Previously on “Top Chef”: everyone had to cook with “random” ingredients because of kids, which wasn't super terrible. Brandon won by basically making a kids' meal. Jennifer sat out again, but didn't go to the doctor this time. After the Elimination challenge, the judges asked if she wanted to stay, and they offered her a guaranteed spot in the future if she wanted to quit. But she didn't, so Jennifer cannot sit out any more challenges or she's out. The Elimination challenge was to highlight dehydrated ingredients. Anthony won, for making a soup that already has dried ingredients in it. Rhoda undercooked her monkfish and was sent home since Jennifer wasn't quitting. (click for more)
Last Chance Kitchen: Nana and Rhoda had to make their take on she crab soup, only it couldn't be a soup. Rhoda made Singaporean chili crab and won, which was nice.
Everyone sits in the Stew Room and mopes. They can't believe Rhoda is gone, since she won the first two challenges and everyone thought she was a frontrunner. They all try to not think about it.
In the morning, Laurence is painting some Warhammer minis which is super nerdy. Anthony rolls in and asks leading questions to make it clear he knows exactly what Warhammer is, so they have a nerd bonding moment. Kristen meets them in the kitchen and says there's no Quickfire this week. It's BBQ time. Brandon says this is his wheelhouse. A pitmaster rolls out with a big tray of food so everyone is excited. There are two main styles, Eastern and Western. Kristen does a bunch of product placement and says it's all about the twos. Sigh.
Anyway, two teams of five, and each team will get a whole hog to smoke. Anthony gets to be one captain, since he won last week, and he also gets to pick out who the other captain is. Interesting. He picks Justin, as someone who will now suffer with him. Anthony picks Laurence first. Justin naturally picks Jenn (of course). Anthony tells the room that he knew if he picked Justin as the other captain, then he will clearly take Jenn so that gives Anthony more options. Heh. Anthony's team is Laurence, Brandon, Sherry, and Duyen. Justin has Jenn, Sieger, Jonathan, and Oscar. There will be five head-to-head rounds, each featuring part of the hog. Everyone has to make one dish. The five parts are shoulder, loin, belly, ham, and “chopped”. I guess chopped is when you just take whatever pork from anywhere on the pig and chop it up. If you win your round, you also win $5,000. The team that wins the most rounds is all safe from elimination. So the losing team can still earn money. Winning team will get 2% extra, which is an extra $500 each. It's a [product placement credit card] thing, don't worry about it.
Because it's a whole hog, they're going to need 10-12 hours, hence the lack of a Quickfire. They've done all nighters before. They have to go outside somewhere, next to a pond, but it's pretty. Hope there aren't too many mosquitoes. Kristen says however they want to get it done is up to them. Justin points out they have a lot of time to overthink their dishes so that's great. They will serve the judges and a bunch of pitmasters, and the judges will each get a vote. The pitmasters will get one collective vote, so they get to have some kind of say but not too much. Before they go out there, there's a little tour around a couple of spots so they can have some food and ask the pitmasters important questions. They can also have $500 per team at a “specialty shop”.
While they're still in the kitchen, they all have some Eastern chopped pork. According to the chyrons, “Eastern style” is mostly chopped, with a vinegar-based sauce. Sieger claims to have done this a bunch of times. They don't put sauce on the hog before smoking, just salt.
In the cars on the way to the next place, Brandon is talking about how he has a butcher shop and he loves the smoker and blah blah. Anthony's team (Red Team) seems pretty pumped with ideas. Meanwhile Jonathan is telling his car (Gray Team) that his brother's team is going to lose focus while they have Sieger, who has done this a million times. Interesting. Justin's plan to separate the twins seems to have been a decent one. At the first spot, they get a crash course in things like, where to put the coals, and when to flip the pig over, and how if you open the lid of the smoker you let all the heat out. The guy says when you flip it, there should still be some structure. He puts basically a whole side of a pig on a big board and shows the contestants where everything is, and they just taste all the parts. Sherry's talking about pernil, and how her family always does a big pork roast at the holidays.
On the way to the next spot Red Team is dividing up the parts, and Brandon is realizing he might get stuck with the pork loin because other people are claiming everything else. He says there is no way the pork loin won't be dry and overcooked, because it simply doesn't have enough fat to be cooked for 12 hours. So he straight up tells his car he doesn't want to be stuck with it because it's a “death sentence”. OK but when you phrase it that way, you've basically said “this cut is super hard to work with, someone else deal with it” and I'm not sure you're going to get a lot of takers. Laurence volunteers to take the loin, and leave Brandon with the pork belly, and then Brandon has the audacity to ask if he's OK with that. You just refused to take the loin, so you can't be like “oh is that OK?” when you straight up said “I'm not doing it, it's a death sentence”. Laurence claims that Brandon is going to lead the team and take on more responsibility. Isn't Anthony the leader? Whatever. In the other car, no one wants the loin either, so the attitude of “pork loin is going to be very hard to deal with” is universal. Sieger says he'll take it, if they will let him be in charge of the smoking. If they do the hog the way he wants, the loin will be fine. No one really argues with this.
The second spot does “Western style” BBQ, which is exclusively chopped shoulder meat and a ketchup-based sauce. Kristen never said they had to do one style or the other, mainly because if the chyron is correct, you can't do a loin or pork belly in Western style because they don't use all the cuts. Oscar is having an idea of treating a salsa as a sauce, because of the tomatoes. Anthony has the leg, or “ham” basically, so he's hoping to put enough fat in it.
In the car Duyen tells everyone she has to unbutton her jeans. Heh. Justin tells his team he's glad for this car, because he knows there is yelling happening in the other car and he's not about it. Cut to the other car where everyone is asleep. Hee. The “specialty shop” appears to be a supermarket that is not Whole Foods. You know what, actually I think it is an Asian supermarket, because Sherry and Justin are talking about their dishes near a display of rice bowls and Chinese soup spoons, in front of pallets of 50 pound bags of rice. You guys know what I mean. Anyway these two have the shoulder and are apparently “Round 1”. Laurence loves this store. He and Sieger have the pork loin and are Round 2. Brandon and Jonathan both have pork belly and you cannot tell me the producers just happened to luck out on that. This twin drama is very mild compared to the twin drama I am used to (*cough*Project Runway) but someone had to be celebrating the twins going head-to-head. Jonathan is searching the display for pork skin. He says that using the actual skin off the hog you spent all night smoking won't be as good as buying separate pork skin and dehydrating it to make chicharron. I'm putting this here because this feels like foreshadowing. Round 4 is ham, which is Anthony and Jennifer. Duyen and Oscar are last with chopped. She asks Oscar how to say “mango” in Spanish. Which is “mango” but with an accent. Heh. No one has money drama. Duyen has realized Oscar is the other person with chopped pork, and she's in her team's car slamming a fist into the other palm and saying “Oscar, you're gonna get it”. Duyen is not particularly threatening so everyone just laughs and Anthony says she's a demon. Duyen interviews that she's very sweet and nice but sometimes her alter ego “Duane” comes out. “Duane” is like if “fuck around and find out” was a person. I hope she backs this up. Duyen is very funny.
The pond is pretty, and there's a big shed or at least a big roof over a concrete slab? Brandon declares himself in charge of the fire and coals and whatnot, because he has the experience. Sure. He says he's putting more charcoal under the ham because it takes longer. I don't have any idea, I'm just writing this down in case it backfires. They put the pig in the smoker and then Brandon gets annoying and bugs the other team about how they don't have the pig in yet and do you need someone strong to lift it and blah blah. It's not even entertaining trash talk. Sieger says that he is doing South Carolina style, where you put the hog in the smoker and then gradually raise the temperature. If you get everything hot and then put the pig in, it won't cook evenly. Interesting. Gray team's plan is to not open the smoker for at least the first six hours.
So the production crew has set up your standard shitty outdoor kitchen under the big roof. OK it doesn't look that shitty, but I feel like any temporary outdoor kitchen is not as good as a real kitchen inside a real restaurant. Sherry is making bossam, which is Korean pork you would put in lettuce wraps, but also chimichurri and rice flavored with the head. Justin is going to make a sandwich with the shoulder and hope it doesn't fall apart. Laurence is making XO sauce. Sieger is making pig ear terrine. Sure, I guess so. The twins are supposedly doing fine dining BBQ, and Brandon is like “of course you copied me”. At least I think it's Brandon but it's not like it matters. As far as I can tell Brandon is the one who tries to trash talk, while Jonathan seems to be too busy for that shit and is therefore winning. Also we have pimento espuma. Everyone is making side dishes and stuff. Duyen and Oscar are both making dishes from their backgrounds, spring rolls and tamales respectively.
Tom Time! He just like, appears in the kitchen. The time stamp says it's 10:25pm. Tom gives Jonathan shit for making espuma for a BBQ, and in confessional Jonathan says he'll take the hit for it. That's all the Tom Time, apparently, because he says to everyone he has a surprise! Because there was no Quickfire today! Everyone freaks out, but it's just that he has s'mores. Oh, I lied, it IS a challenge. You get $500 if you make the best s'more, I guess. Goddammit Tom, I was not wanting to deal with more dishes.
Turns out this is actually optional, as not everyone goes with Tom to make s'mores. There's a lot of random shit, popcorn, other candy. There's Lucky Charms marshmallows, and Laurence spies them and asks Tom if he likes Lucky Charms. Heh. Oscar is grinding up chiles in a mortar and pestle. Meanwhile, the chefs who didn't feel like playing along are discussing who couldn't make it “in the wild”. They feel Oscar. It was Oscar who had all the face masks and beauty stuff, right? Oscar interviews that he just wants his marshmallows to get tan, which is lame. S'mores should be burnt. You need to light the marshmallows on fire do not @ me about this. Someone asks for microgreens and Tom threatens to throw them in the fire. Duyen: cookie s'more sandwich. I think she just used chocolate chip cookies instead of graham crackers. Sherry: peanuts two ways pizzelle s'more. It seems to be peanut butter cups and peanut brittle, and a pizzelle cookie. Everyone is just coming over to sit next to Tom on the edge of a raised planter, while he sits in an Adirondack chair. Laurence: Biscoff and Lucky Charms s'more. Brandon: so it says “right side up” s'more, with the quotes, but I'm not sure what is different about it except that he tells Tom he has to eat it “the other way” with the chocolate on top. Jonathan: caramel and raspberry s'more. Someone does burn the whole marshmallow so someone knows how to do this properly. Jennifer: glazed pecans s'more. Oscar: spicy chili s'more. It's got some ground up dried chilis in there, which honestly I would eat. Justin: peanut butter cup and popcorn s'more. Tom declares Oscar the winner, probably because having something spicy cut all the sugar and was a relief. He gets $500 and in confessional he calls everyone suckers for picking him last. He does also point at everyone in person and say “Take that losers! No I'm just kidding”. Heh.
So Anthony and Sieger both stayed back to cook stuff. I wonder if they would have kicked Jennifer out of the competition if she had not made s'mores, seeing as how everyone had the choice to sit this one out. At 11:45pm Brandon is pulling the pork loins out of the smoker for Laurence, so they don't get overcooked. There is a shot of Sieger watching them, as we get a voiceover interview about how he would never “bastardize” the tradition of “whole hog barbecue in the Carolinas” for a win. He tells the other team they're different, North Carolina vs. South, and then he says “Not saying it's better, it's just different.” That's not what your interview says, Mr. “I would never bastardize traditions just for a win”. I don't care, just own that you think you're better than them.
1am. Anthony is doing some prep work for Duyen, mostly because I think he's looking for something to do. No one is very rushed, which is kind of nice. Laurence asks Sherry for some advice, because he doesn't just want to cook the pork loin but it needs to be integrated. She tells him to make pork floss, which is an interesting idea. I'm not sure if the judges will think it's creative or be mad they didn't get a slice of pork, and Sherry seems to agree with me because she tells him not to thank her until he gets the judges' feedback. True. He is going to serve slices, but also the pork floss and some pulled pork. Sieger says their hog looks great. At 2am Duyen is trying to decide if she wants coffee or if she's going to give up and go to bed. Justin and Jonathan play cornhole. Duyen does end up going to bed, and Sieger tells his team he'll stay up all night. Jenn does head to bed, which her team seems to support because of her shoulder. There are little cabins to sleep in, but the beds are up in a loft and if I was Jennifer I'd sleep downstairs on the couch instead of climbing up and down a ladder with my shoulder.
6:15am. Red Team wakes up to test the hog and see if it's cooked. It seems to be in a good spot. Sieger is just poking the hog with a finger and saying it's ready. People are still doing prep work, and now they're changing into chef's coats and doing final stuff, I think. Jonathan says he has to get his dish ready to kick his brother's ass. Duyen has the chopped pork, so since that isn't really a cut but all the unused meat, she has to wait around for everyone else to take what they're using before she can get meat for her own dish.
Judges arrive, and maybe 15 pitmasters? Everyone has a little paddle with one side gray and one side red. Hilariously the judges have a big table with a pergola and they seem to be slightly higher up, or at least on tall chairs. Everyone else has picnic tables, but at least they have umbrellas. Michelle from Top Chef: Wisconsin is here. She jokes that she's glad they didn't have this on her season, but Gail points out that as a pitmaster, she's probably the only one who wouldn't have been worried.
Round one is the shoulder. Justin is slicing shoulder for sandwiches and baking bread from scratch. Well...I think Jenn made most of the bread while Justin did some of her prep. Oscar says “those buns look great...and the bread looks good too”. Heh. Sherry is slightly worried he's done more work than her. Justin: milk bread BBQ sandwich, smoked pork shoulder, Alabama coleslaw, spicy pickles, and dipping sauce. Sherry: “south of the border” bossam, eastern style vinaigrette, cabbage chow chow, and fresh herb salad. There's also rice and pig's head meat on the plate somewhere, with chimichurri in it. Interestingly Sherry wins 4-1. The pitmasters voted for her, and then all the judges except Michelle. They were both good, but I think they liked all of Sherry's flavors and sides.
Round two is the loin. Laurence is proud of his dish. Sieger: pork loin, crispy ear terrine, and mustard-based carrot BBQ sauce. It's two small pieces of meat and some sauce. He also brags about how he was in charge of the smoking, so he'd rather take the loin instead of sticking someone else with it. Laurence: smoked pork loin, pork floss, rice and “east meets east” sauce. So some of the parts were put back in the smoker, I think, and the slice of loin was the part they took out early. One of the pitmasters says he takes the pork loin out before he puts the hog on the smoker, which I'm sure hurts Sieger deeply. Laurence narrowly gets the pitmaster vote, and then all the judges' votes. Kristen says it was close because she loved Sieger's pig ear terrine. It's just that Laurence had all the different preparations. Tom just straight up tells Sieger his loin was dry. Oof.
Justin says it's not looking great, because they have to win this round or they can't win the whole thing. Also that they put all their faith in Sieger and he just lost. Round three is pork belly. Jonathan: pork belly, chicharron, succotash, and pimento cheese. He immediately tells everyone to dip the chicharron into the pimento cheese, which I'm sure is great, but Tom's gonna get grumpy he had instructions. Also it's technically cheese foam. Brandon: smoked BBQ pork belly, mac n' cheese, collard greens, and mustard onions. Brandon adds that for the record he did not buy chicharrons at the grocery store. Everyone is like, ooooooo damn! But Jonathan still cooked the chicharron. It's not like he bought a bag and dumped them on there. I'm pretty sure I saw him boiling the skin and what not. Jonathan does clarify I was right. In a twist I was not expecting, Brandon took all the votes so the Red Team has won. I did not see very many votes for Jonathan among the pitmasters, if any. The pimento cheese congealed, although the chicharron was good. But Brandon had better flavors. I am too used to challenges where it's magically a tie until the last round, so I was sure Gray Team would win to stay alive. But now that I think about it, I think this show does have uneven challenges.
Round four is ham. Anthony is just now realizing both he and Jenn have hushpuppies. Jennifer: ham steak, black-eyed pea puree, hushpuppies, smoked grapes, and pickled collard green stems. Anthony: ham mojo, black bean puree, oranges, and hushpuppies. Mojo is garlic citrus sauce so it goes with the oranges. Jennifer does actually win, so Gray Team won something finally. Anthony isn't too upset, since he can't go home. But I would assume Jenn is also safe now. Plus she won some money. The pitmasters and everyone but Michelle voted for her. It's very balanced and cooked well. Anthony had a great Cuban feel.
Round five is chopped. Oscar: pig face stuffed tamale, curtido, and salsa ahogada BBQ sauce. Curtido is cabbage slaw, and salsa ahogada is I think tomato salsa that isn't spicy. All the Google results were in Spanish and it's after midnight so you're getting my high school Spanish skills from 30 years ago. Duyen: chopped BBQ, papaya salad, summer roll, and fried spring roll. Her dipping sauce is half the sauce Laurence was using, and half nuoc mam. Duyen takes the pitmaster vote, but all the judges vote for Oscar. Interesting. Both dishes were good, but Kristen liked that Oscar gave them more pork. Yeah, Oscar's dish was a tamale with pork and stuff piled on top, and Duyen had like three bites. Various pitmasters talk about their favorite dishes, and then the pitmasters all leave.
Judges' Table. Tom was pleased with this challenge, overall great dishes. Michelle gets to announce the winner, who is Laurence. Just to twist the knife, she does say he took the masterclass and “smoking the whole hog” and ran with it. Cut to Sieger. Laurence having different preparations and cooking the loin perfectly won it. He says they had great teamwork and they were “dancing together” through the night, and he gives Sherry credit for suggesting pork floss.
Kristen thinks the Gray Team didn't crash and burn, but they just got beaten out by slightly better food. Justin, Jonathan, and Sieger all lost their rounds, so one of them will be out. Justin's milk bread was delicious, but the pork was slightly underseasoned. They ask him why he chopped the shoulder instead of slicing it, and he says he was trying to fit the bun. He should have just sliced it and let it hang over. Kristen then says, “Jonathan, why espuma pimento cheese?” Yeah, for real. He didn't want it to be too simple, and even though Tom tried to tell him not to, he wanted to stick to his plan. The texture was off. Sieger claims they tried the loin “right when I sliced” and it was fine. He is now saying that in the little bit of time between slicing and serving, it carried over and got overcooked. Uh huh. He put a little slice next to a pool of sauce, so it was dry. Gail I am not going to entertain the sentence construction “it ate dry” just say it was dry. Michelle didn't like his sauce anyway, because it was too thick. Tom knows Sieger did a lot of work being in charge of the whole hog.
As the judges are discussing, it is raining, and while that pergola does have a swag of fabric for shade, it looks pretty decorative in terms of keeping the rain off. Sherry is telling the twins she wanted to hate them, but she “borderline” loves them and can she be the triplet. Both teams did a lot of work and had good teamwork. They did not like the pimento cheese but Jonathan's pork was good. He just didn't need the cheese. Sieger tried to “chef it up” too much. He needed the same critique Justin got, which is that it's barbecue and can't be too fancy. The pig ears were great but the challenge was about the pork loin. Justin's sandwich was fine, but now Tom is saying there was too much bread. That's why Michelle said he should have just sliced the shoulder, because the sandwiches would have had more meat.
So for sure it was raining at least part of the time while the judges deliberated, because you could see it in the pond. When the Gray Team returns, everyone has umbrellas, including the judges, so I'm not sure why they had to sit in the rain before. Tom says it's tough, but they have to send someone home, and that's the chef with their least favorite piece of pork. Sieger is eliminated. He took care of the pig for his team, but the loin was dry and the sauce didn't make up for it. He says he volunteered to take the pork loin, and he cooked the hog. If the loin had been perfect and he was still eliminated, he'd be upset, “but I knew what was gonna happen.” Interesting. He says it's been really fun.
Next week: some fake house facade, people from a TV show I don't watch, make dessert for superfans in three hours, Kristen again asking Jenn if she's OK. Justin talking to Kristen alone by the refrigerators saying she deserves to be here and Kristen saying “Oh God if you cry I'll cry”.
I have to add in here, Padma and her “my food show is about the food and not gimmicks, we don't do stupid things” just had a challenge where everyone voted on who was most and least likely to win the show. Beverly got “most likely” and immediately burst into tears because she was honored. The “least likely” had to sabotage everyone with weirdo ingredients to put in desserts: pickles, horseradish, sardines, etc. I have two points: one is that they had to make two desserts but had SIX HOURS, amazing; and two is that the losing chef ran out of time and didn't plate her second dessert. And no one offered to help her plate. They do staggered start times so there were people who had already served who were just sitting around. Now it's possible they were told they couldn't help. But still.
Last Chance Kitchen: Rhoda is just standing there without Tom, while the peanut gallery is also there, and the table next to her has weird shit on it. Like, duck heads, and durian, or whatever. Tom finally rolls in, and says the chef who was eliminated isn't here. They are not coming. Something “really unusual” happened. When I tell you I immediately got on the internet. Although honestly, we can guess, right? Jenn did bow out and they brought Sieger back in, and then Jenn left so there isn't anyone for Rhoda to battle. Tom says we'll all find out next week, so I assume next LCK whoever shows up will tell the peanut gallery what's up. Anyway, time for something “never done before” or whatever. Or did Sieger refuse to do LCK? As people have pointed out, bringing Sieger back would be like giving him immunity randomly which isn't super fair. And Jenn was in enough of the preview that it seems like she did the challenges, so if she quit after the challenges wouldn't she just go home and they don't eliminate anyone? But Tom said we'd find out next week, and people have refused to do LCK before and Tom just tells everyone immediately.
Anyway, if Rhoda can win tonight, she can choose the next challenge. That's a huge advantage. Oh but also the stupid [product placement credit card] will give her $5000, and she never won any money. Oh you need competitors though right? Rhoda is like, you said an S right? Tom offers Nana and Brittany a chance to win money, and they both very confusedly get up. Tom clarifies they can't get back into the competition, but $5000 is $5000. On the other hand Rhoda can't be eliminated.
So after shopping was over, Tom called the teams and told them he was giving them more money and 10 minutes to buy whatever they want to buy. Keep it separate from your stuff and keep it a secret from the other team. “Be adventurous”. Interesting. Laurence thinks they are sabotaging the other team, but someone else thinks it's a surprise Quickfire. Everyone is buying random bullshit. They have to pick out two of these ingredients to make something. Rhoda takes dried salted plums and fish sauce. Nana picks fried fish with peanuts, and coriander. It's peanuts with little fried whole fish. Someone bought coriander seeds I guess to be nice. Brittany takes Korean melon, and shrimp and crab boil concentrate. I guess to flavor your crab boil? Tom then decides having to eat these things is not enough suffering for him, so he picks out duck heads and Vietnamese eggplant, that everyone has to use.
So Sieger knew what half of these ingredients are. But I don't think that's enough that they wouldn't want him to participate. Right? Whoever was out would have known what half the ingredients were. Anyway, only 20 minutes to cook. Brittany says she's not turning down the chance to win money. She's familiar with duck tongues, but some troll has put out duck heads and removed all the tongues. Rhoda thinks she needs 20 minutes to process what the fuck is happening. But she's going to make some soup. Nana is already flailing. She tries her fish and peanuts and yells “What is this!?!?” She likes it but this is a person who already doesn't have good time management. She reduces coconut milk and dumps the peanuts in. Brittany discovers the shrimp and crab boil concentrate is both bitter and very spicy. Nana makes fried green tomatoes to put the peanut sauce stuff on, but she has no idea what to do with duck heads. There's no meat on them, so she slathers them in mustard and coriander oil and curses Tom. Rhoda's soup is getting sweeter the longer the plums are in there, so she adds fish sauce. A lot of fish sauce.
Tom Time! But with only five minutes left so he just kind of watches them, it's not like he can give them any good advice. Nana says salad is her thing so she's pickling some eggplant. She also claims she's gotten so great at time management she had time to really think about if she was going to put something else on the plate.
Rhoda: miso-style soup with shiitake mushrooms and tofu. And fish sauce, and dried plums, and duck heads, and eggplant. As she's explaining how she added fish sauce to counteract the sweetness, Tom is like “yeah you did” because it's pretty salty. Nana: fried green tomato with coconut peanut sauce. The sauce and peanuts is good, and he seems to like this one. Brittany: poached shrimp with cucumber, carrot, eggplant, and melon. This one is not bad either but it needs salt. Tom did this to himself. Rhoda's dish is almost too salty to eat, so she's not winning. Tom gives the win to Nana, who now has some cash. Rhoda won't get that advantage but she is back next week.
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