Top Chef 3/14/19--"Finale" summary

Previously on “Top Chef”: Padma made everyone make a dish with durian. Also apparently Padma hates durian. Michelle won an extra hour to cook for the Elimination Challenge, which was to “look to your own heritage” but use Chinese ingredients. Family members were on hand to provide support. Sara made matzo ball soup with Chinese flavors, which is a good idea, even though I still don't like her. She won, and made the finale with Kelsey and Eric. Sadly Michelle didn't use enough Chinese flavors, and she was eliminated. (click for more)

First we get a montage of the final three. We all know. They end up in a theater, where they get to watch more montages and like, Tom talking about Kelsey and all her wins and stuff. Little montages about each of them. Anyway, eventually Tom and Padma arrive with a fog machine. Tom advises them to tap into the emotional side of cooking. The final challenge of course is to cook the four course meal of your life. Each of them gets to pick two sous chefs from the pool of eliminated contestants. They draw knives for picking position. Kelsey takes Brandon and Nini. Eric takes Justin and Michelle. Sara has Eddie and David. 30 minutes to plan and 3 hours to shop. The hotel will also take some special orders. 6 hours to prep and cook. After two of those hours, they'll serve the four judges their first course. Someone will be eliminated right then, and the other two will serve their entire meal the next day. Wow.

Kelsey's theme is “Summers in the South”. I think she's doing buttermilk for the first course? Oysters? Not sure. She wants to make perfect beautiful food. Every time she wins, she went with her gut so she's doing it now. Eric wants to do a jerk tartare for the first course. His theme is the Transatlantic slave trade and how those flavors moved to the South. Sara wants a lot of Southern flavors too, but she seems to be planning some Asian flavors for each course. She is also not planning on dessert. They didn't say she had to.

They've got just under $500 to shop. I think Kelsey's making cornbread and buttermilk sauce? Sara wants to make chili prawns with boiled peanuts. This involves green peanuts, so hopefully she can find them. Eric buys beef tenderloin for tartare. Kelsey is leaning very heavily on Brandon and Nini's Chinese cuisine knowledge. She's listening to others and learning, I guess. I'm not that pressed about it. Sadly Sara finds the peanuts and brags about it in confessional. Eric goes to the supermarket to get some things, while Sara and Kelsey stay at the street market.

After shopping, the final three go out to buy street food and hang out. Eric knows Kelsey and Sara are really close, but he can't be bothered. Meanwhile Kelsey and Sara are buying egg tarts and then trying to Lady and the Tramp it.

Time to get started. I think everyone is working on the first course, and that means sous chefs too. I guess no one has anything in the other courses they want to work on? Oh, no, Eric has sent Justin to work on the other courses. Eric is going to make jerk tartare, which sounds delicious. Sara hollers at whoever that she's making Southern food but with local flavors because that's just the kind of food she makes. Kelsey says buttermilk and cornbread is the kind of thing you get at your grandma's house when you go randomly in the middle of the afternoon. She's brought her grandmother's cast iron cornbread mold. Michelle is making lotus chips, but Eric also wants them thick and she's having problems.

Padma appears to warn them they have one hour. Nini says the texture of the cornbread is good, but the flavor is weird. So they scrap it and make another batch. Justin encourages Eric to put a ton of jerk seasoning in there. Sara's got most of what she wants in terms of flavors. Five minutes of frantic plating.

Sara: chili prawns with boiled peanuts. Kelsey: cornbread and buttermilk. Eric: Caribbean jerk tartare and lotus root chips. Everyone also explains the theme of their meal. The contestants leave, probably to go keep working.

Eric has stayed true to his roots and his flavors. Padma says his food has been so interesting. But they don't taste beef because there a lot of flavors going on. Maybe too many. Plus the lotus chips are uneven. Sara developed some great flavors, but maybe the peanuts were a tiny bit grainy. Kelsey created a memory and also stayed true to herself, but she served them basically straight buttermilk.

Tom has praise for everyone, for putting emotions in their food. But Eric is eliminated. Fuck you guys for real. He's proud all the way through. He's also proud that he introduced the show to West African food. The two girls giggle but they need to get back to work. I think the judges understand Southern flavors more than West African. They get four hours today, and then two more tomorrow.

Kelsey fries soft shell crabs, but they're not getting crispy. Brandon suggests tempura batter with cornmeal. Hmm. Sara knows Kelsey is strong on dessert so she's not going to make any.

Tom Time! He tells Sara maybe she could add an herbal note to her first course. She explains her menu, so they know no dessert is coming. Kelsey maybe should put some seafood in her first course, maybe crawfish. In the last 30 minutes everyone rushes to pack up.

Sara and Kelsey think that shotgunning beers is a good idea. I thought it was the next day at first, but it's the last night. They go downstairs to have drinks and then the chef “happens” to be there, just as they “happened” to decide to go to dinner. We all know this was planned out. Dinner is a super fancy affair with dust and blowtorches and whatever. You guys, I went to a fancy tasting menu type of place and had things like cheese that was made that morning and beet chicharrones and an apple that had been cooked for TWO WEEKS. It was amazing but I also went to a bar afterwards and had cheese fries because I was still hungry. Sara admits to Kelsey she didn't think she'd be making this food in the finale, because with all the Chinese ingredients it's not really anything she'd normally serve.

Each course will have 25 minutes for plating and last minute stuff. Kelsey tells us that she's going to cook and serve her dishes first, and then Sara will go second. The crab dish is standing in her way, but she's out of options so she'll just have to figure out how to make it crispy. I think she finally figures out the batter. Also she is going to use Tom's advice to put a protein in the first course. First course is now cornbread and buttermilk with crawfish, boiled peanuts, cucumber and watermelon. You break up the cornbread and pour the buttermilk over it. The flavors are good and she got the cornbread right. It's light and refreshing and everyone seems to love it.

Kelsey wants ice cold oysters and she's making everyone help with it so it's perfect. I think they have to be ice cold because she's cooking the outsides somehow? And the inside should still be raw. French oysters, vichyssoise, Chinese chives, pickled green tomato and cheese straw. She's done two dishes that were delicate and soft, but very well done. The soup is just the right thickness and the subtle flavor is great.

Back in the kitchen Kelsey is second-guessing herself, because now she has to top her oyster dish. She think she should have switched the order. Soft shell crab and field peas with a pistou sauce. The crab isn't quite crispy, and Tom also thinks the crab itself isn't that great. They've been frozen, because there aren't any soft shell crab in Macau. So was Kelsey so determined to cook Southern food that she decided to have crab shipped in, just because it's soft shell crab season back home? The field peas are maybe slightly underdone.

Dessert time. Meanwhile Sara arrives to start cooking. Tom told her she needed an herbal note in her first course, so she's doing that how? By adding more herbs! It's not a funny joke, Sara. She and David adjust the thickness of some pork. Kelsey's dessert is peach cobbler. There's a honeysuckle tea ice cream and Szechuan peppercorns in the whipped cream. She's very proud of herself for being here. The peaches were wonderful, but the honeysuckle took over. And the peppercorns aren't really doing anything.

Sara insists she needs to do something different and not what she usually does. The pork is kind of salty, so she might have just warm it instead of searing it. But then she says that it's too late to change things so maybe she won't. She's brought some Carolina rice from home. She also jokes in confessional that maybe the judges will just give her the win. See this is the thing that bugs me about her personality. These jokes just aren't funny, and I just want to roll my eyes and ignore the rest of what she's saying. She's not funny but she thinks she is so she keeps joking. The first course is the same as before, but now there's basil and cilantro in there. The broth is subtle, and the herbs help. They like the forcefulness.

The bacon is too salty, or at least she thinks so. But what can she do now? Braised bacon with razor clams, baby corn, and pickled peaches. Padma asks if the baby corn was soaked in salted water, and Sara says she just cooked them in water with a ton of basil. She then says this bacon is not what she's used to and that's probably why it's salty. It is the bacon, very salty. So now it's not comforting. Some of the judges liked it though, including Tom. Well then Tom says there's stuff that doesn't need to be there, and it needs something green.

Third course is roast duck with black eyed peas and pickled beets. These are her two least favorite vegetables from when she was a kid. The pickled beets are a great accompaniment. The duck is well done but maybe she could have pureed the peas? I don't think it's a huge issue.

Eddie cooked Sara's steaks perfectly. Just before service, Sara says to Eddie “Tell your wife 'sorry'” and then kisses him on the cheek and gives him a big hug. It really irritates me, I think because she clearly knows that maybe someone will be upset about it, but fuck it anyway. Rib eye steak with dirty rice, shiitake broth, and maitake mushroom confit. She says she can't tell her story that often. Oh, you know she tells it to everyone. This may be her strongest dish. Someone praises the cook on the steak.

Judges' Table. Both of them did a fantastic job. Sara's first course was much improved over yesterday. It had a great depth of flavor. Kelsey let her broth sit overnight and that really helped. The broth was better, but today's cornbread was less crispy. Tom likes the thought she put into it.

Kelsey's oyster dish was perfect. Tom has nothing bad to say. Sara used some saffron because it's Portuguese, and Macau. It sounds like Tom is going to nail her for how saffron isn't Southern enough. He says it didn't feel like her, and Sara is quick to agree.

Sara's duck was cooked really well, and the tamarind was a nice surprise. But Tom and Padma say it needed something to tie it together. Kelsey admits she struggled with that crab dish. The dipping sauce had oil in it,and then it made everything greasy.

Sara chose not the make a dessert, and this was a great idea because that last dish was amazing. She does not give Eddie credit that we can hear. Kelsey wanted her dessert to be perfect and she's proud of it. The peaches were wonderful, but the ice cream kind of took over. Before they go back to the Stew Room, Padma tells them there will be thousands of little girls looking up to them. Why didn't you say that kind of thing to Kristen and Brooke?

Both chefs are Southern, but they made radically different dishes. Sara's first and last dishes were nearly perfect. Graham is still thinking about peach cobbler. But Kelsey's second course was perfect also. Padma asks if Kelsey gave enough of a progression, because the third dish was too much like an appetizer? Why are we talking about progression suddenly when Sara didn't make a dessert?

Aww, here's family members and everyone to applaud and celebrate. Tom says they're fantastic chefs and fantastic people. Kelsey is the winner! She can't believe it. She just wanted to make her family proud. I think she's in shock. Sara says of course she's disappointed, but if she couldn't win then she wants Kelsey to win. Then she says she started as the local girl, but now she's much more than that. No, you're still the local girl because you reminded everyone all the time. Sorry, I should stop because this is the end of the season! Thanks for reading this far and sticking with me. I've got double Project Runway recaps for a minute and I'll be back to this show when it returns.