, but apparently it's the first truly American version of a curry dish, generally made with chicken. The judges also liked Malarkey's Baja Asian street food concept, but chose Gregory and Kevin's to compete in Restaurant Wars.

On the bottom: Erik, Stephanie, and Lee Anne. Stephanie had immunity, so that left Erik and Lee Anne. And while her concept was a little run-of-the-mill in the judges' mind, Erik's was also muddy, plus he didn't execute his dishes well, so he went home.


Where We're At Now

Next episode is Restaurant Wars! I don't have a prediction going in -- Restaurant Wars is probably the hardest challenge to predict, ever, because so many things can go wrong no matter how talented the chefs are. They have to depend on servers who don't know their food or the pop-up restaurants layouts, and on diners knowing that they shouldn't linger too long after dessert when there are crowds at the door. I like Kevin and Gregory equally, so I can't even say I have a preference for which restaurant wins.


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Top Chef: All-Stars L.A. - Playing "Ketchup" with Episodes 3, 4, and 5

[L-R: Ludo LeFebvre, Padma Lakshmi, Tom Colicchio, and Gail Simmons]
If I can't keep up with Top Chef blogging when I'm stuck at home 24/7, it's probably hopeless, but I'm going to try and catch up anyway with this summary of Episodes 3, 4, and 5.


Episode 3: Strokes of Genius

I was super excited to see Ali Wong and Randall Park as guest judges for the Quickfire Challenge! I adored them in the Netflix movie they co-wrote, co-produced, and co-starred in, Always Be My Maybe, and I recently read her book Dear Girls, a somewhat rated-R memoir written as short letters to her still-small daughters (to be read after they turn 21, she says). The Quickfire was to make a great fried rice dish, incorporating at least one of the odd ingredients that Randall and Ali had picked, including peanut butter, frog legs, jelly beans, Red Hots, watermelon, Fritos, and so on. Kevin won immunity with what he called "bachelor fried rice"; it contained wieners, cheetos, and bourbon. Ali called it a party in her mouth. (I will make no comments!)

For the Elimination Challenge, the chefs went to the Getty Museum to find inspiration in art. I like these kinds of challenges, but sometimes they work better than others. In this case, many of the dishes were a reach when it came to connecting them with the art period that inspired them. But there were some truly beautiful plates. Melissa took top honors with a lobster wonton in broth; guest judge Ludo LeFebvre called it a Michelin-star dish, Gail said it was pretty close to perfection, and Tom called it stunning. I know I certainly wanted to try it!

On the bottom end, Jamie was asked to pack his knives and go, because although his plate was gorgeous, he failed to get the jus onto the chicken, so it ate dry. Lee Anne was also in the bottom, and it's worth noting (because a pattern will emerge) that she ran out of time plating. She still seemed to get everything on the plate, but she said it looked terrible. In my mind, the bigger problem was that it was a whole mess of ingredients. She described it to the judges as: duck breast, a duck egg, a duck confit, beet red wine puree, yellow golden beet puree, fermented black garlic sauce, bread and celery root puree, and poached apples. It seemed like the list would never end!


Episode 4: You're So Fresh

Another fun guest judge for the Quickfire Challenge: Kelly Clarkson! With great promotional timing, her appearance coincided with the upcoming animated Trolls film in which she voices a character. So the kitchen was decorated with Trolls and six bright colors, each one representing a group of trolls and their musical genre from the movie. The chefs had to make a dish with at least one ingredient from each color group. As you can imagine, this resulted in some fairly strange dishes. Gregory won the Quickfire with a butternut squash and plantain vegan soup.

The Elimination Challenge was one I could get really excited about: two teams, each creating a six-course progressive vegetarian meal that would include dessert and feature produce they would be buying at the Santa Monica Farmers Market. The blue team's meal seemed almost perfect, and what I wouldn't give to have been in that restaurant sampling that menu! The red team made the mistake of starting with two raw dishes in a row, and neither were spectacular. Brian Malarkey made a tomato and mozzarella salad that, while beautiful, certainly wasn't very original. It was followed by Lee Anne's hummus with crudite.

Although this season has been fairly drama-free so far, this episode flirted with drama disaster when it came out at Judges' Table that Lee Anne's dish didn't have enough salt on it. Remember I said that pattern that was developing? In Lee Anne's own words, "I just don't have time to finish plating my dish" -- for which she has nobody to blame, especially when 1) it happened to her the previous episode, and 2) she was plating raw vegetables! So Lee Anne made a point at Judges' Table of saying she didn't finish off her plates, somebody else did, at which point a slightly guilt-stricken Marlarkey pointed out that the hummus was underseasoned too, i.e. that could not possibly have been his fault. He didn't need to say this -- the judges wouldn't have sent him home for how much salt he did or didn't put on someone else's dish -- but on the other hand, Lea Anne kind of started it by pointing out that it was supposedly someone else's mistake.

Sigh.... but I have to give Lee Anne credit for letting it go.

At any rate, Melissa won her second Elimination Challenge in a row with a coconut corn soup with pickled garlic chives and puffed rice grains. Again, I would have loved to tasted the entirety of that team's menu, but I also have to say, I was excited by both teams' desserts, which may never have happened before. Eric made a butternut squash and goat's milk pudding with chocolate hazelnut "soil" and a ginger granita. Nini made a delicious-looking "peaches and cream" creampuff with peach sorbet. I bet that tasted heavenly.

Before I move on to the next episode, my two favorite moments were Karen, Stephanie, and Nini chorusing "Good morning, Padma!" while striking a Charlie's Angels pose, and Karen's reaction to seeing Kelly Clarkson walk in through the door. My least favorite moment, however, was when the chefs stormed the table with the colored ingredients, almost knocking each other over and taking ridiculous quantities of food. I will keep saying this until I'm blue in the face: the chefs should not have to physically wrestle over ingredients. They should either draw knives to see who picks in what order, or there should be enough of every ingredient for every chef who wants it.

Episode 5: Bring Your Loved One to Work

Almost every season of Top Chef involves family members, and this season is no exception. For the Quickfire, the chefs had to imitate a restaurant dish as described over the phone by their family member. Padma called this a challenge of communication, and while that was true to an extent, you can be the best communicator in the world and not recognize a certain fish, or know that cilantro is cilantro. So it wasn't an entirely level playing field. Kevin won, assisted by his wife who is not only an attorney with a head for details, she also knows food and subtle tastes. Still, Kevin's reaction when he wins something is adorable, so I had to be happy for him.

I enjoyed this Elimination Challenge. The chefs had to create a signature product and then serve it at an outdoor shopping center with a dish showcasing that product. They had the evening before to prepare the product, then time to cook the dish the next day. During the evening session, Lee Anne's mother became faint and had to leave the kitchen. I was glad to see that Lee Anne behaved like a trouper, and the other chefs pitched in to give her a hand where they could.

Between the evening and the next day, we got one of those interludes where they show the chefs at the house, and we were treated (!) to Brian Malarkey's list of who he thought would go home next. I think the instinct to have those thoughts is entirely natural, and if writing it down helped him organize his thoughts, that's fine. But to share that on television? That was kind of a dick move. I knew the minute they showed it that he would end up in the bottom of the Elimination Challenge, and so he did. Honestly? I'm ready for him to go home. It wasn't him, however, but Jen, whose "sunny" ginger and lemon sauce turned Tom off with its grainy ginger bits. Joining Jen at the bottom were Stephanie, who seems to have a lot of stress-induced crankiness (I can relate), and the afore-mentioned Brian Malarkey.

At the other end of the spectrum, the three top contenders at Judges' Table were Gregory, Nini, and Eric. It's worth noting that all three made something related to their respective Haitian, Vietnamese, and African heritage, which often seems to delight the judges when it's done at this kind of elevated level. Gail said Nini's Nuoc Mam glaze was clearly made with love, the second time she's described Nini's food that way (the other time was the peach dessert). The judges also had a nice word to say to Melissa, who "sold" 31 bottles of her Korean-inspired kimchi-peach vinaigrette. But it was Gregory who took first place.


Where We're At Now

I like this season so far. My top three prediction, in order, is Melissa, Gregory, and Kevin, who all seem to be winning up a storm. Kevin has a lot of heart, but Melissa and Gregory seem to be extremely consistent so far. I'd be happy to see any of the three of them win. My favorite challenge so far has been the vegetarian progressive meal. I'm not a vegetarian myself, but I keep my meat consumption pretty low, and I'm always excited to see what really great chefs can do with vegetarian ingredients.

Until next time .... which is a few hours from now!

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Top Chef: All-Stars L.A. - Episode 2 - "The Jonathan Gold Standard"

[The Top Chef contestants arrive at L.A.'s Union Station]
This week's episode had a little change-up in format; instead of competing in a Quickfire Challenge, the chefs spent a day exploring a handful of L.A. restaurants listed in the late food critic Jonathan Gold's guidebook. The first 17 minutes of the episode consisted of the chefs sampling some of Gold's favorite dishes, looking for inspiration for the dish they would each individually serve to 200 guests gathering to honor Gold, who passed away in 2018.


Elimination Challenge

After stuffing themselves silly (no judgment here; I'm just envious!), the chefs were given 30 minutes and $700 to shop at Whole Foods. That seems like a lot of money, but of course they want the best ingredients and they'll be serving 200 people apiece.

A little foreshadowing occurred during prep: Eric Adjepong said of his African-inspired scallops and braised red cabbage that it was a "kind of funky pairing" so it would be hard to pull off. Just as Tom Colicchio told Joe Sasto in the first episode that "glue" isn't a word you want to have associated with your food, so I would tell Eric the same about the word "funky." In the meantime, Stephanie Cmar realized mid-service that offering Indian food to Padma without having any experience cooking it might not have been the best strategy.

At the event, the two guest judges were food writer Ruth Reichl and Laurie Ochoa, an arts and entertainment editor and Jonathan Gold's wife. I enjoyed seeing director and actor Jon Favreau as one of the guests, especially because I recently watched his movie Chef, in which he plays a high-level chef who finds himself again by running a food truck.

The dishes were varied and interesting! I was drawn to Melissa King's mala beef tartare served on a little spiced potato chip, but sadly would have found it too spicy. I truly wish I wasn't a spice wimp. Same goes for Karen Akunowicz's pan-roasted cumin lamb dumpling. I'm a sucker for dumplings, but when describing it she used the word "chili" twice.... I was puzzled by Brian Malarkey's dish, which was (deep breath) a fried rice beef tartare with kimchi vinaigrette, cracked peanuts, and a fish-sauce cured fermented egg yolk.

???

Lee Anne's dish... I'm with Tom; you could see by his expression that he wasn't won over by the cheese and fish combination. And assuming the order of service aired is the same that actually happened, you could tell Lee Anne's confidence in it was shaken when she self-consciously greeted Padma and Gail with "Hello, ladies, I'm braving the fish and cheese boat."

One thing that puzzled me show-wise is that we heard chefs describing their dishes during prep, we heard again when the first set of judges tasted them, and yet again when the other set of judges tasted them. It seems to me that in years past, we would hear one set of judges' reactions or the other, but not usually both, unless there was something unusual going on. So this episode felt a little repetitious to me by the end. Is it because they had more time to fill due to the lack of a Quickfire Challenge? Meanwhile, the silhouette of Jonathan Gold projected high on the wall made me think that Alfred Hitchcock was there waiting for a murder mystery on the Top Chef show.


Judges' Table

Overall the judges thought the group did a good job honoring Jonathan Gold's legacy. Their three favorite dishes were by Nini, Kevin, and Brian Voltaggio. Tom loved Nini's broth from her "masa" ball soup so much that he told her he'd had someone bottle up what was left since he was feeling under the weather. Ruth Reichl said that she was expecting the worst from Kevin's "clunky ball" but that it turned out to be delicious, and she said twice during the show that he needs to bottle the apple butter that he used, which turned out to be his grandmother's recipe. Gail told Brian V. that his short ribs felt like a departure from anything she'd eaten before from him, which made me think: if someone asked me to describe Brian V's food overall, I couldn't do it. I don't have a feeling for who he is as a cook, but at the same time, I would have confidence in anything he put down in front of me. Of the three, the judges picked Kevin's dish as their favorite.

Next came the three least favorite dishes, and there were really no surprises based on the comments made during the event. Angelo, Stephanie, and Eric were called up to have their dishes picked apart. Stephanie accepted the criticism gracefully; she was obviously unhappy with herself, but she didn't disagree with anything the judges said. Of Eric's dish, Gail said that the two pieces (the scallops and the cabbage) were not talking to each other. When asked about his dish, Angelo talked again about being inspired by tumeric. Tom called the dish too sweet, Padma said that the tuna, while beautifully seasoned, didn't make sense in the dish, and Ruth had the severest criticism of the night when she said, not unkindly, that the tuna had died in vain because the dish was just a piece of flesh in broth. She also said that she felt like the three bottom chefs forgot that food is supposed to be delicious, and the cutest moment of the episode is Padma's expression when she says, "YESSSSS!!!" to indicate that Ruth expressed Padma's own feelings perfectly.

Ultimately, Angelo was asked to pack his knives. I'm sad to see him go, but I felt like his focus wasn't there as I remembered it from his previous season. I did watch "Last Chance Kitchen", by the way, and debated blogging about that too, but I've decided I'll just let that unfold as it may.


Elimination Challenge Winner: Kevin Gillespie

Packed Their Knives: Angelo Sosa

Dish I Most Wanted to Taste: Kevin's roasted pork, mushroom, and black currant terrine with apple butter, because I'm a sucker for hot little dumpling-type foods, especially with unexpected ingredients (as long as they're not too spicy!)

Question of the Week: When did everyone on Top Chef decide that saying "in broth" was too passe, and we must now refer to it as "en brodo" as much as possible?

Who I'm Most Rooting for After this Episode: Kevin Gillepsie, because who wouldn't be moved by his humble statement upon winning this week, and Melissa King. I can't put my finger on what it is, but there's something about her that I really like. I also liked Nini's sweet and apparently calm disposition. She thought of a dish, she made it, she served it with confidence -- no drama there at all.


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Top Chef: All-Stars L.A. - Episode 1 - "It's Like They Never Left"

[Left to right: Jeremiah Tower, Padma Lakshmi, Tom Colicchio, and Gail Simmons]
Although this season of Top Chef is called "Top Chef All Stars L.A.", I'm tempted to rename it "Top Chef 2020 - The Social Distancing Edition". The enforced isolation is giving me the time to blog the episodes again, something I haven't been able to do in a couple of years. And heaven knows I want and need the distraction from the news right now!

Before I get started ... It occurred to me to think about whether I prefer this, an all-star season, to a regular season with a completely new crop of chefs. And I think I prefer this right now, because it's the TV version of "comfort food," giving me a lot of familiar faces, most of whom I like. And I'm all about comfort food at the moment! I'm most excited to see Gregory Gourdet, Angelo Sosa, Lee Anne Wong, and Bryan Voltaggio back -- although I think it's a bit weird for Bryan to be back after having been on Top Chef Masters. And as always, it's terrific to see Tom, Padma, and Gail again!


QuickFire Challenge

I liked this version of the familiar mis-en-place, which took place at L.A.'s Griffith Observatory, presumably because it's both iconic and scenic. All 15 chefs started by "turning" artichokes, which I think means removing the leaves and the choke to get to the heart. The first five chefs to finish to Tom's satisfaction formed the first team, and got to immediately speed away and begin on the remainder of the Quickfire challenge, which was to use the prepped ingredients to create two dishes. The remaining 10 chefs began to "supreme" California oranges, a term I've never heard used as a verb before! According to marthastewart.com, supreming "is a technique that removes the membrane from citrus fruit so it can be served in slices" with "no rind, no pith, no mess." The five chefs who finished this task first formed the second team, and also got to leave for the kitchen, but the remaining chefs had to shell 20 perfect almonds, which apparently is a lot harder than it sounds. The last team couldn't leave for the kitchen until all five had completed the task, and once they arrived, the 15-minute clock started for all teams, giving the first two teams a significant time advantage over the third.

Rather than list the many variations of artichoke dishes that were prepared and given Really Long Names, I'll summarize by saying that the first team, wearing red aprons, won the challenge, even though Joe Sasto's pasta was one of the judges' least favorite elements (and Joe making pasta was the source of the episode title "It's Like They Never Left", because apparently he made it a few too many times during his original season). Each member of this team became a team captain for the Elimination Challenge, and were given the option of choosing their team members. So the competition went from 3 teams of 5 preparing 2 dishes to 5 teams of 3 preparing 3 dishes. (Got that?)


Elimination Challenge

This was a fun challenge, and one that folks who've competed on the show before, and watched other seasons, might have seen coming: cooking seafood on the beach using only a fire pit. Each chef was meant to prepare an individual dish, but the judges were also looking for cohesiveness among each team.

The Green team went first, consisting of Melissa King, Karen Akunowicz, and Angelo Sosa. I remember Melissa and Angelo from prior seasons, but I think I must have missed Karen's season. I remember Melissa having this sort-of understated super-competence, if that makes sense, and she showed it here by impressing the judges with her grilled swordfish and radicchio. Karen's grilled scallops also went over well, but Angelo's oysters were, according to Tom, off-putting because there were neither hot nor cold. In fact, Tom compared the oysters to eating phlegm.

Next came the Red team: Brian Malarkey, who served sea urchin and spot prawns with hibiscus ponzu; Joe Sasto, who offered a flatbread with clams, sea urchin, peppers, and aioli; and Lee Anne Wong, who prepared a glazed halibut and sea urchin. It immediately became clear that this team was likely to be on the bottom, because Brian and Lee Anne's dishes both had sauces that made the flatbread soggy (the food was served family-style). Lee Anne also accidentally burned the edges of her fish.

The Yellow team was led by Jamie Lynch, who served steamed muscles that Tom ultimately found a little dry, although the judges liked the taste. Gregory Gourdet made a charred salmon with grilled peaches (yum) and a roasted chili dressing, which I'm sure would have been too spicy for me, but the judges loved it. Stephanie Cmar served a brined prawn with tomato sauce and roasted corn dressing, which Gail loved. Guest judge Nancy Silverton said she liked everything from this team.

Next up: the Dark Blue team (they were just called the Blue team, but the last team looked to be Light Blue to me!). Kevin Gillepsie made an eye of swordfish dish that Tom said was overcooked, although all of the judges practically gasped at how beautiful the presentation was. Jennifer Carroll made a spiced tuna loin with grilled kale, which multiple judges said they would gladly eat every day. Nini Nguyen, another chef I don't recognize (so I probably missed her season), served a grilled scallop with a variety of vegetables. The judges commented on the "herb line" that went through all three dishes, drawing them together as a cohesive meal.

Last but not least was the Light Blue team, with Bryan Voltaggio serving a sablefish over corn porridge and charred leeks. The judges liked the taste but the fish was somewhat overcooked. Eric Adjepong, who I don't recognize, made a "Chesapeake boil" with prawns -- I'm not sure what that means. Lisa Fernandes made a ceviche that Tom praised for being simple and ice cold.


Judges' Table

So there were no real surprises at the Judges' Table. The Yellow team won, with Gregory taking home top honors, and the Red team was on the bottom. The only bit of suspense was whether Lee Anne or Joe would go home, and in the end it was Joe. I always feel for that first chef to go home.

What actually surprised me in this episode was how much Lee Anne struggled during every phase. She was on the last team in the mis-en-place contest, her tempura artichoke was thick and doughy, ostensibly because she couldn't get a fryer quickly enough or for long enough, and she burned her fish by pouring olive oil directly on top of her grilling fish instead of rubbing the oil on the grill itself. I like Lee Anne, so I don't want to pick on her, but I wonder if her difficulties stem from the fact that after competing during Season 1 of Top Chef, she then went on to work as a behind-the-scenes producer of the show for several years, which may have kept her from doing as much cooking as she otherwise would have done. Anyway, hopefully she'll go far in the season, and she did go far in Season 1. [Edited to add: ack! I didn't realize Lee Anne was also on Season 15, which I missed. So much for my theory!]

So, to wrap up.....

Quick Fire Winner: Red team - Brian V., Jamie, Joe, Melissa, and Kevin

Elimination Challenge Winner: Gregory Gourdet

Packed Their Knives: Joe Sasto

Dish I Most Wanted to Taste The Blue team's artichoke tempura with citrus aioli, from the Quickfire Challenge

Who I'm Most Rooting for After this Episode: Gregory, Kevin, Melissa, and Angelo


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Top Chef Season 13 - ""Where It All Started"

QuickFire Challenge

Ooh, ouch. I'm not sure how I feel about a sudden death QuickFire at this late stage of the game, but at least this was handled fairly. And the show does have a history (in the past few seasons, at least) of having a sudden death QuickFire right when the last few contestants arrive for the finale, so this isn't much different. (Although a slight nitpick: when they do an "each judge votes," I feel like they should have to write their answers down before hearing what the other judges have to say. Otherwise it's too easy for cynical me to believe they're rigging it to get to the tie-breaking situation.)

Anyway, this particular QuickFire was all about artisanal toast. Apparently fine-dining toast is all the rage, although this is the first I've heard about it. But I'll take the show's word for it, since I'm not out there eating at new restaurants every night and reading all the top foodie magazines. (I only subscribe to Clean Eating, which I highly recommend, by the way, but it's about healthy recipes for home, not about the latest culinary industry trends.)

I can see where this was a tough challenge. You don't want the toast to be dry and tasteless, but you don't want it soggy either. Marjorie and Isaac did fine, but it was Jeremy who won the challenge, not to mention a $16,000 oven of some kind. He made a ciabatta toast topped with chicken liver mousse, pickled cherries, arugula, and jalapeños.

This left Carl and Amar on the bottom: Carl due to his unappealing combination of fish and cheese, and Amar's too complicated, too soggy rendition of fois gras, duck, and balsamic truffle glaze. Their challenge for the head-to-head elimination was to cook any dish, and Carl made a .... crudo. The technical definition of crudo is "a dish of raw fish or seafood, typically dressed with oil, citrus juice, and seasonings." Remember at that finale in Hawaii when Tom pitched a fit because one of the contestants didn't use any heat so therefore didn't "cook" in his opinion? I disagreed with him then, because of the local Hawaiian ingredients the chefs were trying to incorporate into their dishes. In this case, though.... if you're told to make the best dish you can make to keep yourself in the show, would you really just do raw fish again?

Not surprisingly, Tom preferred Amar's cooked fish dish (pan roasted fish with watermelon radish, plum yuzu brown butter, and pickled mushrooms) but Padma preferred Carl's crudo, and the guest judge, Traci Des Jardins, was the tie-breaker, choosing Carl. I was sorry to see Amar go. At this point I like all the contestants, so I can't be happy when any of them have to leave after getting so far.


Elimination Challenge

The Elimination Challenge brought back a familiar face from Top Chef Masters: French chef Hubert Keller. I didn't know it until they showed the clip, but apparently he was also a guest judge on the first episode of Top Chef's very first season! In any case, Chef Keller explained that he had just closed his signature restaurant, Fleur de Lys, but was going to re-open it for a group of 40 VIP guests for whom the remaining four contestants would cook. The chefs were given some time to study the restaurant's previous menus.

Poor Carl. He so desperately wanted to make foie gras that he just rationalized and rationalized until he could convince himself that he could make in three hours what he said normally takes three days to make. (Tom later mentioned that it took at least 24 hours.) Jeremy got ambitious too, settling on making "branzino," which apparently is sea bass. Personally, I was more intrigued by his fluffy little potato "pillows." Marjorie made lamb "saddle," which is both sides of the lamb loin with the attached backbone joining them together. But it sounded to me like she took it off the bone to cook it, which you know if you've watched enough Top Chef is another no-no as far as Tom is concerned. Isaac made duck ballontine, which means (I think) that he de-skinned and de-boned the ducks, then stuffed the meat back into the skin.

It was immediately apparent that Jeremy was the clear winner, and I have to say I was happy for him. Marjorie completely psyched herself out, which was unfortunate, because she has it in her to make it to the end. Isaac's ballontine was actually kind of unappealing to look at, just a mass of brown stuff on a plate, and the judges found the duck to be dry. And unsurprisingly, Carl's fois gras was seriously underdone, a mistake for which he was sent home. I wasn't surprised.

So now we're down to three, heading into a two-part season finale in Law Vegas. I can't say I'm overly excited about David Copperfield as a guest, but maybe that's just me. If I had to predict it now, I would guess we'll see Marjorie and Jeremy go up against each other in the end. I think Isaac is talented and actually a lot of fun, but I think the other two may have a bit more range than he does.

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Top Chef Season 13 - Wok This Way

I'm pretty sure this is the first episode this season that actually made me tear up. I completely agree with the judges' decisions on both the winner and the loser this episode, but still....

Before I get into specifics, though, I do have an aside. Most episodes, they show a chef calling home, and this time it was Jeremy. He spoke on the phone to his daughter, who had just made honor roll, according to Jeremy because of all those books he made her read. He then said "I teach my daughter to be a winner always. If you're second, you're the first loser."

No. NO NO NO NO NO!

Now, while I am a fan of the kids' sports leagues where the coaches and parents don't unduly pressure the kids, I'm not a big fans of the ones where every kid on every team gets a trophy every season. In addition to learning the value of doing your best, it's important to learn how to lose gracefully. So when Jeremy said his daughter had to read 125 books for some school challenge, that's great<. But what if she read 125 books and some other kid read 126 -- is Jeremy then telling his daughter that she's a loser? I dislike how he expressed that sentiment, and I truly hope that's not how he's raising his kid.

And back to the show....

For this episode's QuickFire, the chefs used woks in guest judge Martin Yan's kitchen. I wasn't familiar with Chef Yan but the contestants obviously were; he was apparently one of the early celebrity chefs with a show called "Yan Can Cook." The contestants were given 30 minutes to create a chop suey dish. Chef Yan explained that "chop" means mixture and "suey" means bite-sized morsel, and the two together make the famous Chinese-American dish. He also noted that the wok stations the chefs would be cooking at are five to eight times stronger than normal restaurant kitchen burners.

Long story short, our top three contenders were Marjorie, Jeremy, and Amar. To me, Marjorie's lobster dish looked the most refined -- the most "fine dining" of the chop sueys. Jeremy also did well with his Dungeness crab with a kick, and Chef Yan also liked Amar's pork, vegetable, and fried rice dish. While Carl's lobster dish looked good, both Padma and Chef Yan found it had too few veggies to be a proper chop suey. Isaac's chicken was a little starchy, and Kwame's oil-blanching technique backfired a bit when his eggplant soaked up all the oil. In the end, Marjorie won the QuickFire, earning as as-yet-unknown advantage in the Elimination Challenge.

This was a neat challenge. Padma explained that San Francisco is full of venture capitalists, or people looking to invest in, well, pretty much anything. The six chefs were challenged to create a concept for a fast casual restaurant that would work anywhere in the United States. They would have to describe the concept, name their restaurant, make a single dish for 150 diners, and indicate what the rest of their menu would look like.

Now this is what I call the right balance. It requires the chefs to envision more than a single dish, to think through the things that will make or break a restaurant, but still be required to cook at a level that's actually somewhat reasonable and achievable.

Instead of immunity, the advantage that Marjorie won in the QuickFire was that she not only got to pick her own sous chef from among six eliminated contestants, she got to pair everyone else too. I was definitely surprised that Marjorie didn't pick Karen, but I realized she actually made a wise choice in picking Angelina as her sous chef. While it's obvious that Marjorie and Karen have the utmost respect for each other, Karen did have some time management issues during restaurant wars, and Angelina's lesser experience actually makes her more likely to simply do what Marjorie needs without trying to insert her own editorial view into the challenge. Alas, poor Kwame got stuck with Phillip. Well, Marjorie had to stick him with someone, and since she didn't have immunity herself, it made sense that she try to make sure somebody would have a disadvantage.

Some of the concepts were fun, some were well thought out, and some were less so. The judges made a point of comparing Carl's "Savory Med" concept with the Chipotle chain, but actually I thought most of the chefs' concepts were along those lines. Maybe Carl's menu sign just made it more obvious. In any case, here's what we had: Carl's "Savory Med," for which he served lamb stew over couscous; Marjorie's "Pasta Mama," serving olive oil poached tuna over fresh-made spaghetti; Isaac's "Gumbo for Y’all," with bowls of gumbo that he envisioned as takeaway for the whole family; Jeremy's "Taco Dudes," where he served pork belly tacos and had plans for octopus and other unusual proteins; Kwame's "Waffle Me," with mini chicken and waffles; and Amar’s "Pio Pio," serving Dominican-influenced rotisserie chicken.

In retrospect, while I liked this episode, I can't say that I found any of the concepts all that exciting. I'd love to try quick fresh pasta, but the idea of eating if with tuna didn't really appeal to me. I agreed with the judges that Carl's "Savory Med" seemed to be the best concept. And just going by food trends right now, I have to imagine that Carl's healthier menu would have a better chance of succeeding than Marjorie's carb-heavy idea. Don't get me wrong; I love pasta, but I'm also not looking for reasons to eat it more often than I already do. On the other hand, I was surprised that Carl's prospective menu offered lamb, chicken, and fish without offering a vegetarian option, which would go hand in hand with the "healthier" image.

In any case, Carl did win, which I thought was the right choice. Once again, I was happy to see that his fellow contestants seemed genuinely happy for him.

On the bottom: Jeremy for what Tom thought was a muddled taco concept, and Kwame for his chicken and waffles, which were messy to eat and, more importantly, made with frozen waffles from Whole Foods. I think that if this concept were ever turned into reality, of course they would use frozen waffles. But anybody who watches Top Chef knows that unless you want to go home, you don't use pre-packaged pasta, cake mix for wedding cakes, or anything canned or frozen if you can help it. The minute Kwame chose to use frozen mini-waffles, I knew he would be going home unless someone else majorly screwed up.

But Kwame is also the reason I teared up. He's only been cooking for about five years, and he stopped to graciously thank Tom for inspiring him during his first job as a waiter at one of Tom's restaurants. You could tell Tom was moved too. And even though Kwame seems to have struggled a bit the last few episodes, he's done amazing things for his age, and remained one of the nicest contestants. There he was, stuck with Phillip, and he still managed to put the most positive spin on it that he could. I am really sorry to see him go.



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Top Chef Season 13 - Hammer Time

The chefs hop up to Oakland to make rap-inspired dishes for MC Hammer! I thought this was a cute and quirky basis for a Quickfire, and I was really impressed that while the chefs were cooking outside under strict time constraints in an unfamiliar environment, they were obviously having fun with the challenge. It made me happy to see how much these people love to cook. And did you notice that when MC Hammer praised his three favorite dishes, the other chefs absolutely grinned -- they are genuinely happy when their friends do well.

(And it made me really happy that I didn't have to endure Phillip in this particular challenge.)

And then... the Elimination Challenge, with shout-outs to libraries and librarians! I became a librarian in my 30s, and I can tell you, if I had any idea how to do research when I was an undergrad, I would have been a freakin' Rhodes scholar. Information is everything.

The specific challenge, introduced by guest judge Jonathan Waxman, was for each chef to pick (in order of drawn knives) a specific historical time period that they would have to represent with their dish. Kudos to Isaac for choosing the Viking era. Granted, he had immunity, but he also chose it, without knowing anything about specifics, because it sounded like fun to him. That said, these poor chefs needed more than two hours to research, because the time periods chosen for the challenge were not all that simple.

Carl and Marjorie served first, he with a Greek and she with an Indian era dish -- and in her case, it wasn't necessarily what we would expect from our Americanized version of Indian food. I was definitely worried for her based on the judges' reaction. I think they were spot on with their criticism of her paratha bread, but I'm not so sure it was fair to call her out on serving medium-rare lamb when it would have probably been charred (i.e. had all the life sucked out of it) during the actual historical time period. To me, the best thing about challenges like this is to take the inspiration from the time period and improve upon what they actually would have produced during the time. Since lamb is almost always served medium-rare in the good restaurants today, I felt that was the right way to serve it now. In other words, if the flavors and ingredients recalled the time period, that should be enough. Carl, at this point, was clearly safe, as the judges loved his seafood medley that presented as simple but was quite sophisticated.

It was clear from service that the three chefs in danger were Marjorie, Karen, and Jeremy. For me, Karen and Marjorie's failings were more obvious in some ways, but Jeremy's dish was the one that least inspired recall to a specific era. On the plus side, the judges loved Kwame's duck (it was nice to see him do so well again) and Amar's squab, and also enjoyed Isaac's venison and Carl's seafood. I actually think Isaac's venison deserved even a few more points for the creative plating -- not that we want gimmicky, but he really did embrace the time period. At this point in the episode, though, I expect Amar to win, and I would not be at all unhappy about that.

And win he did. (And once again notice that his friends were happy for him!) Then we get to the expected bottom three, and may I just say that Karen's humility is a thousand times preferable to Phillip's boneheadedness. She knows what she did wrong, and she can accept what the judges are telling her. I really thought, and in a way hoped (but not really, because I like him) that Jeremy would be the one going home, but in the end it was Karen. I'll miss her beautiful smile and sense of fun. And did you notice how much Marjorie did not want to see her go? Women are often accused of being bitchy rivals, but not these two. I don't think anybody, judge or contestant, was happy to see Karen go home.

Solid episode. And if I could taste anything from this challenge, I think I would have Amar's squab, if only because I've never really eaten that kind of decadent French cooking.

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A Top Chef Quickie - Restaurant Wars (Parts 1 & 2)

Hmm, I'm getting a little worried that Top Chef is making me a snarkier person than I used to be, because here's the first thought that came to mind after watching this season's "Restaurant Wars" two-parter:

C'mon, Top Chef! We want this to be challenging! It's not enough that you're making them do two services, and they have to choose furniture and artwork and even figure out where the bloody kitchen equipment should go! Next time, let's make them wire the building electricity and maybe hook up the gas lines! After all, they can't cook without those things, so every chef should also be an electrician. Better yet, make them build the freakin' building first!

/end snark

That said, I do like the fact that each chef had to be either front-of-the-house or executive chef for a service, because otherwise it's too easy to hide as a line cook and huddle back there in survival mode. But if the show continues with this two-service format, I hope they will allow the services to be on two different days (unlikely) or at least go back to putting the chefs in existing kitchen/restaurant spaces and letting them concentrate on food.

All of my complaining aside, this is probably one of the few Restaurant Wars in which I think they absolutely chose the right winners and the right losers, both in terms of teams and individual competitors. The orange team, with its restaurant called "District LA," was the clear loser, and Phillip was asked to pack his knives and go. Not surprisingly, Phillip once again proved that he is absolutely incapable of taking criticism. He may hear the words being spoken, but in his mind anything except high praise cannot possibly be true or valid if applied to his perfect food. One of the complaints was about his strawberry champagne salad, which even to me looked like a huge amount of strawberry syrup poured over some greens and strawberries. What's bothersome is that Phillip complained that the judges told him to "do his own food" yet sent him home anyway, like they were deliberately deceiving him. What does he think they tell the other chefs? He also whined about taste being subjective, so he feels they sent him home because they didn't "happen" to like his sickly sweet salad. If only one judge made the criticism, that would be subjective taste, but when they're in complete agreement, maybe he needs to pay attention to what they're saying.

It was also typical Phillip that he thought he aced the front of the house. I wasn't sure the judges needed to be that harsh about the free cocktail upon entering the restaurant, but little touches like that don't make up for otherwise inadequate -- which can also mean overly solicitous -- service. And how telling that the judges were able to predict that Phillip spent most of his table-side time with his diners talking about his own restaurants.

As for the rest of the orange team, I felt that Jeremy was fortunate that the judges didn't realize just how badly lunch service had actually gone once they themselves were done eating. From the judges' conversation, I don't think they were aware that many of the diners were ignored for ages while Jeremy instructed everyone to drop everything and serve the judges. I'm glad Amar didn't go home for his dish, as unappetizing as it sounded. I do agree with the judges that Amar didn't act like an executive chef, but I truly did feel Phillip's mistakes were worse. Even Kwame didn't serve anything close to what he is capable of (although to be fair, he had the unenviable job of executing Phillip's strawberry salad, knowing all the while that it was a disaster -- and he did try to tell Phillip so).

While I didn't find any of the food in this Restaurant Wars to be super memorable, I really think the gray team, with its "Palette" restaurant, did quite well. Marjorie struggled a tiny bit in the front of the house at the beginning of service, but pulled it together. Much more importantly, when Karen fell so far behind that she couldn't prep the servers for dinner service, Marjorie took time away from her own dishes to go back out front and pick up the slack. In addition, Isaac stepped in to help Karen finishing prepping one of her dishes. This, people, is teamwork. And while it's unfortunate that Karen fell so far behind, it wasn't due to ego -- and she did eventually manage the front pretty well, plus contributed that tortellini that was quite successful. Meanwhile, Isaac and Carl both nailed the executive chef roles for their respective services. They just got it done.

In the end, I was glad to see Isaac win, especially because we all relate to that "last kid picked for the team" fear. But the rest of the team's contributions, especially Carl's calm competence, should not be overlooked. I feel like Marjorie might have won overall for her front-of-house (especially if the judges had known how much she contributed to dinner front-of-house too, which I don't think they did) if her second dessert, with its champagne fizz, hadn't turned the judges off a little. But she certainly would have been safe no matter what, with her delicious bread, delicious cheese course, and front-of-the-house work.

Was it my imagination, or was Phillip the first chef to leave this season without going over to hug the other chefs goodbye? Overall, and I hope I'm not jinxing things here, this has been a nice group of chefs, who seem happy for each other's successes for the most part. But I don't think anyone was unhappy to see Phillip go.

And now we are seven: Carl, Karen, Marjorie, Kwame, Isaac, Jeremy, and Amar. Earlier on, I thought Kwame was the one to watch, but I have to admit he doesn't seem confident lately. I think he's a nice guy and extremely talented, so I hope things improve for him. Actually, there is nobody here I don't like. I think at this point I'd be happiest to see Marjorie win, but unless things change radically, I have trouble envisioning a final outcome I won't be okay with.

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Top Chef - Episode 8 - Where's the Beef?

[Pretty junk food plating by contestants Karen Akunowicz, Amar Santana, and Carl Dooley.]

This episode had a really fun Quickfire challenge. Padma explained that, inspired by a mysterious new Instagram chef, our contestants would be doing a plating challenge, and the chef with the most "likes" on Instagram would win immunity. The mysterious guest judge known as "Jacques La Merde," face and voice disguised, showed up via screen to encourage the chefs, and Padma revealed that like Chef La Merde, they would only be using junk food, such as Twinkies, Oreos, Cheetos, and so on.

In my mind, they did most of this just right. Thank God the dishes didn't have to be edible -- although I do remember the time in Season 1 when the chefs had to make an edible dish out of vending machine fare.... And thank goodness that while the winner would get immunity, this was no sudden death quickfire, so nobody faced elimination for their artistic talents or lack thereof. Most of the chefs embraced the challenge and seemed to have fun doing it, but if you had to guess who the exception was? If you said Phillip, you'd be right. He takes himself so seriously that he prowled around his dish from every side, looking for the perfect angle from which to take his Instagram photo. Based on the reactions from Padma, Chef La Merde (who turned out to be Christine Flynn) and the rest of the chefs, this probably took a lot longer than we saw onscreen.

My only issue was that the way the photos were displayed on the TV screen, "framed" by their Instagram posts, made it difficult to really see any detail. They did put up a larger size image at the end of some of the chefs' turns, but only for an moment. The whole point of this food was the way it looked; I would have liked to be able to really look at it!

[And now I interrupt this blog post with an anti-commercial about one of the stupidest commercials I've ever seen in my life: the Voltaggios trying to get us to see a new movie release called The Finest Hours. I really like the Voltaggios, especially that cutie Bryan, but to have the two of them pretending to have a "spontaneous" discussion about the movie while cooking for a bunch of water rescue folks was just ludicrous. Top Chef is incredibly skilled at tying into current things (Twitter, Instagram, current hit TV shows), but this just Did Not Work, and I find it a bit insulting that anyone would think I would go decide to see a water rescue drama because two chefs talked about it.]

And back to our regular programming.... Due to the Instagram voting, the winner couldn't be announced until the next day, so the chefs moved on to the Elimination Challenge. Guest judge Neal Fraser, a Top Chef Masters alum, appeared to explain about his Beefsteak charity events, in which people pay a lot of money to dress up, get drunk, and eat a lot of meat. The nine chefs were divided into three teams of three based on who they were standing next to. Each team responsible for one meat dish, one seafood dish, and two sides. The catch? The diners would not be using plates, cutlery, or napkins. (Personally, I would allow them napkins, but whatever.)

I was definitely surprised at some of the chefs' choices. Isaac, who was on the blue team with Chad and Marjorie, decided to serve chicken and bacon sausage rather than some kind of red meat. Chad ended up making tuna, which wasn't his first choice, but the Whole Foods store didn't have enough of the kind of fish he wanted. Marjorie chose to make pickled vegetables and bread. The latter was a risk, but it was a smart one, because that kind of hands-on, medieval dining really needs some bread.

On the green team, Phillip decided to do a rack of lamb that could be served as lollipop chops, another good choice for this type of event. Amar served grilled halibut, using an entire fish that cost over $500 at Whole Foods if I heard him correctly. Jeremy made fried brussel sprouts with bacon and cilantro, and roasted carrots with a spiced yogurt sauce. (Those carrots looked really good, by the way.) The red team, consisting of Kwame, Karen, and Carl, served a roasted beef loin with romesco sauce, plus shrimp and sides. (I had to look up romesco; it's a nut and red pepper-based sauce.)

Service was ... odd. If I were wearing a gown at a black-tie charity event and was not allowed cutlery or napkins while eating, I sure as heck would want the apron bib to cover a lot more of my clothes. And what was someone thinking, dressing Padma in white? But what was really odd is that judges almost seemed like they were drunk. It's great that they were having fun, but while they were acting silly and trying to one-up each other with clever remarks, they seemed to forget that the chefs who had just busted their butts getting this food ready were standing right there and hearing some of it. The judges are there to criticize, not ridicule. Maybe I'm being oversensitive, but I thought the judges were really disrespectful this week.

In terms of the specific criticism, the judges' biggest complaint was that a lot of the food was too dainty. They felt that Isaac's sausage, Carl and Karen's beef loin, and Phillip's lamb fit the parameters of the challenge most closely, but Isaac's sausage was dry, and the steak was too small on the plate. They were definitely not impressed with any of the seafood. Both of the fish dishes were way too dainty, and Kwame's shrimp was apparently quite unappetizing in its preparation. But it's hard for me to imagine seafood prepared in such a way as to fit the medieval dinner atmosphere. I picture turkey drumsticks, sausage, and other meat on a stick. Seafood is a lot more fragile. I think it would have made more sense if the challenge had been to prepare at least two different proteins and two side dishes. Then the judges would have gotten a lot more of what they were looking for.

At judges' table, the first order of business was to announce the winner of the of the Quickfire Challenge: Karen, who maybe had the most adorable reaction ever when she practically shouted "Shut UP!" at the judges upon hearing her name. Her immunity didn't really come into play, though, since the red team was neither on the top or the bottom. Not surprisingly, the green team had the judges' favorite meal, with Phillip taking home the win for his lamb. I don't really like Phillip, and this win is not likely to improve his appeal, but I was glad to see the other chefs congratulate him and seem to mean it. This is a pretty nice group of people so far.

The blue team was the least favorite. It was quickly clear that Marjorie would be safe, with her nicely prepared vegetables and bread. I think it was a close call between Isaac's sausage and Chad's tuna, but ultimately Chad went home.

So, this was an episode that started out strong for me, but made me a little unhappy as it went on. I'm also a little nervous about next week's "Restaurant Wars." Although in recent seasons they seem to have gotten away from making the chefs worry about decor, the previews here showed them hanging artwork on the wall. Really? And they'll be serving both lunch and dinner. I think I do like the idea that each person must serve at least once as Executive Chef or front of the house, because those are always the danger spots and I'm happy to see the risk spread more equally. That's probably the reason for making the chefs do two services, but in a way it also feels like setting them up to fail. We shall see.




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A Top Chef Quickie - Episode 7 - Back in the Day

[Top Chef alum and guest judge Antonia Lofaso and Padma during the Quickfire Challenge.]

To start off the episode, the chefs finally returned to the actual Top Chef kitchen, where guest judge and Top Chef alum Antonia Lofaso was waiting to preside over the Quickfire Challenge. Each of the remaining chefs had 20 seconds to choose an ingredient, and those ten choices would be the only ingredients available to them. Phillip chose beef and Isaac chose chicken, which some folks weren't happy about because it meant they had to provide the essentials such as salt, vinegar, and olive oil as opposed to choosing an ingredient they themselves might really like to use. During judging, I thought it odd that Antonia made Kwame essentially admit that yes, he'd selfishly chosen garlic for his ingredient, but didn't do the same with Chad, who chose jalapeños. In my mind, garlic is a much more universal and adaptable ingredient than jalapeños. Other choices included mushrooms, tomatoes, and celery. Once again, some chefs were unhappy because they thought celery was a bad choice. But Antonia echoed Jason's comments about his choice of celery: you can serve it cooked or raw, and you can use the leaves as an herb.

Not surprisingly, there were several beef carpaccio-style dishes. Jeremy won the challenge, earning immunity, with Mark as a close runner-up.

Now this is a small thing, but as someone who always wants the playing field to be fair, I'm often distressed by the way things are done on this show, or by the fact that certain rules aren't explained, at least not to the viewers. First, giving each chef only 20 seconds to choose an ingredient meant that they had to run, in a kitchen. That's dangerous and stupid. Second, it was not clear to me whether the chefs only had the use of the exact amounts placed on the ingredient table. For instance, I find it hard to believe that they all had access to only that one small package of beef that Phillip chose. But at the same time, one of the chefs brought over an entire basket of tomatoes, yet Jeremy had difficulty getting anyone to give him a tomato to use. Kudos if Top Chef has suddenly decided to minimize food waste -- which I highly, highly doubt -- but if the chefs are limited to only a few ingredients, they all have to have access to each ingredient. Jeremy shouldn't have had to waste precious time begging for a tomato.

For the Elimination challenge, Padma tasked the chefs with creating a dish exploring who they were ten years ago, since this is the tenth anniversary of Top Chef (even though they're in Season 13). They served the food as a "Chef's Table for 10" right there in the kitchen, with show alumni Michael Voltaggio, frequent judge Richard Blais, and Mai Lin joining Antonia.

Not surprisingly, some chefs did better than others at turning memories into inspiration. Kwame struggled a great deal, in large part because he couldn't separate unhappy from happy memories. In addition to his odd choice of making jerk-seasoned broccoli, he cut his hand, which didn't help his plating any. He appeared on the bottom at Judges' Table, along with Jason and Phillip, and was seriously lucky not to go home. That fell to Jason. While I didn't think Phillip was likely to be the one eliminated, he really needs to stop talking. He still seems intent on somehow convincing the judges that anything he does wrong is because "they" didn't want him to cook his own food. Jeremy might have been on the chopping block too, had he not had immunity.

On a happier note, the top three this week were Marjorie, Chad, and Carl. Marjorie made a green curry inspired by the green cook she thought she was ten years ago. She was alarmed when Whole Foods didn't have lemongrass, which is an essential ingredient for a green curry, but she was resourceful, and successfully incorporated grilled lemon into her dish. I was glad for her win.

I have to say, though, overall I wasn't all that tempted by the Elimination challenge dishes myself. Most of them were bowls full of stuff, and while I have to imagine that the flavors can be incredible, I still prefer the more refined look of a dish artfully arranged on a plate. (I also don't like that much seafood, so I was a little biased.)

Two random thoughts: first, I think chefs should be careful with the plate smear. It can look elegant, but it's overused and it can also look distinctly unappetizing. Second, I sure don't miss Grayson, and I find I don't miss Angelina either. I feel like the kitchen is more grown-up without them.


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A Top Chef Quickie - Episode 6 - Banannaise

This was a fun episode. For the Quickfire, I liked the idea of fish tacos made on a San Diego pier, and a lot of the food looked delicious. My main takeaways from the Quickfire were that 1) Angelina needs to concentrate (she plated her dish on the cutting board instead of the plates); and 2) Wesley needs to clean up his act. First he misplaced his lobster (I seriously thought it had crawled away until I realized what had happened), and then, during the sudden death elimination, he almost put the spoon from his mouth back in the food again. Remind me never to eat in a restaurant where he's cooking, because that's obviously a habit with him.

In any event, poor Angelina went home after not plating her food, then failing to beat Wesley in the Sudden Death challenge. She did well in that head-to-head challenge, which was to use the classic ingredients of a Caesar salad in a new way, but I stand by what I've said in earlier posts. Angelina wasn't quite ready for this. I do think that given a few more years of experience, she'll be a force to be reckoned with.

Oh, and as far as I'm concerned? Phillip can just go home any minute now. I was happy for him when his tacos were so well received, and I understand that he was disappointed not to be in the top three. But the proper response is to say "I'm disappointed," not to say "What, am I not supposed to be making yummy food?" That demonstrated that he is egotistical and self-centered in the extreme, because he literally can't conceive of the possibility that his food might have been delicious, but the food of three other highly trained chefs was just as or even more delicious. Get over yourself, Phillip.

The elimination challenge was also surprisingly fun. I'm not a beer drinker myself, but I enjoyed hearing about the various flavors that Padma, Tom, and guest judges Emeril and Richard Blais incorporated into "their" beers. And I'm always happy when the chefs draw knives, or in this case beer bottles, to make things as fair as possible. Padma's beer was a golden ale flavored with ginger, jalapeño, and tamarind; Richard's stout incorporated ras el hanout (a North African spice blend), beets, and chocolate; Tom's wheat beer featured lemon, coriander, and banana; and Emeril's beer took on a New Orleans tone with coffee, cayenne, and tangerine.

So I didn't really get the title of this week's episode until Isaac mentioned his banannaise, a banana mayonnaise. Because trending is everything, Top Chef wasted no time: they named the episode after it, and even flashed a hashtag on the screen to make sure we all got it. I was surprised then, when Isaac's dish wasn't a particular hit.

In any case, there were a lot of stand-out dishes and a few disappointments. I won't go into the play-by-play, except to say that I'm continually impressed with Kwame. I was also happy for Karen's confident win; she clearly didn't need Richard's explanation as to what the ras el hanout was. I, on the other hand, needed that and many other definitions after this episode. More new words learned tonight:

-- Opah: "a large deep-bodied fish with a deep blue back, silvery belly, and crimson fins, living in deep oceanic waters" (according to Google's "define" function). Good to know, I guess?

-- Cracklin: OK, this I've heard of, but I never really paid attention. It's "a fried piece of pork fat with a small amount of attached skin." Yeah, I don't think I'd like that as much, but foodies do really like pork.

-- Mojo: Kwame's street food that he turned into something that impressed Tom, and that the judges said could compete anywhere (for that reason, it surprised me a bit that he didn't win). In any case, from Wikipedia: "In Cuban cooking, mojo applies to any sauce that is made with garlic, olive oil, and a citrus juice, traditionally bitter orange juice. It is commonly used to flavor the cassava tuber and is also used to marinate roast pork."

-- Velouté: from Google, "a rich white sauce made with chicken, veal, pork, or fish stock, thickened with cream and egg yolks." I might be odd, but that doesn't sound all that good to me. And Isaac's dish didn't look all that appetizing, I have to say.

[/vocab lesson] When it came down to the weakest dishes, the judges singled out Jason's pork and squid meatball with grilled tentacles (which Richard Blais said might be the weirdest thing he's ever eaten), Isaac's velouté, and Wesley's badly cooked lamb. Padma told Wesley to pack his knives and away he went. I wasn't happy to see him go because I think he's a decent guy, but as I said before, I'm really not sure I'd want to eat in his restaurant. He's like the Tasmanian Devil Chef.


An unrelated aside: hey Bravo, I think it's cute that your ads keep calling A Girlfriend's Guide to Divorce a "scripted series." In the old days we used to call that a "television show."

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A Top Chef Quickie - Episode 5 - Big Gay Wedding

In the spirit of better late than never, here are some thoughts on Episode 5 of this season's Top Chef.

For the Quickfire Challenge, the chefs went to a date farm -- that's a place where they grow dates, not a new and horrible reality television concept. So naturally, they had to create a dish featuring dates, and also inspired by a favorite or best date that they themselves had been on. Some of the chefs played fast and loose with that concept, like when Chad tried to turn his love for his daughters into a "date" with them. Yeah, not so much. Worse, some of the chefs barely got the dates into their dishes. Those of us who've been watching the show for a while now know that one of the unspoken rules is that when the judges ask you to feature an ingredient, they don't mean that you should dribble a little bit of it into a sauce, dressing, or (especially) foam.

In any case, I was happy to see Jason win with his dish of dates and carrots. It reminded me a little of the carrot dessert Gregory made last season during the finale, and I bet it tasted phenomenal.

I was less impressed with the guest judge for the elimination challenge, who did nothing to dispel any of the myths about models. I think lots of models are intelligent -- look at Padma -- but the coy innuendo thing from Chrissy Teigen was kind of stereotypical. On the other hand, all the guest judges this season have been given bad-pun-dialogue at some point or another. Whoever's writing that? Please stop.

For the elimination challenge, the chefs were tasked with providing the wedding reception food for 24 gay and lesbian couples tying the knot. I was glad to see familiar face Art Smith as a guest judge here, and even happier when he told the chefs that after his own fiasco trying to make a wedding cake on Top Chef: Masters, he was going to spare them (not to mention the wedding couples) the misery that would come from forcing them to make the cake.

And on that note, an aside: waaaay back in season one, Tom Colicchio gave the chefs all kinds of grief for using cake mix when they had to cater a wedding on less than 24 hours notice. Keep in mind that back then, the chefs didn't come on the show knowing they would have to make desserts -- in fact, Harold Dieterle won the finale while serving a cheese course for dessert. So I was 100% behind the Season 1 chefs when they decided to use a mix rather than risking a fallen cake since none of them had cake recipes memorized. And I think that Art deciding to provide the cake this time sort of backs that up. /aside

But back to the wedding. I'm normally less interested in the non-food moments of the show, such as the chefs calling home to husbands and wives in what seem like very self-conscious, almost staged conversations. But when Padma, who had just gotten ordained, married the couples, I was more than happy to sit back and enjoy the moment. You could tell how much these couples love each other, and while I'm thrilled that this important social step forward happened in my lifetime, I'm also ashamed that it took so long in the land of the free. In a similar vein, I loved the little story about Tom losing and finding his wedding ring. (My husband and I have a temporarily lost wedding ring story too -- maybe that too is universal in marriage!) I'm glad that his rabbi encouraged him to proceed with the wedding only a few short days after 9/11. Love is love.

I always like it when the chefs do well, and the appetizer course had three judge-pleasing dishes. I'd love to know what those carrots tasted like. And I just realized I've talked about carrots twice already in this post, which is funny because I generally consider raw carrots to be an aggressive, in-your-face kind of vegetable. I eat them, but they're not my first choice. In the hands of a trained chef, though, I think they can be made sublime.

For the next course, I was uncomfortable with the tension between Jason and Angelina. On the one hand, I think she's not ready for this show, and she's been coming off as a little immature. (I'm not biased against young people; Kwame, by way of contrast, seems incredibly mature although people keep commenting on his youth.) On the other hand, Jason's repeated comments about this being his dish began to grate after the third or fourth time. But the dish was a hit, and he was right: it wasn't because of Angelina.

Ultimately, that has to have been the best wedding meal that a Top Chef crew has produced to date. The only off-notes were Phillip's potatoes and Giselle and Karen's vegetables. Everything else looked fantastic and impressed the judges, especially the dessert. I am not a dessert girl at all, but that's one I would have loved, especially if the cherries were tart. In any case, poor Kwame looked nervous even though he'd just won the entire challenge for the shrimp dish he and Wesley put together. He needn't have worried, because Padma had said earlier that Kwame's sauce saved the dish. Now although I'm not crazy about Phillip or his cooking, he did say that his potato ... whatever would taste like mashed potatoes, not that they would be mashed potatoes. And I wasn't too impressed that a bunch of judges not on the chopping block felt compelled to jump in with their comments at this point.

In the end, Giselle went home. I think, as she said, she was one of the nicer people there, but it never felt like she really had her act together. I originally thought her comments about Phillip not seeing his own flaws was out of left field, but when she went on to say that at least she and Karen realized they could have/should have done better ... well, she was right! And Phillip still couldn't see his flaws, no matter what the judges said. (I still think Jason should have stayed the heck out of that, though.) Overall, I think the right person won this challenge, and probably the right person went home, although I couldn't have quibbled if it had been Karen instead of Giselle.





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A Top Chef Quickie - Episode 4 - It's a Dry Heat

The last thing I wanted to do was get behind on Top Chef posts, but the universe conspired against me.... And continues to do so, because this Thursday I'll be going on a writing retreat and won't have access to a television! So my posts for episodes 4, 5, and 6 are all destined to be Top Chef "quickies," I'm afraid, which essentially means a lot of stream-of-consciousness thoughts as I watch.

For this episode, the chefs traveled to Palm Springs. I loved the Quickfire challenge, which was to create a dish on a solar-powered oven or stove. Whether you got the oven or stove depended on your knife draw. I love the alien look of wind farms and we chose an electric company that is 100% wind and solar power, so how could I not like this?

I felt sorry for Giselle when her oven exploded. As someone who once killed a hot Pyrex dish with cold water, I can sympathize. I was happy for Wesley's win. I'm a sucker for any chef who expresses a little humility and seems genuine in saying they simply want to do their best, as opposed to slipping through because someone else has done badly.

For the elimination challenge, the chefs became two teams, blue and orange, based on whether they'd gotten stoves or ovens in the Quickfire. Their task was to create a four-course progression to be served from refreshment carts on one of Palm Springs' many golf courses. There was only one bit of drama, when Giselle and Angelina, both on the orange team, indicated they didn't want to work together on a dish. The others were slow to concede, but they finally let them pair up with other chefs. In my mind, that was the right call, because if you know going in that one of your pairs won't work well together, you're asking for a dish to tank. On the other hand, maybe it's deviously smart to put two weaker (based on record so far), sniping chefs together, because if they do tank their dish, you'll probably be safe from elimination even if your team loses because one of them will probably go home. Me, I much prefer the "let's be the best team we can be" approach as opposed to the "how to play it safe" mode.

And ironically, it turned out that Angelina's new pairing tanked. With guess who .... Grayson.

Although Grayson generally hasn't made a very good impression on me, and failed to do so again tonight, I will say one thing -- I thought that as she went up to shake the judges' hands and say goodbye, Tom really didn't need to get one last dig in. They judges had already told the pair that the decision about who was home would come down to one ingredient. In other words, Grayson's corn or Angelina's shrimp. So when Grayson was sent home, she knew it was because of the corn. Tom did not need to say it again. I imagine he felt compelled because she's shown that she doesn't listen well, but that wasn't the time.

That said, I'm not going to miss Grayson. She tries to pretend, but she has not learned how to accept criticism in a graceful, mature manner. This is something I have some experience with; several years ago, I went to Clarion West, a six-week science fiction and fantasy writing workshop in which we did nothing for six weeks but criticize each other's work. You don't argue with the critiques and insist you're right, even if you think so privately. And you should probably realize that usually there is something valid in the criticism, especially if the critiquers (or in this case judges) agree with each other -- it's not just a fluke in that case!

I was happy for Karen and Jeremy, who nailed their ceviche dish. It was unfortunate for Kwame and Chad that the first course was a head-to-head "battle of the ceviches," because theirs didn't look bad, but suffered by comparison and lack of ice. To be honest, I'm surprised they didn't think of the "ice solution" too -- it's not rocket science. Jeremy took home the big win. The judges said it was for his perfect fish, but I think it was just as much the ice. More power to him.

Favorite quote of the episode: when Padme said of Phillip's oysters, "It was like snot on a rock." I don't like to see people made the target of snark, but Phillip (whom I can't help thinking of as Marcel) really made a bad decision there. I wasn't even thinking of how unappetizing the oysters might be under those circumstances; I was worried his dish would be full of grit from the rocks!

Biggest annoyance of the episode: why weren't the chefs given hats during the Quickfire? That was incredibly irresponsible of the show, and they could have used it to their advantage -- put Top Chef caps on all of them, and you've got free merchandise branding and promotion.

Dish I most wanted to taste: Isaac's grapefruit sabayon. I love citrus.

All in all, this was a decent episode.

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Top Chef: California - Episode 3 - Spines & Vines

This episode of Top Chef began with the chefs setting out on their California road trip, beginning with Santa Barbara. They made a harbor-side pit stop to pick up some sea urchins, which they took to the Sanford Winery & Vineyards, where Padma and guest judge Dana Cowin were waiting. It was interesting to see that Dana knew one of the chefs, Jason Stratton, whom she had named "Best New Chef" for Food and Wine magazine. Now, I'm sure she and all the judges are perfectly capable of being objective so I'm not worried on that count, but it seems strange to me that one of the things the chefs are competing for is a feature in Food and Wine magazine. It draws attention to the fact that we're not always getting brand new, young talent trying to break through in the same way we used to on this show. Instead, we're getting people who are already well-known in the culinary world. It doesn't have to be a bad thing, but in a way I'm still a little sad to see it.


SUDDEN DEATH QUICKFIRE

After initial greetings, Padma announced that the chefs would start their first Sudden Death Quickfire Challenge immediately, pairing uni (the aforementioned sea urchin) and wine, with 25 minutes to cook. We got lots of commentary from the chefs while they were cooking, and Grayson finally said something that kind of made sense to me, which was that she wasn't sure why people were blending the uni into other ingredients rather than highlighting it, especially since it's delicate.

The first dish the judges tasted was Jeremy's opah, which I had to look up to discover it's a kind of fish, with sour apple, cucumber, and radish vinaigrette, paired with a chardonnay. Angelina, who had said she was playing it a little safe since it was a sudden death challenge, made cacio e pepe with uni butter, also with chardonnay. Padma and Dana commented on the saltiness of the dish, but I was surprised that they didn't comment about Angelina using what I assume had to be dried pasta -- she couldn't have made fresh pasta outdoors in a 25-minute challenge so it had to be dried, right? So why go with that when there were clearly a lot of high quality ingredients there to work with?

Grayson's dish was crab salad with cucumber, grapefruit, and uni. Dana said it was bold to do so little, but that it was nice. Personally, I don't feel that a crab and uni salad with several ingredients in 25 minutes is "so little," but maybe that's me. Dana did compliment Grayson on her wine pairing, which made Grayson happy because her boyfriend is a sommelier. Jason served a salpicon seafood salad with jumbo crab. I had to look up "salpicon," of course, and found that it is "a mixture of finely chopped ingredients bound in a thick sauce and used as a filling or stuffing." I have to say, the photo of his dish didn't look like that definition to me. Dana said the balance of flavors was lovely, but Padma wished the dish had more uni.

Karen had tried to make a soup into which she would "ribbon" the whipped egg and uni, like egg drop soup, but the uni essentially dissolved instead, and Padma said all she could taste was scallion or chive. Giselle made a simple seasoned potato with onion jam and uni; personally I thought this one looked like something I would want to eat, but Dana said there was a bit of a fight between the wine, potato, and onion.

Carl made a sea urchin omelet that looked very pretty in presentation, and Dana called it a thoughtful combination. Amar made uni with shitake tempura on lime ricotta cheese and served it with a rose wine, which the judges found to be a nice combination. Francis's curry was complex, and Padma remarked that she could have edited a few ingredients out. Wesley presented creamed corn with uni, fennel, roe, and scallop, which Dana really seemed to like it (although it sounded a little like all that wine tasting was getting to her). Chad served Asian goulash with uni, rice wine, and a little lime. Padma called it intense, and Dana thought the wine went well with it, but the dish itself wasn't balanced. Isaac made an uni potato salad that they liked a lot.

In the end, the judges started with their favorite dishes, and Grayson looked pretty surprised to be chosen. Dana commented on the simplicity and the showcasing of the uni. Wesley was another favorite with his creamed corn, and Carl was also complimented for his pairing of eggs and uni (cue Giselle looking miserable because she hadn't been able to find the eggs -- did she ask anybody?). The winner, who got immunity, was Grayson. As much as I didn't care for her in the first two episodes -- and I'm sure she'll annoy me again -- I couldn't help but be happy for her.

For the least favorite dishes, Dana named Angelina's pasta with uni butter, Karen's soup due to the lack of uni flavor, and Giselle's potato, which Dana found puzzling and undercooked. Giselle ended up on the bottom, and had to pick one chef to compete against in a head-to-head cook-off. My first thought went to Angelina, who I imagine was a bit shaken by her near miss, and that's who Giselle chose.

The challenge was to cook something with ostrich eggs in 25 minutes, which was a little ironic. Giselle decided to make soft scrambled eggs with a little salsa, while Angelina wasn't quite sure at first what she was doing. I was a little annoyed at the chefs yelling out advice to her from the sidelines; it's almost as though they were giddy with being off the hook, but they weren't doing her any favors by yelling at her. She did also end up with a scramble, with charred vegetables and tomato jam. Dana didn't seem blown away by either dish, but named Giselle the winner in the end, even though she wasn't impressed with Giselle's presentation.

Overall, this was a good quickfire challenge. I noticed that the majority of the chefs seemed to choose chardonnay, which I imagine is the wine most familiar to a lot of them. I also have to say that I felt sorry for these guys trying to do this delicate plating work outside.


ELIMINATION CHALLENGE

Uh oh, it's another team challenge, and the chefs had to pick each other (apart from Grayson, who competed alone as the one with immunity). I'm not saying the show's wrong to do this, but I hate when they have to just look around and pick each other. You know some of them wish the other person hadn't asked them, but they didn't know how to say no. It's just so uncomfortable, like high school all over again. And the chefs didn't appear to choose each that wisely in a lot of cases. Angelina noted her apprehension at getting stuck with Giselle, and I couldn't blame her.

Padma then explained that the chefs would have two hours the next day to prep and cook at the Bacara Resort & Spa. Padma dangled an extra incentive; the overall winner would get to come back to the winery and choose an estate wine with his or her own label.

[We interrupt this blog post for an important message: TOP CHEF, STOP MAKING THE CHEFS RUN TO GET THE INGREDIENTS! If there's one thing that will ever make me stop watching the show, this is it.]

And cue badass music as Tom Colicchio walks in the kitchen (which is also rather obnoxious). He arrived to tell the chefs they were now competing against each other: surf versus turf instead of surf and turf. I'm not crazy about mid-plan change-ups like this, especially when they seem designed to ratchet up the tension between the chefs. Karen and Marjorie seemed to handle it pretty well, while Phillip went the passive-aggressive route with Jeremy in their little team interview. Jason ended up at a big disadvantage; he had compromised with Francis and agree to do Thai flavors, and now he was stuck with those ingredients when it's not a cuisine he knows well. Finally, although I applaud chefs helping each other somewhat, I'm not so sure I would have helped Chad butcher his lamb chops if I were Kwame. It's not the same as lending a few eggs, it's lending a skill the other chef doesn't have, and this is a skills competition. That said, I like Kwame a lot so far.

The first chefs to serve the judges were Wesley, Amar, and Grayson, the latter of whom got to choose any of the chef pairs to compete directly against. Amar served an olive oil poached halibut with eggless Béarnaise sauce, asparagus, and morels. Tom found it delicate but the fish was a little overcooked, and Cat Cora, who was one of several guest judges, found it too simplistic. Wesley was very apprehensive about his ribeye, which he knew was too tough, and made a bigger point than he might have done pointing out the "artwork," as he called it, which was asparagus purée that he stenciled onto the plate in the shape of leaves. The judges found the meat underseasoned but none immediately commented on the toughness of the meat. Tom was snobby about the stenciling. I mean, I thought it looked pretty, but I do agree that Wesley would have done better not to try so hard to call attention to it. Grayson made a lacquered pork belly with a spiced carrot purée. Cat Cora loved the flavors, as did Richard Blais. Grayson won the round handily -- and after the chefs left table-side, Richard did comment on Wesley's meat being badly cooked.

The next pair to serve was Phillip and Jeremy. Jeremy made pan-roasted spot prawns with potato gnocchi and English peas. Cat Cora loved it, and Tom said it was all about finesse. Phillip made center-cut ribeye with rutabaga purée and nori buerre blanc from butter he'd made himself. Cat said it was cooked perfectly. The judges universally preferred Jeremy by a nose, but guest judge Suzanne Goin said she felt bad that they competed directly against each other, because either of them could have wiped out the three previous competitors. I got the feeling that Phillip is not going to take this defeat well, but he needs to remember that just because he will technically be up for elimination doesn't mean there's any chance he would actually be eliminated, based on this dish.

Next came Angelina versus Giselle. Angelina served marinated mussels with escabèche sauce (vinegary sauce with herbs and spices), fennel leek puree, and potatoes. Unfortunately, the judges found that she had neglected the mussels in favor of the other ingredients. Giselle served quail with a tamarindo sauce and a cucumber and radish salad. Tom liked the sauce. The editors cut this sequence a little short, jumping right to the win verdict being handed to Giselle without them actually polling the judges on camera as they'd done for the prior teams.

Kwame and Chad went next. Kwame made a crab salad with turmeric, asparagus, and radish, that was gorgeous to look at. Tom found it playful and fun, while Suzanne called it decadent (in a good way). Chad made spicy bean, honey and orange-lacquered lamb with asparagus mint purée, which the judges found perfectly cooked and luscious. The judges went four and four, so that Tom had to be the tie-breaker: he gave the win to Kwame. Although I thought Chad was a good sport, I'm glad that Kwame won, because Chad's meat might not have presented so well if Kwame hadn't helped him.

Isaac and Carl were up next; Isaac served a fennel-crusted halibut, English peas, and brown butter hollandaise. Tom wanted a little hit of acid, and Dana called something slightly overcooked, although I couldn't catch what she said. Carl did a roasted chicken thigh with prosciutto and English peas. I felt bad for him, because nobody wants to be the one stuck with chicken for a competition at this level, but Tom liked it, especially the white wine dijon sauce. Carl won, although it was another close race.

Next came Karen and Marjorie. Karen had difficulty plating, to the extent that she left someone's fish off the plate. I felt terrible for her. Her dish was seared rock cod with carrot orange purée, blood orange vinaigrette, and roasted carrots. The judges loved it, although Padma continued to look put out at her lack of fish. Marjorie served roasted pork loin with olive oil crushed potatoes, glazed vegetables, and citrus gremolata, which is a garnish made with chopped parsley, garlic, and grated lemon zest (yum!). Unfortunately, the pork was very dry -- Dana Cowan actually made a face, and called it 1960s food. Karen dodged a bullet there for sure.

Finally, we had Jason and Francis. Jason made a marinated grilled pork loin with steamed crudités, Thai-style egg, and green bean salad. Tom was unimpressed with the flavors, and one of the guest judges told Jason he was sorry Jason had been "bullied" into cooking something he wasn't 100% comfortable with. Well, no. Jason wasn't bullied; he compromised because he thought they'd be cooking together, not against each other. Furthermore, most of the challenges are about cooking things they're not 100% comfortable with. Francis's dish was ginger glazed black cod with jicama cucumber relish and roasted squash. Tom called it a hodgepodge on a plate, and the judges didn't appreciate the skin on the fish. Another close race, and Tom once again was the deciding vote: he chose Jason.


JUDGES TABLE

The favorite dishes were by Jeremy, Kwame, and Karen (keeping in mind they couldn't pick the really good dishes happened to get edged out in their round, such as Phillip's). The judges were full of compliments for Karen, but Padma pointed out that they couldn't give her the win when the main part of the dish didn't make it to one of the plates. Tom really liked Kwame's dish, and found Jeremy's dish well put-together and thought-out. Guest judge Michael Cimarusti announced Kwame as the winner.

The three least favorite dishes were by Francis, Angelina, and Wesley. I felt strongly for Wesley, because he'd just been hired by Richard Blais, and was embarrassed by his performance. To his credit, he made no excuses, but owned his mistakes. Angelina's dish was criticized mainly for the way she treated the mussels, taking them out of the shell so they dried out on the plate. Francis felt like her original dish wasn't enough, which is why she added the butternut squash that Tom thought didn't make sense, but the judges pointed out that she had too many ingredients. Ultimately, Francis was sent home.


DISH I MOST WANTED TO TASTE

This is based partly on personal tastes -- I'm not terribly adventurous when it comes to seafood -- but the dish I most wanted to taste was Phillip's ribeye. It looked like it would melt in your mouth. I don't care for his personality a great deal, but there's no denying he's talented.


WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

I think that Angelina and Wesley will continue to struggle. I think they're good chefs, but they seem a little shell-shocked at finding themselves in this situation. I think Grayson will be up and down, up and down -- if there's one quality I don't see in her, it's consistency. I think Kwame and Jeremy as a team would probably be unbeatable on this show. So far, other than Phillip, I'm finding most of the competitors to be pretty good eggs (no pun intended).


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