Top Chef 11/4/09--Top Chef Reunion Dinner summary

Sigh. Bravo decided that we were bored this season so they’re letting Fabio host a party with “the most loved” contestants from past seasons, and I don’t know what kind of crack Andy Cohen is smoking, but no one in their right minds would label Ilan or Lisa “most loved”. I don’t mind Marcel as much as everyone else does but I surely wouldn’t name him most loved either. (click for more)

So we have Tiffany and Harold from season 1 (woo Harold!), Ilan and Marcel from season 2, Hung, Casey, and Dale from season 3, Richard and Lisa from season 4, and Fabio, Stefan, and Carla from season 5. Out of those 12 people, I “mostly love” 7. Everyone comes in to schmooze and talk about what they’ve been doing, and nothing exciting happens. Except that Marcel thinks the drama from his season was because he was young and talented. Well…partially, and partially because he’s kind of a jerk and also Ilan is a jerk too. So, a combination of things. Marcel claims all that is under the bridge. I notice Ilan claims no such thing. Blah blah, everyone loves each other, it’s fun, etc. Dale lives with Sarah now. The Asian Sarah? Sara? I forget. Sorry. It looks like Hung hasn’t opened his restaurant yet. There is a clip about how fast he is which is only awesome because it has CJ in it. He says after watching the show he’s calmed down a lot. Fabio mocks Richard’s hair, asking him if he copied it from Jen. Ha! It is pretty stupid. Casey points out that she hasn’t seen Carla since the end of the season. Oohhh. So it was edited to seem that Casey talked Carla out of doing all the things she was good at, and so there was a lot of backlash on Casey because people blamed her for Carla losing. Even though Carla didn’t have to listen to her and Carla also admitted that she thought she needed to do something different. Casey was on a blog (her blog? MySpace? something) the next day saying that Carla had no idea was she was doing and that Casey felt she had to step in and save the entire meal. So it was kind of ugly. Stefan shows up and Fabio flirts with him. No really, Fabio says that now he is complete.

There is a lot of schmoozing and random chit chat. Montage of Lisa scowling. She claims that people tell her she’s awesome. Ilan and Richard talk to each other about how they totally miss competing, in a conversation that is not instigated by the producers at all. Tiffany owns her bitchy attitude from her season, which I didn’t like at the time but now I think she was a great villain from her season. She was irritating but somehow less irritating than, say, Ilan. Fabio asks Marcel something about a bottle? I’m not sure, but Marcel refuses to play along and says Fabio is just trying to start shit so what’s the point? Then he says he’d ask about season 5 but he didn’t watch it. See, that’s why people don’t like Marcel. Why’d he even come back then? I mean…you have to know they’re going to bring up every stupid thing from when you were on the show the first time.

Fabio has a surprise! It’s the knife block! What fun! Not. Although I’m not surprised. Harold wishes to napalm the knife block. Richard apparently is a crazy paranoid person, reading importance into every little detail like what van he’s in today. He goes on this litany in interview about it, and then finishes with how he misses the competition. Well, yeah, being that paranoid in real life generally doesn’t go over that well. One person from each season pulls a knife for choosing order. Each season is making a course for dinner. $500 for shopping. On a side note, I could listen to Fabio and his accent all day long.

Carla and Stefan have the last course but don’t feel like making dessert. Seriously? Lame. But then Fabio comes over and says they have to do dessert. Woo! He promises that they are both good at it. While shopping Stefan insults Fabio using cucumbers. You can figure that one out. Many shopping montages. Ilan and Marcel joke about buying some wine just for them. They seem to not be fighting at this moment. Ilan claims he’d take back all the stuff he‘s said. They go over budget by $88. Nice.

Cooking ensues. Everyone seems pretty relaxed. Even Hung, which Harold notices. Dale has tied a dishrag around his head. Also he is making salty ravioli and the wine he’s used wasn’t good. Fabio plays Tom and comes in to see what’s up. The producers (via Fabio) ask about crazy dishes they’ve made. The montage begins with Hung’s cereal landscape that was insane, yet hilarious. Hee! There seem to be duos and trios all ‘round. Marcel and Ilan are making a salt crust grill, which is kind of cool. We are reminded of Michael Midgely and his Cheeto-Snickers vending machine thing. That was hilarious too. Richard claims one of his favorite challenges was the Wedding Wars when they stayed up all night. Huh? OK then. It was a realistic challenge but real caterers don’t stay up all night. Carla calls Stefan “Uncle Joe” and that he’s the glue that keeps the family together. He asks Tiffany if she needs help and she gives him crap about breaking up with Jamie so quickly. Then she calls him a “lesbian opportunity whore”? I think? It’s funny either way. The cooking is much calmer than usual.

So apparently during the season 5 finale the judges talked to Marcel, Richard, and Casey individually, to see what the finalists were like. They ask Richard something about Hosea but as he’s talking Marcel tries to talk over him about how Stefan really wants it or something. Eventually Toby tells him to shut up, and then Marcel gets all offended that Toby was rude to him. Seriously? I think I was one of the few people who actually didn’t mind Marcel, but…it’s fading. He continues to be a jerk until Gail shuts him down and he walks out of the room.

Harold thinks dinner will be civilized. Right. First course by Dale, Casey, and Hung, is a trio of sardine, oyster, and crab. No chyrons to tell you what is in it. Wait, I was wrong. Casey did the oysters, which are Fanny Bay oyster puree, puffed rice, with watermelon and red onion. Dale made a crab pierogi with mushroom and asparagus ragout. The dough is instant mashed potatoes and there is also a curry hollandaise. Tiffany says it’s a train wreck. Ouch. Hung made sardines with black pepper pork broth and scallions. Fabio says it’s nice that no one will go home and asks leading questions so that someone will say that they were judged unfairly. Montage of insults. Tiffany brings up the box cake mix they used to make the wedding cake in the first season. She points out that they didn’t’ have recipes and baking needs recipes. I would rather have box cake than no cake, I agree. Plus I don’t mind box cake anyway.

Second course is seared scallop with scallop sashimi noodles and tom yum broth, by Tiffany and Harold. I think they also bought some nice wine. Montage of boozing. Especially Leah and Jamie, from when they got drunk in the Stew Room and went in front of the judges plastered. Padma admonishes Leah that she is on national television, but this woman already cheated on her boyfriend and then tried to pretend like she didn’t like Hosea, so I don’t think that argument will work.

Marcel and Ilan made Thai snapper baked in a salt crust, stuffed with lemongrass, lemons and basil, and ratatouille. Everyone praises it. Fabio tells Marcel it looks like he wants to fight everybody all the time. Marcel claims that he doesn’t know him at all, etc., and Casey jumps in to defend him. Fabio says that’s why he’s brought it up, I guess to point that out and ask him what the deal is, but of course Marcel is on the defensive now. Dale claims that out of the past 5 seasons, Tiffany and Marcel have been dumped on pretty badly. I notice he didn’t mention Lisa. Then Fabio brings up the Casey/Carla drama from the finale. Carla takes responsibility for her choices and doesn’t blame Casey at all. Casey didn’t understand how it got turned around on her. I think they all got along great but when she saw the final edited episode it was not accurate. All of a sudden everyone is jumping in that they don’t want to talk about it anymore. Fabio says “you know the deal” which makes me think contracts have been signed. Everyone is tired of it, and then Fabio asks to say something and then tells the camera people they can leave because this is off camera. Of course they do not leave. He says if they want to go home, they need to wrap this up. They all know the drill, and no one forced any of them to come tonight, so don’t make him look like the bad guy. If he gets upset, it will be bad off camera. Next time “Top Chef” asks you to do something, then just say no. I love it. Everything he said was right. Fabio sits back down, everyone laughs, and Fabio immediately asks Marcel to talk about the head-shaving. Rehashing of nonsense. We learn nothing new, except that Fabio asks Marcel if he feels like a victim and Marcel is like “Did I feel like a victim when Cliff dragged me off the couch and held me down and physically assaulted me? Yeah, kind of.” Yeah, they deserved that comment.

Fourth course is corn fed beef, confit in its own fat I think, duck pate with savory root beer caramel. And a damn foam. Fabio asks for the most fun fight. Casey brings up the Howie-Joey fight that was random but very angry. Richard remembers Spike/Antonia/Jen/Hung/Lisa. Oh yeah, that was fun. People getting angry for no reason and Jen being insulted because her girlfriend screwed up.

Dessert is raspberry panna cotta with chocolate mousse and an almond crisp. Harold begs to talk about something positive, so then we get the montage of people acting crazy in the Stew Room. CJ sings. People dance and look like fools. Season 5 made both a volleyball court and beds out of the Ziploc bags. And then all of a sudden Fabio thanks everyone for coming and that’s the end. They should have named a winner. Also, Bravo, just for future reference if you wanted to do a clip show you could just pay Andy to do one. I would be angrier because I hate Andy Cohen but it would have been so much cheaper.