Previously on “Top Chef”: the chefs had to make British biscuits, and Tom decided he didn't even want to try. But it was a Quickfire so who cares? Ali won immunity for having crispy biscuits. Then we made teams and went to Tottenham's stadium and cooked with British ingredients. If your team lost twice then you had to compete against each other, so that meant Gabri, Begoña, and Luciana had to fight it out. Luciana did the worst, so she was eliminated. (click for more)
In Last Chance Kitchen: Luciana had to battle Dale and May, using cheese, apples, peas, and rabbit. Everyone got creative, but May doesn't ever cook with rabbit, so she was eliminated. Then Tom said that Dale and Luciana might get back into the competition very soon.
In the morning Victoire gets to call home and talk to her husband. She says when she was in school, if school wasn't in session, she was homeless and ate out of the trash. Jeez. She seems to be recovered from last week's not telling her team she's allergic to walnuts and having to be stabbed with an Epi-pen.
As the chefs come into the kitchen, they see a table full of jams and honey. Padma introduces Adam Handling, who I think was at the table for the pub challenge. The Quickfire involves mead and honey. Make a celebratory dish. Winner gets immunity.
30 minutes to cook. For some reason Victoire thought mead was like vinegar. Huh? Everyone seems to be making easier things, but Sylwia is making dumplings. Does she have time? I think Nicole is making trifle. Tom is making honey mead caviar, with the molecular gastronomy kit. A couple of people holler at Buddha about his crepes being done. Ali has made fresh cottage cheese and fruit poached in honey. Amar tells us in confessional that he has a son now, and that he's making pancakes and hot honey chicken. Nicole is starting to freak out, and Sylwia's dumplings are splitting open. They play the “oh shit” music sting but I'm not sure what happened.
Buddha: birthday crepe with honey roasted bananas. Gabri: mead beurre blanc with poached lobster and honey poached baby corn. Ali: homemade cottage cheese with poached apricot and glazed mead. Sylwia: dumplings with a mustard, honey, and mead sauce. Sara: canary melon and mead soup with honey yogurt and fried seeds. Begoña: Mediterranean cookie with tomatoes, anchovies, and honey. It's a flat cracker with stuff on top, and Begoña served it on an upside down bowl. So when Padma goes to pick it up, it slides off the bowl and ends up face down on the table. Oops. Victoire: shrimp guacamole. Amar: hot honey fried chicken with orange pancakes and whipped mead. Tom: pine honeyed duck with honey caviar. Charbel: butternut squash with feta cheese, toasted cashews and mead sauce. Nicole: mead zabaione with honeyed strawberries. Zabaione is like a thin custard.
Nicole's dessert was pretty sweet, and her zabaione was very soupy. Amar needed acidity. Sylwia had a good sauce, but her execution wasn't good enough for this competition. Tom was very impressive in a short time, Victoire was the most balanced, and Charbel did have acidity. The winner is Tom. No one is surprised. Padma tries to make a bee pun.
Elimination Challenge. She introduces Martha Ortiz, who is a judge from Top Chef Mexico. Gabri is cute about it. Everyone has to pack up and go to Kent, where they will have to have a party for each other and the judges. Be inspired by your favorite holiday. Padma says the phrase “family holiday feast”, meaning everyone will have to agree on dishes so it's a complete meal, and not just 11 meat dishes. They will also have to share the budget of £1000. The winner will get a free stay from the product placement vacation home company.
No one really wants to compromise on what they are making, so it's a lot of proteins and everyone making hearty dishes. Buddha at least says he'll do a cold seafood, maybe a salad. Someone asks if anyone wants to do dessert, and Tom actually volunteers, saying no one ever wants to do dessert, but he has immunity so fuck it. Sara tells them if anyone is planning to use three burners, it's not going to happen. Then Gabri says he wants to do a mole and everyone kind of freaks out. Everyone will get £90, but I guess they'll share if they need to.
Shopping is fun, I missed shopping. Gabri is making tortillas, and his holiday is Dia de los Muertos, which is very fun. Maybe there will be a skull. As they check out, Buddha seems to have put himself in charge. He says for everyone to put anything they don't absolutely need in one cart, and then if they have money left over, they'll add stuff back. It's actually making people ask the group if someone else has a staple they also got, like bay leaves or flour. They end up with some extra money, and they decide to spend it on tequila. Heh.
They drive out to a huge house, with a huge kitchen, but not big enough for 11 people. You know it's not. There's a pool though, which is fun. It's 9pm, and they're getting started. Are they prepping some today? I missed the timing if they said it. Tom hides in the laundry room to cut up fruit and talk about growing up in a winery and I guess making cake with the fruit. There is some chit chat about holidays, and Gabri says he doesn't like holidays. Only Dia de los Muertos, the rest have bad memories. He swigs some wine straight out of the bottle and says “celebration right?” His dad called him right before he died, but he was working and couldn't talk to him. Jeez. A lot of people have sad memories about people who have passed on. Buddha only started celebrating Christmas recently, because when he was younger he worked in his family's restaurant on Christmas. Victoire is wearing a mask because she's using walnuts in her dish and she doesn't want to die. Sara tells everyone she's Jewish. Ali explains to the group about Eid. It's fun to see how different everyone's experiences are. Nicole tries to fight for a burner. Tom wanted to bake the cake today, but people are all up in the oven already. His attitude seems to be “whatever, I've got immunity”. Sara and Amar are planning to cook overnight, low and slow. It looks like they got a couple of hours tonight to cook. Amar pours everyone shots and they all go to bed. There is some giggling about how Amar snores so he needs to shut his door, and someone says “don't fart bro”.
In the morning, we see Sara has a notebook with a grid to track everyone's performance and if they were in the bottom and stuff. Amar celebrates his lamb being tender and not dried out. Gabri is slightly hungover but he's ready to cook. Two hours to cook today. Amar laughs that he just needs to make sauce, because he cooked overnight. Charbel and Begoña work out a plan to share the hot oil to fry things. I think Ali is making pita bread. There are two charcoal chimneys on the ground next to a retaining wall, and they keep popping. Is it the charcoal popping, or the stones on the ground? Or part of the wall? No one seems concerned. Tom begs everyone not to open the oven. Charbel's frying is taking too long and Begoña is not happy to be behind. Tom has to wait for the cakes to cool, so he's just kind of hanging around.
The judges arrive and get very nosy. I know it's much calmer than I expected, based on how frantic it usually is when everyone has to share a home kitchen, but adding four people doesn't help. Begoña interviews that she cut all her chicken into smaller pieces, because she was running so late she was afraid it wouldn't cook in time. Tom's cakes are slumping because they're still hot. It's finally getting frantic with a couple of minutes to go. There is a LOT of food.
Sylwia: Polish white borscht with pork, potatoes, and quail egg served with horseradish. This is an Easter dish. Sylwia says red borscht is for Christmas. Victoire: madesu stew with beans, tomato, and a black bean tuile. Gabri: sea bass with mole verde, pickled onions and radish, with blue corn tortillas. Ali: lamb kebab, tarator sauce with pomegranate molasses, grilled salad, and flatbread. Tarator sauce is a tahini sauce. Buddha: salmon tarator with tahini yogurt, pearl couscous, sumac, chili, nuts, and grapes. I think it's cold. Nicole: five-spice pork belly and greens. Sara: creamed greens with brisket gravy. Sara's story about this dish is absolutely insane: her mother was trying to make a spinach souffle, as she had brought Sara's dad to meet her parents and have dinner, and then Sara's grandfather made her dad help him cut down a tree, and then cut into dad's leg, so they went to the hospital and forgot the souffle in the oven for that whole time, but when they got home it was still good? What is this story. Begoña: “leftover” stew with chicken, vegetables, and peanut sauce. It's a new tradition she does at Christmas time. Charbel: eggplant fatteh with tomato and onion concasse, fried eggplant, tahini yogurt, and crispy pita. Fatteh is leftover bread topped with different things, so this looks like a bread pudding. Amar: braised lamb shank with prunes, cinnamon, sweet onions, and toasted almonds. Tom: apple cake with pastry cream, apple sauce, chocolate sponge, crumble, and plum sauce. Tom Colicchio gives him shit about how dense the cake is, and says he has immunity so he can give him shit. Apparently the cake is not good.
You know, there were dishes with nuts, which I find surprising because it is EXTREMELY common for nut allergies to react to ANY nuts, and you are serving family style? Does Victoire just not eat all the dishes? What about making pork belly and then Sara said she's Jewish and Ali's holiday was Eid, which is the end of Ramadan? No one has mentioned anything about any of these details.
Judges' Table. Everyone has to go stand outside and stare into the sun. Ali, Victoire, and Amar are called out as the top three. Amar says vacation is serious, because as a chef you don't often get to enjoy meals like that. He wanted to bring everyone together. The dried fruits didn't make the dish too sweet, and it felt like a celebration. Victoire wanted to show her story, and the judges loved it because it wasn't anything they've seen before. They've had African food before, and they weren't super thrilled about it, but sure. It was comforting, even though it was new to them. All the beans were perfectly cooked and the whole thing was well-seasoned. Ali told himself earlier he needs to stay humble. Heh. There were so many components and they all worked together like a symphony. The winner is Amar. He immediately invites Ali on his vacation for some reason.
Begoña, Gabri, and Buddha are the bottom three. Oo. Buddha had too many things on top of his salmon, and too much of each thing. He says it's a salad, and to him the salmon isn't the star so he's not pressed that everything else overpowered the salmon. Padma says that's not a problem, but he didn't tell them to mix everything up so they didn't get it. Plus Tom tells him the salmon was underseasoned. Gabri had a bad emotional day yesterday, and it showed. Gail gets weepy as she tells him she empathizes with the weight of what he was doing, and his feeling of wanting to make this for his father and it wasn't what he wanted it to be. Each component was fine, but together they didn't really work. Tom says the mole was scorched and too acidic. Padma asks Begoña why she made leftovers. The sauce was nice, but a little sweet. And the vegetables were just there, they didn't really go. And the chicken was dry. I'm not saying “it ate dry”, “it ate sweet”, I hate that sentence structure.
Buddha complains that Tom said he was too “cheffy”, because it's Top Chef. Amar and Sara respond that this particular challenge demanded home cooking and not cheffy food. The judges are talking about how it was underseasoned, no matter what format that dish was supposed to be. And even as a salad, there was way too much going on. Begoña is offended by how the judges spoke to her, because when they told her this dish wasn't what they expect from her, she decided they were insulting her skills? I don't know. Gail says that there are a lot of ways to serve chicken, vegetables, and a curry sauce, and this wasn't a great one. It's not really a curry, since the ingredients aren't cooked in the sauce so they don't have the same flavor. Gabri knew he was in a bad space, and he knew it affected his food. He put too much pressure on himself and his dish wasn't that great. Notice they didn't tell Tom that he's lucky to be immune, like they do sometimes.
Tom says these dishes were just not at the level they wanted. Begoña is eliminated. Wow. She's pissed. She says she doesn't want to cry, because she can sort it out in the end.
Next week: someone comes back from LCK, picnic baskets, they seem to be in one of those fancy department store food shops.
Last Chance Kitchen: Begoña is ready to admit she deserved to be eliminated because she tried everyone else's dishes and hers was the worst. But she's going to fight for what she wants. Luciana is a little worried because her last challenge was a head-to-head with Begoña and she lost. This is a two-part challenge, where they will eliminate one person the first round, and then the winner of the second part will return to the competition. The first challenge is to work together to make a three course progressive meal. Tom wants something crunchy, something chewy, and something creamy. They each get one texture. Begoña already knows she wants to do chewy.
30 minutes to cook. Begoña throws her apron on, yells to the other two that she's doing chewy, and runs to the fridge. Dale tries to get her back, but Luciana sees how this is going down and tells Dale that Begoña is doing chewy and she'll do crunchy. Dale kind of shrugs, he'll do dessert so whatever. Because Begoña ran off without talking to anyone, no one checked on anyone else. Dale's fine, because he's got dessert, but both Begoña and Luciana have decided to make squab. They argue about it, and then I guess they fix it by Luciana saying she'll do starter instead of main?
Tom Time! Dale admits he doesn't really know how he got creamy and dessert, but he's got a plan. Begoña thinks squab is chewy? Should it be chewy? Tom finds out that Luciana is doing squab also, and (in my opinion) makes overly exaggerated faces about how weird this is. Begoña can't get her sauce reduced fast enough, so she's separated it into three different pans, all on high heat. Luciana maybe overdid how crunchy her squab is. Begoña's reduction plan maybe made the sauce too salty.
Luciana: crispy skin and chopped squab, casaba with parsley, and Marsala reduction. Begoña: squab with crispy skin, confit mushrooms, and Madeira reduction. Dale: mascarpone and lemon curd sabayon, macerated strawberries, meringue, basil, and cilantro.
Everyone at least got the textures right. Luciana made a bowl of crispy things. Begoña cooked everything really well. Dale made meringue and it kind of melts to something creamy so that works also. Begoña's is the favorite. Luciana looks annoyed, but I would be too if my opponents just decided what they wanted to do without working together like we were supposed to. Luciana is eliminated. She chopped her squab so finely it moved back around to chewy.
Time for part two. They have to make afternoon tea. One hour to make six tea towers, each one for two people. Each tower has to feature a finger sandwich, a scone, and a pastry. I think they're feeding the remaining contestants, and then maybe a vote? Begoña immediately says she doesn't know how to make scones, and pastry cooks are one kind of cook and savory cooks are different cooks. Yeah but you're acting like you didn't come on Top Chef with a single dessert recipe? I mean, the chances that it would be scones is very small, but nothing?
We get a preview of cooking, so I think this is going to be on the main show. It looks pretty frantic, and Begoña slips and falls.
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