Top Chef:All Stars 5/21/20--"Colossal Coliseum Kaiseki" summary

Previously on “Top Chef”: everyone had to go up to a fancy campground to cook brunch for a mom's group. So rich white ladies (they were mostly white, don't act like you didn't see that) pay to get away from their kids for a long weekend. The contestants had to first do a Quickfire with baked beans, which Lee Anne won. Then brunch, but they had to get up early to do prep, instead of the day before. Maximum drama. In the end no one made eggs because everyone who was going to messed up. Bryan won, for making his Bryan fancy food out of whatever was left in the pantry. Lee Anne made two bad dishes, and was finally sent home. There was a tiny bit of drama, where she blamed Bryan for having the oven on steam so her clafoutis got ruined, but he had the oven first and she never checked. So it's not like she set the oven and someone changed it. (click for more)

On Last Chance Kitchen, Kevin and Lee Anne had to cook eggs in various ways, and somehow Kevin won. I think Lee Anne pulled her poached eggs too early and they got cold. Or, the producers want Kevin to get back in the competition. Either way.

Melissa says losing Restaurant Wars threw her off her game, and then she was on the bottom last week, so she's in a rut. Stephanie hasn't won yet, and she dreamed about her brother (who passed over a year ago) last night so she's not in a great place. Poor Stephanie.

Padma has Sherry Yard for the Quickfire. I think she used to have a Food Network show about desserts. Immediately everyone is very worried about dessert. Sherry says there's no difference between an executive chef, and an executive pastry chef. Cut to a shot of Karen blinking rapidly as if she doesn't agree in the slightest. The chefs will have a basic pantry with things like flour and eggs, but then to get other flavors, they will have to have a blind taste test. Five minutes for 20 items. Anything you guess correctly, you can use, but you don't have to use all of them. The two chefs who guess the most things correctly will get an hour, next two get 45 minutes, and the last two will only get 30 minutes. Winner gets an advantage.

There are some normal flavors in there, like fruit and stuff, but also prosciutto and ricotta. Malarkey says that since he was co-host of a show called “The Taste” his taste buds should be epic. Overall everyone seems to be doing really well. In the end, Stephanie got 15 correct. There was a tie for second, between Melissa and Gregory with 13, but since Melissa didn't make it through all of her ingredients she gets bumped to third place. Bryan had 11, Karen had 8 and Malarkey had 7. Heh.

Karen thinks she can make panna cotta in 30 minutes. Panna cotta is the kiss of death. And that's when you have lots of time. Malarkey thinks he can bake a cake, if he uses the wood oven. Oh but let's use the ice cream machine again. He's obsessed. Melissa is trying to get back on track. Bryan says that he creates the desserts for his menus. Also we see Gregory consulting a notebook, which answers a frequent question of whether the contestants can use notes and recipes. Karen's panna cotta is...maybe not set. But she's serving it. Melissa is making ice cream with liquid nitrogen instead of trying to brave the ice cream machine. Stephanie has the liquid nitrogen too, mostly because she doesn't want to clean out the ice cream machine after Malarkey used it. Plus he probably made something weird and she has normal ice cream. Gregory has a lot of things.

Karen: coconut panna cotta with peach sauce and fried coconut. Sherry asks a pointed question about what she used to set it. Malarkey: woodfire cake, burnt peaches and cherries with pink peppercorn ice cream. Melissa: olive oil pistachio cake with egg custard ice cream, blackberries, tarragon, and lemon meringue. Bryan: lychee curd, macerated peaches, lavender, honey with coconut sand. Gregory: coconut and milk chocolate curd topped with tropical fruits, coconut ice, salty pumpkin seeds, and pickled cherries. Stephanie: peach and tarragon crostata, pistachios, caramelized ricotta with white chocolate ice cream.

Karen's panna cotta didn't set up, as we could have predicted. Bryan's components all fought with each other. Malarkey celebrates not sucking. His cake turned out. Melissa had delicate meringue and her flavors sang. Melissa wins.

Elimination Challenge. The chefs will be cooking for Olympic athletes. And since the games are in Tokyo, then why not be inspired by Japanese food? Lot of nervous looks. Padma promises help, which is Niki and Carole Lidi-Nakayama. Gregory says you can't get into their restaurant, it's so busy. They'll be making a six course progressive kaiseki meal. That's serious business. Kaiseki is the most formal kind of dining, often seen at tea ceremonies. There's a defined sequence to the dishes. There's also more than six courses, I think, so maybe they'll cut them some slack. It's also hyper-seasonal, although this show usually doesn't have too much of a problem with that. You have to respect the ingredients and cook with restraint. Malarkey freaks out.

To help out, the contestants all take seats at the counter for Niki and Carole's interpretation of courses. First course is appetizer, or sakizuke. After a lecture on how your knife cuts are extremely important, Bryan tries to ask if this course is always cold fish, and he gets the response that it always has vinegar. The knife cuts thing, though, is the other reason this is going to be hard for some people. Presentation is at least as important as taste. It has to look perfect and beautiful. Second course is owan, which is soup. The first sip should be underseasoned, and then perfect by the end. If it's slightly salty at the beginning, then it's maybe overseasoned. Third is yakimono, which is a flame-grilled dish. Fourth is mushimono, a steamed dish. Fifth is shokuji, a rice course. Someone (I think Gregory) asks if this is always plain rice, and apparently it usually is. It depends on the rest of the dishes. If everything else is very light, you can have a heavier dish here. Last is mizumono, which is dessert. Karen interviews that most of them try to layer flavors and add ingredients, which is the opposite of how this meal is set up. Plus she was eliminated on her season for making a Japanese dish, so she's nervous. No, you were eliminated for NOT making a Japanese dish, but instead making a Chinese dish because that's what you wanted to do, and then trying to shoehorn it into the challenge. But I can see why you'd be nervous. Because Melissa won the Quickfire, she gets to both pick what course she wants and then assign everyone else. She picks the fourth course, the steamed dish. As she assigns the courses, she interviews that she's not trying to screw anyone over, she wants them to get the courses they want.

So the schedule is this: first is Bryan, second is Malarkey, third is Karen, fourth is Melissa, fifth is Gregory, and dessert is Stephanie. Two hours to prep and cook tomorrow. They'll be at the LA Memorial Coliseum. Winner gets tickets to the Olympics (I assume for next year).

There's some discussion in the cars about what dishes they're going to make, but I'm pretty sure they're in two cars so as far as we've seen, the chefs have not all gathered to agree on a progressive menu. Malarkey calls Bryan “Michael”, and as Bryan is being offended Malarkey says “I'm a real fan of your brother!” Heh. Melissa is planning on chawanmushi, which is steamed egg custard. Gregory is worried because his style is big flavors. Kind of the opposite here. As everyone is getting ready in the morning there is some shitty knockoff “Olympic” music and then some footage of Karen. This is very rude because she is power lifting with no makeup on, and when they cut immediately to her in her “Asian” top and full makeup in confessional it makes the weightlifting footage look terrible and ages her. She's working out! The least you could do is not intersperse it with her looking all made up. Anyway, Karen would compete in power lifting, if you couldn't guess with the power lifting she is actually doing.

At least this kitchen looks decent. Two hours to work. Bryan is being anal about knife cuts and stuff, but that's not surprising. Malarkey yells about how Bryan should let him win since Bryan has already been to the Olympics. Malarkey wants his broth to have as much flavor as possible. His food usually is really out there. Karen has the flame grilled dish, and I guess this kitchen doesn't have any actual open flames. So she's got hotel pans with charcoal in them, and then the duck breast skewered and balanced over the opening. She's worried that they each have to make 13 plates, and there maybe isn't room to cook 13 portions of duck over what looks like something the size of a steam tray in a buffet line. Melissa reminds us that on her season, her mother cooked chawanmushi for a challenge. I remember that! It was excellent and everyone said she was lucky her mom was there. Gregory is making rice porridge and sablefish. Stephanie has decided to make panna cotta, which is never a good idea. But she's also cleaned out the lemon rinds and pouring the panna cotta in there, I guess as a presentation thing? I don't know how I feel about that. Karen doesn't like the grill situation, so she decides to hot smoke the duck in jasmine tea. It tastes fine, but now the skin isn't crispy and the fat is not rendered. So then the duck has to be seared on the flattop. This is a lot of steps.

Tom and the judges arrive and greet the athletes. Tom immediately demands to know who has the most medals. Tacky. Bryan is more confident in his presentation that everyone else seems to be, because he's so anal about his presentation in his regular life.

Bryan: scallop, avocado confit, tomato dashi with osetra caviar, bonito aioli. It looks lovely. This goes over very well, but I think we all expected Bryan to do really well. Malarkey is using tweezers to plate, but of course the biggest tweezers possible. Malarkey: spot prawn, dashi, celery, and squash. It looks nice but also not as “artsy” as expected. The judges notice the presentation, and also that it looks nicer than it tasted. The soup was kind of cold. I guess it wasn't supposed to be cold.

Karen's duck cookery is not consistent. Karen: jasmine tea smoked duck with roasted and fresh grapes, miso and saba. I think saba is cooked from grape juice? Used in balsamic vinegar? That's all I could find. It's not that crispy, and Tom can see that it's inconsistent, which is bad on a regular day and deadly for this menu. Melissa usually steams her stuff on a stove, but she had too many portions today so she had to use the commercial oven. Melissa: dungeness crab chawanmushi with clams, chantrelles, and Meyer lemon. It's delicious, but someone says they're not sure if it's supposed to be soup. Padma says it didn't set up as much as it was supposed to, because you should never mistake it for soup. Also someone got a piece of shell. Uh oh.

Gregory didn't salt his broth enough, and he didn't realize it until it was too late and he couldn't really do anything about it. Gregory: short grain rice, sable fish, mushroom broth with salted daikon and pickles. It's not a porridge so much as it is rice in broth. The fish has crispy skin and the pickles are nice, but it is kind of bland. And the broth is cloudy, which I guess is not ideal. Stephanie's panna cotta did set up. Stephanie: panna cotta with yuzu curd and orange granita. Everyone raves and raves about it. Also the lemon rind cup goes over well, so what do I know?

Judges' Table. Padma says the decision about the winner is unanimous. The winner is Stephanie, who cannot believe she has won. Bryan also scored high, with a great balance of all the ingredients. So these are the top.

Karen admits she didn't know how to set up the grill. The duck wasn't unctuous, not meaty. The skin wasn't crispy on all the pieces either, and Tom dings her for uneven cuts. Melissa's flavors were amazing, but the texture was off and there was a shell. She wanted to make something traditional, which makes sense. Malarkey's soup was fine, but the celery was overwhelming. Tom gives him shit about holding himself back, because they know he had to be dying about that. The broth wasn't hot enough to steep any of the ingredients. Gregory knows his broth wasn't seasoned enough, and it meant that the mushrooms didn't come together with the rice.

Padma says everyone's mistakes were technical, not really conceptual. Malarkey had lukewarm soup. Gregory had bland soup, and Tom says he still liked it though. Karen failed to grill her duck and then failed to make even cuts. She disrespected the ingredients. Melissa didn't steam her custard properly. And even though there was a shell, they still ate all of it because it did taste amazing.

Tom says in kaiseki you have to both honor the ingredients and have precision in cooking, and in one dish the precision was off. Karen is eliminated. It feels like she is walking up to the judges' table to shake hands before Padma is even finished speaking. She thinks she's been eliminated for a good dish. I guess.

Next week: last elimination before the finale in Italy (which I hope they were able to film?), Gregory didn't get everything on the plate, Malarkey tries to have an excuse.

Last Chance Kitchen: we start with the remaining chefs in the Stew Room talking about how close this was. They discuss how Karen has already been eliminated and come back this season. I had forgotten about that.

Kevin had not really hoped to see Karen today. Tom says there is a two part finale for Last Chance Kitchen, and this is part one. Back at the house everyone is having breakfast, and discussing that they know they may be walking into the Last Chance Kitchen finale this morning. Karen knows she had problems cooking her duck. Tom is seizing on the tea smoked part.

Kaiseki originated as part of the tea ceremony, so they have to highlight tea. Karen did a really great job on that, and Kevin never cooks with tea. This seems rigged. Especially since Tom has mentioned more than once that the tea-smoked part of Karen's duck was actually really good.

30 minutes to cook. Kevin doesn't have a solid idea right now. He's got hibiscus tea, and also a turmeric ginger. He's going to make components and then taste them at the end and see what he has. Karen...is opening tea bags? There were canisters of loose tea and she's got mass market green tea bags? That seems weird. She also claims to not know what she's doing. Maybe poach some fish in the tea and then make seafood broth? She then boldly goes up to Kevin to demand the turmeric ginger tea. Oh you might think she was asking if she could have some, but the loud voice and how she snatched that canister? That's how you make sure if you don't get what you want everyone sees the other person denying you. Kevin has found some tuna to infuse with the tea and a spice rub, but he's not 100% committed.

Tom Time! Karen has many things, including poached fish that is somehow in the oven. Can you properly poach fish in the oven? I guess. Kevin has a pickle in mint tea, I think. I think he's still planning to make a bunch of things and then hope enough of them go together to make a dish. He's got sour apples and “homemade” mint tea and some lemon, in a vacuum pack. Karen grabs some black tea to add to the poaching liquid, and then she almost drops her whole pan with the fish on the floor. Karen bitches not to tell Kevin the time, as if you can't both hear it.

Karen: poached cod in lemongrass and ginger tea with a turmeric ginger broth. There is also black tea in the poaching liquid, and the turmeric ginger broth is tea based. Kevin: roasted tuna in hibiscus and mint tea broth with apple, pistachios and tahini. Both good dishes, well cooked. Tom doesn't say much else, except that it was hard. It was about the tea, and the dish that had clearer tea flavor was Kevin. Yay! Karen immediately crosses her arms and when Tom says the sauce was murky, she just snaps, “OK. Thank you.” and gives him a dirty look. Then in her interview she says she's going to cheer for Kevin because she knows what it's like to be the person who got back in from LCK. This is what I don't like about Karen, is her attitude that I find obnoxious. If you're so mad you got eliminated that you're snapping at Tom, then be mad. Don't act like you're a gracious loser.

Tom says it's time for part two. So everyone else walks in, and they keep the lights off as if it's night. But we know it's the middle of the morning. The only think standing between Kevin and the title is the remaining chefs. Well three of them.

So now there's part two? Up now? And it's half an hour long. Is this basically the first half of next week's episode? I don't know. Well, in for a penny, in for a pound, I guess. Time for part two. We'll see if they make a cliffhanger out of it.

No one will admit they want Kevin to come back in. So here's how this will work: Kevin can pick three of the remaining chefs to battle head-to-head. He has to win two of the three battles to return. No one else can be eliminated, so either Kevin loses and they remain a final five, or Kevin wins and now there are six left. Kevin knows some people are better at Eliminations and some are better at Quickfires, and this is closest to a Quickfire. Kevin picks Malarkey as his first opponent, which is not surprising. Malarkey is thrilled because he is slightly crazy. There is a table with food in four categories: roots, shells, fruits and nuts, and stinky. Malarkey gets to pick an ingredient category, which is shells. Tom gets to pick what they're cooking, so he picks risotto. Nini gives a super loud dramatic gasp. Actually everyone does, she's just the loudest. Bryan thinks it's the one dish that has sent home more chefs than any other dish on this show.

30 minutes to make risotto. Malarkey says he's making fennel lemon risotto with lobster. When the peanut gallery asks what Kevin is making, he says exactly the same thing. Malarkey wants to keep it classic, because Tom likes it classic. Kevin knows the other contestants know he's a competitor. Usually he'd make a seafood stock, but he doesn't have time so it's gonna have to be vegetable broth infused with crab. Kevin thinks this is a technical challenge.

Tom Time! Malarkey has his risotto in a saute pan so he can toss it instead of stirring, because he doesn't have time. He chants in his Malarkey way that he doesn't need no stinking wooden spoon! Cue basically the entire peanut gallery saying “You do.” Ha! Kevin also has saffron, because he likes saffron and crab together. Kevin has a third pan filled with...something. Cream and butter? So he can poach seafood for a garnish. The peanut gallery reminds Malarkey to edit. Kevin is very confident. Malarkey I think is also confident, but because he's put his risotto on the plate and then spooned broth over it so it won't dry out.

Malarkey: tarragon, fennel, and lobster risotto. Kevin: saffron and crab risotto with beurre monte sauce. The two dishes are essentially the same, but one dish the rice and the seafood both were cooked a little better. Kevin is the winner, which is not surprising. You can't put rice and then pour broth over it, it just makes soup. Malarkey is like, we can disagree, I know I won, Tom is just too old. What happened to “Tom is classic so I'm keeping it classic”?

Kevin picks Bryan as his next opponent. Possibly because Bryan has no Quickfire wins. Or, it's a grudge match from their season. Heh. Bryan chooses the stinky food group from the table. Tom asks for soup.

30 minutes. Bryan knows these ingredients will have a ton of flavor. Kevin takes like, every ingredient up there. Bryan has a coconut curry soup, with some squash, and some miso, other stuff. Kevin has decided on spicy vegetable soup, with just whatever he has decided to throw in this broth for fun.

Tom Time! Kevin admits to Tom he's just trying to put as many things in this soup as he can. Tom seems nervous. He tries to get sympathy from the peanut gallery, who just says that he set himself up. Tom continues to look nervous until time is up.

Kevin: vegetable soup with tomato, fish sauce, shrimp paste, cabbage, blue cheese and kale. The whole place is highly entertained by how many items are in the soup. Bryan: curry delicata squash soup with scallop, fish sauce, and shrimp paste. Both ended up being good, somehow. Kevin had a ton of umami. Bryan was more subtle, but combined everything better so he won. He actually seems not happy, I guess because he does like Kevin. He says it's his first Quickfire win ever on this show, except for one team challenge.

Of course it comes down to the last person. Kevin asks for volunteers, which is dumb. Pick someone. He thinks because they wouldn't admit they wanted him back, they should have to pick who goes against him. This strategery backfires strongly when Gregory is the one who volunteers. The person with the most Quickfire wins. Oops. Gregory takes the fruits and nuts group, and Tom asks for dough. He says quick breads and batters will count, and it doesn't have to be sweet.

30 minutes. I think they've both decided on dessert. Kevin is making pear and walnut cobbler. Cook down the pears and fry the walnuts, with cornbread batter. Gregory is getting help from people about keeping track of his pans and stuff. He's making rice dumplings out of rice flour. Is it going to be mochi? Hmm. Also a fruit salad and some coconut milk.

Tom Time! All he gets out of Kevin is that he's making dessert, and then he walks off. Tom can't really make heads or tails of Gregory's dish but he seems to trust him. Kevin finally gets his cobbler in the oven, but I guess we're trying to make sure it's hot and I think he's only going to have maybe 15 minutes to bake them. Kevin knows that if he fails at this, there's no backup. Gregory freezes some fruit with liquid nitrogen. I mean Kevin's plating, I guess. Gregory also plates a tiny bit early so the frozen fruit can thaw a little and not be so cold.

Gregory: cold coconut milk fruit soup with rice dumplings. Tom gets a brain freeze. Kevin: pear and walnut cobbler with whipped mascarpone cream. They are both excellent. The dumplings were good, and the fruit was good, but there weren't as many dumplings in there as maybe there could have been. Kevin's cobbler was cooked, but not as tender as it could have been. Kevin takes it. Everyone claps but no one looks that happy about it. There are some congratulations, but the peanut gallery doesn't even look happy. Karen said she was going to root for him, remember. Kevin is exhausted now, which puts him at a disadvantage.

Oh of course on an night with 45 minutes of LCK they decided that's the time to actually have an episode of What Would Tom Do? Tom has decided to take some Japanese ingredients and make them his way. This means king crab and uni and miso butter put in a syringe and then injected into king crab legs that are going to be grilled. I wonder if someone had made a Japanese burre blanc to poach uni if they would have allowed it. Maybe. It's a very pretty dish. Host woman wants to say “kampai” but with food. It's “itadakimasu”. All the flavors are subtle, which is the point.