Top Chef 7/28/10--"Power Lunch"

Previously on “Top Chef”: the Quickfire involved some “exotic” proteins like ostrich and foie gras, and also actual exotic proteins like llama and emu eggs. Padma makes everyone switch around once but it doesn’t change much of anything. Kelly won with an emu egg omelet which was a pretty good idea. The Elimination challenge involved two things: serving cold entrees and also being judged by your peers. One group was fair about judging, and one group was so negative about every dish that Tom called them out. Kevin won, while Tamesha went up against Kenny for elimination and lost. In other news, Angelo tried to help everyone, including Tamesha, and now people think he screwed up her dish to make her lose on purpose, instead of Angelo just being arrogant and thinking he knows more than everyone so they need his advice. I would be more concerned with Alex, who knew Amanda had cartilage in her chicken terrine, but said nothing, even though this was when they were already about to serve and she couldn’t have done anything about it anyway. (click for more)

Kelly says the people in her room “keep getting whacked”. Kenny is still convinced that he was in the bottom last challenge because everyone was threatened by him. Never mind that Michelle Bernstein the guest judge said she could talk all day about how his food sucked and she doesn’t know him. I mean…I don’t think that Angelo and Alex weren’t happy to nominate Kenny and possibly get rid of him. But I’m sure they were relieved that his food wasn’t that good and they had an excuse. He says he’s too much of a beast to go home. Angelo says he’s sad to see Tamesha to go. Tiffany believes that Angelo hurts the people he claims to help since both of them (Tamesha and Stephen) had poor dishes.

Padma is there to greet the contestants with a young man who immediately reminds me of Gareth David-Lloyd (he played Ianto Jones on “Torchwood” but sadly they killed him). His name is Aaron Schock, who is the Representative for the 18th District of Illinois. (Kmanpat: “OH! That’s MY district! Cute.” Me: “Yes, you‘re special. Woo Peoria.” Kmanpat: “I meant he‘s cute, not that it was cute my district is on TV.”) He’s the youngest congressman. He starts talking about ethics, and says that a lot of ethics talk is about food. No one wants lobbyists to have that much influence. Apparently the solution that chefs and caterers have found (to the problem of getting everyone in the same room? That’s a problem?) is toothpicks. Padma lifts the cover off a dish and there is one square of American cheese with an American flag toothpick stuck in it. To make sure elected representatives are not influenced by lavish meals, any food served to a member of Congress must be served on a toothpick. Really? That’s…kind of a cool rule. Weird, but cool. I was afraid this would be another amuse bouche thing where someone would get in trouble for making their food too large. This is the Quickfire challenge. Winner will get immunity and also $20,000.

30 minutes. There is such a dash for the fridges I’m surprised no one gets trampled. Kenny is going to infuse a cocktail in his dish too. Kelly says she’s going to season as she goes. Stephen is fairly confident. Alex talks smack about him. Tiffany has a pork roulade but it looks kind of big. Amanda is flailing as she thinks this challenge is boring. Andrea is making chicken and waffles. Yum. Angelo’s food is falling apart. Ed can’t get his food on a stick.

Kevin: roast port kabob with mushroom and sherry vinegar. It’s in a little cup with the sauce…I guess sauce is not included in the “toothpick” rule. Andrea: buttermilk fried chicken, pecan cheddar waffles and black pepper maple gravy. Ed: duo of tuna: tuna confit, grilled tuna with avocado, sweet and sour watermelon. He’s used a cocktail umbrella, and the food covers the whole toothpick up to the bottom of the umbrella. Tiffany: crispy pork roulade with prosciutto, dates and red pepper coulis. Amanda: lamb kabob with heirloom tomatoes, and salsa verde. There is some smiling and slight flirting but I can’t blame Amanda because I’d probably flirt with him too. Kenny: tandoori spiced sockeye salmon and shrimp with mango mojito relish. Angelo: cucumber cup with spiced shrimp and cashew. It’s in a Chinese soup spoon, with a toothpick in it crossways. He’s embarrassed to use cucumber cups I guess. Whatever. Stephen: scallop and beef with crispy potato and béarnaise sauce. Aaron declares it meaty so Stephen thinks he’s in. Alex: scallops with crispy bacon, strawberries and basil essence. Padma makes a face. Kelly: scallops with watermelon and watermelon vinaigrette. She salted the watermelon which, if you’ve never put salt on your watermelon, I suggest you do so. Delicious.

Alex’s dish had too many flavors, and Ed’s dish looked better than it tasted. Kelly’s food lacked flavor. (Watermelon with a little salt on it is still delicious.) Kevin’s dish was the first one, and Aaron thought about it the whole rest of the time. Angelo’s cucumber was like “fireworks”, and Stephen had “a lot on that stick”. Angelo wins. He claims if he “lives it” too much he won’t keep going to win it all. Kevin thinks Angelo is a one-trick pony.

Elimination challenge: a power lunch. They will be taking over the Palm Restaurant for lunch. Each contestant will serve 24 people using main ingredients from their menu. Knife drawing commences for ingredients. Lamb chops, lobster, swordfish, porterhouse, or salmon. There are two chefs using each ingredient, but it’s not a head-to-head challenge. Alex and Tiffany seem especially excited.

$300 to shop, and 30 minutes. The Palm will give them the proteins so they don’t have to buy those. Stephen does mostly power lunches so he has 3 salmon recipes that he knows are successful. Even though there is no direct competition, Kevin feels the pressure that Kenny has the same protein he does. Andrea only spends $183. That can’t turn out well. That never turns out well. Plus she has swordfish and she doesn’t like swordfish.

2 hours to prep today. Angelo is kind of afraid of the giant lobsters. Ed points out that everyone else’s proteins are already prepped. Or at least prepped more than live lobsters. Tiffany knows her dish very well. Alex is cutting down his filets of salmon because he says they are huge. Amanda has never cooked a porterhouse steak before. She has no intention of serving a porterhouse in an Elimination challenge. Kelly interviews that once Amanda cut her meat off the bone, she turned her porterhouse into filet and NY strip. Yeah, that might come back to bite her in the ass. Kevin is very confident with his lamb chops and goat cheese. He does something that involves a lighter. Angelo is not familiar with power lunches but of course he’s going to be fine. Andrea is making vanilla bean mustard beurre blanc. Ed’s pissed because he’s spent most of his time breaking down lobster.

Back at the house, Kenny is wearing his pimp robe and Andrea has a T-shirt with a skull and crossbones but the crossbones are made of bacon. Alex tells them he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He says something about peas, and that they turned out poorly somehow, but then the other two ask him if he got the same peas Ed got, because Ed has peas and they looked good before he pureed them anyway. Ed is busy talking to Tiffany about his pea puree and says he trusts her. They’re not really flirting at this point, but Andrea interviews that Tiffany’s fiancée probably wouldn’t be terribly happy about that. Tiffany says Ed’s not flirting with her.

Everyone arrives at the Palm and is greeted by the man who runs the place, who tells them that Tom will be around to watch them. This is the first time they’ve handed the Palm over to anyone else. The winner will get their dish on the menu but also a caricature on one of the walls. Kelly bitches at Amanda and interviews that she should go home. She doesn’t even bring salt or pepper with her. Well that is kind of dumb. Amanda claims she would share, but she doesn’t have any so that’s easy to say. Alex asks for salt too, and Kelly tells him she only brought salt for herself. Alex now he knows what he’s going to do. He says he’s going to make a pea puree first thing, which is risky because his whole concept revolves around this pea puree.

Tom time! I think he just makes everyone nervous. Tiffany is back in hiding somewhere where no one will bother her. Someone’s pan is flaming so high it’s touching the shelves above the stove. Tom tells them to clean up after themselves. Kenny’s glad to have lamb because his cold lamb dish didn’t do very well. Ed goes to get his pea puree but can’t find it. He says he put it in a cooler. No one has seen it. Tiffany knows that Alex suddenly has pea puree that he hadn’t made before. Ed knows it too. Tiffany tries to get him to calm down and offers him some other vegetables but he’s pretty pissed. There are no interview shots from Alex defending himself or addressing the issue in any way. That doesn’t mean they don’t exist, just that the producers chose not to show them. Tom’s blog notes that this all happened before he got to the kitchen and no one told him about it, so the judges had no idea until they watched the episode. Kevin has to reheat his sous vide lamb but is pretty confident he’s done it right.

There are a bunch of politicians and reporters but also Art Smith. Kelly: porterhouse with crispy potato arugula salad, and roasted shallot demi-glace. She makes sure to state it’s “on the bone”. Amanda: “duo” of NY steak and filet mignon, red wine with pomme parisienne and arugula. Kelly’s portion is huge and slightly salty, while Amanda’s meat is cooked well. Poor Tom has to eat in the back in the kitchen by himself. Tiffany: swordfish with olive raisin tapenade, broccolini and bacon. Andrea: pan-seared swordfish with “risotto style” couscous, asparagus, and beurre blanc (the vanilla bean and mustard beurre blanc). Andrea’s dish is very sweet and buttery, to the point where Art is worried what it will do to him. Tiffany’s dish is busy but it all works. However her fish is a little overcooked. Stephen: salmon with warm vegetable salad and Worchester vinaigrette. Alex: apple wood smoked salmon on black rice and English pea puree. Alex’s portion is perfect, and the pea puree is wonderful. Stephen’s salmon, however, is messy and kind of heavy in presentation. Angelo: butter poached lobster with lobster froth and jicama, arugula and Asian pear salad. Ed: butter poached lobster ballotine, eggplant caviar, and English pea-asparagus fricassee. I guess because he didn’t have puree no one said anything about the peas? No one likes Angelo’s lobster, it’s chewy. They do like Ed’s food though. Kenny: peppered lamb, fig-pistachio bread pudding, and vanilla-morel demi-glace. Kevin: double cut lamb chops with olive and goat cheese rissole (like a croquette), mache, and tomato concasse (just a peeled and chopped tomato, I don’t know why it needs a special name). Kenny’s dish was tasty but needed some greens. Kevin overcooked his lamb, sadly, since the other flavors were strong. Maybe too strong. Gail thinks the tomatoes are spicy.

Tom rejoins Gail, Padma, and Art in the now empty dining room to report on the kitchen chaos. Art says he knows there was love in some of the dishes. Cut to Ed saying he wants to know who the fuck took his pea puree. Kevin says “supposedly” someone saw Alex’s puree in the blender. We don’t hear what else the judges say, but when they get up you can see that apparently Padma decided to wear hot pants today.

Commercial interlude: Stephen says he’s holding a seminar about being on the bottom. Then he gets up in the Stew Room and starts talking like a motivational speaker, including standing behind a box like a podium. Tiffany admits she was listening to him. Stephen says he focuses on these words: then they bleep his cursing. That was entertaining.

Back in the Stew Room there is much whispering about the pea puree. Alex finally gets his interview to defend himself, but he says it was just “coincidental” that Ed couldn’t find his puree and that he didn’t even know Ed was making pea puree. Cut immediately to the flashback of Kenny and Andrea telling Alex that very fact. I’d like to say that I find it interesting that Alex said it was a coincidence that Ed couldn’t find his puree, not that they both made pea puree. There’s just this smugness to his tone that makes him look guilty. I can’t tell if it’s because he did it and he’s not sorry, or because he just is smug in general. Padma comes to get Alex, Tiffany, and Ed. They are the winners. Tiffany is especially relieved because she knows she overcooked her fish. Tom and Gail reassure her that her other components had enough moisture to compensate. Art tells Ed he knows Ed was “challenged” but didn’t show it. Alex admits to not knowing what to do at first. Art praises the salmon and the puree, as we get shots of Tiffany and Ed not looking happy. Alex wins. No one claps for him.

Tiffany tells the Stew Room that Alex won and that they loved the puree. She’s kind of a shit disturber. I love it. Kenny says there’s no way Alex could have done that in one day. Kevin, Andrea, and Kelly face the Loser gong. Kevin’s tomatoes were way too spicy and were just heat. His lamb chops were unevenly cooked and also the bones weren’t cleaned. Andrea doesn’t make swordfish, and it was obvious. Her couscous was overcooked, and the sauce didn’t work. She says she’s made that sauce before, and Gail says if they want the stuff she does every day they’ll just come to her restaurant. Ouch. Kelly knows her food was too salty. They try to nail her for talking about how she wanted steakhouse flavors and whatever, like she didn’t know what was wrong, but she knew when she sent the plates out. The judges send them back to the Stew Room, where Kelly breaks down because she’s upset about her food. Amanda gloats that “that’s what happens when you don’t share” and she deserves to be on the bottom. Shut up, Amanda. Bring your own salt. And don’t grin when people are crying.

Andrea’s swordfish was under the heat lamps for 7 or 8 minutes. Art says that not eating a food does not give you an excuse to cook it poorly, except that most chefs don’t cook foods they don’t eat if they have their own restaurant and set their own menu. Kevin’s dish wasn’t cohesive. Art thinks that he had a good idea but didn’t have the skills to execute it. Tom rants that if you sous vide something, and then sear it, it’s already been cooked perfectly so of course now it’s overcooked. Art thinks Kelly might have a poor palate. She says she was trying to season to what she thought they wanted, which is much bolder than she usually does.

Tom nails everyone again and then Padma sends Andrea home. She’s sorry she didn’t get to show herself but she thinks that her mistakes were all mental. She also says she doesn’t need four people behind a table telling her she can cook because she knows she can cook. Then why was she so concerned about Michelle Bernstein last week?

Next week: international food; Alex nearly brains himself on a shelf, Tiffany is very behind, Marcus Samuelsson in a FAB hat. Clicky clicky

Top Chef 7/21/10--"Cold War"

Previously on “Top Chef”: The producers, desperate for another ratings goldmine like Leah and Hosea, focus on various couples flirting with each other, or at least where one person is flirting and the other one isn’t outright laughing at them. At least I assume Leah and Hosea was a ratings goldmine. Drama usually is. Too bad none of it involves Amanda, who totally looks like Leah. The Quickfire challenged involved cooking crabs, and was won by Ed. Ed then had immunity. Then they tried to make everyone work together to provide dinner at a farm. Everyone just kept their teams from the last challenge and tried to make things that were somewhat related. No one said anything about if their whole meal was supposed to go together or what, though, and I thought it was. Not that they usually care if you don’t follow the theme. Oh, Kenny and Angelo had a fight about how that was all going to go down, but you pretty much knew that was going to happen, right? Obviously. Kenny won with his curried eggplant. Amanda made minestrone without pasta and got nailed for it the way the judges always nail someone who makes a “classic” dish but leaves out whatever the judges feel is essential. Stephen also failed with a poor salad, but Tim’s dish lacked flavor and no one could taste the turnips so he went home. (click for more)

Angelo says Tim’s exit made people kind of somber. He says he will keep up changing his strategy. Andrea brags about how she’s been in the top and is in a good place. Bad foreshadowing.

Michelle Bernstein is the guest judge. Cool. Weird proteins abound on the display table. Andrea is not happy to see her, because she already knows Michelle. Andrea claims there is a rivalry and that she’s equal to Michelle, and that she’s not comfortable with Michelle judging her. Interesting. Exotic protein time! They draw knives for picking order. The proteins are: foie gras, frog legs, wild boar, yak, duck white kidneys, crocodile, ostrich, llama, rattlesnake, duck tongue, emu eggs. I’m just going to list them all because you’ll see them in everyone’s dishes. So you’ll know who has what. I would argue that things like foie gras and ostrich are no longer “exotic”. However, “duck white kidneys” are actually testicles, a fact which Angelo did not know before he picked them, as you can see when they ask if he knows what they are and he backs away in horror. The look on his face is very entertaining. Ed tells an awesome story that when he worked for Todd English they made consommé with cock’s comb and duck testicles and they called it “cock and balls soup”. Kick ass.

45 minutes. I think the best part was when everyone laughed at Angelo and made fun of him. Kelly says some people had an easier time than others because for example Amanda is using a hacksaw to get into her eggs. Angelo is making testicle marshmallows. Alex is pretty confident as is Kevin. After 10 minutes Padma makes them all move one station to the left. Nice. Although, unnecessary. Everyone curses a lot. Kelly is making an omelet but it has to be perfect. Stephen went from crocodile to frog but he kind of shrugs about it. Kevin gets stuck with the duck testicles. He has no idea what he’s doing. Andrea complains some more about the judging.

Tamesha: duck tongue in broth with mirepoix, lime, and sriracha. Andrea: wild boar and risotto with dried cherries, almond, mushrooms, and red wine. Michelle says it’s a little chewy. Tiffany: foie gras with caramelized apples, and toasted pecans, brandy-caramel sauce. Alex: ostrich in caul fat and basil with mushroom duxelle and balsamic glaze. Kevin: duck testicles meuniere with beet and licorice puree. “Meuniere style” is dredged in flour. Angelo: seared crocodile with ginger, garlic, and chilies. He brags that he knows he had to combat crocodile’s chewy texture but Michelle says he screwed that up. Stephen: seared frog leg, frog leg confit, tomato grits, and blackened bourbon sauce. It looks really good. Kenny: rattlesnake francese and rattlesnake cake with leeks, bacon, and curry sauce. “Francese” means it’s dipped in flour and egg and then fried, and served with lemon. Kelly: emu egg omelet with goat cheese and harissa Vinaigrette. Amanda: roast llama, sauce soubise with leek, date, and bacon compote. Soubise is béchamel sauce with onions. So…white sauce with butter-cooked onions.

Stephen’s frog legs were “insipid”, Alex dried out his ostrich and screwed up his sauce, and Andrea undercooked the boar. Andrea claims that she knows she just psyched herself out. Kelly’s omelet was creamy and delicious, Tamesha’s tongue was perfect, Amanda did a beautiful job. The winner is Kelly. She gets immunity. She’s quite pleased with herself.

For the Elimination challenge, everyone has to make a cold dish. They will be divided into two groups so that Group A can serve food to both the judges and group B, and vice versa. At the end of service, then group B will nominate someone from group A for the win and another person for the loss. Group A will do the same. Kelly, since she won immunity, gets to eat with both groups. So she doesn’t have to cook? Awesome. They pull knives to divide themselves. Extra surprise: they’re going on a boat! Woo. They will plan their menus as they sail around the Potomac on the U.S.S. Sequoia, which is the boat version of Air Force One. Padma references the “Cold War” title of the episode a bunch of times.

The boat is really nice. Kenny worries because he thinks everyone is out to get him. Amanda thinks no one realizes how hurtful it will be to have the other group judge them. Stephen wants to do tempura green beans, but tempura gets nasty if you let it sit and get cold. Angelo tells the people on his team things they should do. Well…talking Stephen out of doing cold tempura probably is a good thing. Kevin spies on them and interviews they should make their own food, and not Angelo’s. Tiffany talks to Ed about what everyone is doing, and that she only trusts Ed because there is strategery afoot. Kenny doesn’t know why Angelo would give out advice unless it was to manipulate people’s insecurities. Kelly’s very happy to have the opportunity to eat everyone else’s food.

$200 for shopping. Alex says he’s going to be fair in judging tomorrow. Stephen wants to make filet mignon with Asian flavors. Instead of the tempura. Tiffany thinks Alex would never vote Stephen off. She says whatever, it’s one vote.

2 hours to prep. Tiffany has “spring and summer flavors”. Andrea has 3 tartares and is STILL worried about Michelle. She says she went and had kids while Michelle continued to be a chef, which is why I’ve heard of Michelle Bernstein and not Andrea, I guess. Kevin has tuna and veal surf and turf. Kenny has lamb, which I don’t know if I’ve ever had cold. He thinks the other team will vote him into the bottom to get rid of him. Amanda is making a chicken terrene. Her machinery is failing and she’s freaking out. Tamesha says she’d probably strangle her since they don’t get along, so she avoids Amanda. Angelo gets on Tamesha’s business. Why isn’t he making his own food? Seriously, he’s seasoning Stephen’s food. I don’t get it either. Unless he’s making everyone’s food worse with his suggestions. Stephen thinks that since Angelo and Kenny are on different teams maybe if one of them was gone it would be better for everyone else.

The next day everyone arrives at some nice ballroom at an unnamed location. Ed says he has no disagreements with anyone on the other team so he’s pretty sure no one will do anything personal. Kenny is done quickly and he brags that everyone must be thinking about how awesome he is. Amanda gives Alex some of her terrene and he says it needs seasoning. He then says in confessional that he thinks there’s some cartilage, but he’s not going to say anything. Kevin hopes everyone is professional. Psshh.

Tamesha says she’s going to try to be professional. See, I believe her. First group up is Amanda, Kevin, Alex, Kenny, and Ed. Amanda: chicken galantine with mache and plum chutney. Mache is a type of lettuce. Kevin: tuna and veal with romaine leaves, pine nuts, and Mediterranean condiments. Kenny: grilled lamb salad and lamb carpaccio with black eyed pea hummus. Alex: sous vide lamb with red beet puree and tzatziki. Also pumpkin seed dust, which I include because how pretentious and ultimately pointless is “pumpkin seed dust”? Ed: vodka cured sockeye salmon on pumpernickel bread, cucumber vichyssoise, and cream cheese. The contestants complain about Kenny’s lamb but the judges say nothing. Alex needed salt or something for the beets. No one likes Amanda’s chicken. Wow, these people are harsh. Angelo says he can taste the proteins coagulating. Shut up, Angelo. Andrea got cartilage. Oops. Kevin’s dish needs acidity, says everyone, and finally Tom is like, um, didn’t any one see that he had Meyer lemon slices? Everyone hems and haws and he interrupts them to say that he also had tomatoes that are acidic. Ha. Tom knows exactly what you are doing. Tiffany says she liked it. Angelo says that Ed’s bread is dry. Everyone tried so hard to sound smart. They all tried to sound like the judges. Padma says they have to pick a winner and loser. Everyone says Kevin is the winner, possibly because Tom defended him. Everyone also says Kenny’s dish sucks, except that Andrea says that she can’t get over having cartilage from Amanda. Kenny’s still the majority though. Ed doesn’t think there was any scheming going on but admits he might just be naïve.

Commercial interlude: Andrea tells Ed about how Angelo is trying to possess people’s minds. Ed says that he’s known Angelo for years because they used to date the same girl. At the same time. Ed tells Andrea it’s OK “because I used to bang his girlfriend”. Hee. Wait…that’s Ed, right? Everyone looks like each other.

The other group starts their cooking. Tiffany starts to doubt herself but it’s too late anyway. Angelo says he’s getting nervous and putting too much condiment on his salmon. He knows it’s too much but keeps on doing it. Tamesha likes her dish. The other group comes in and Tom is like, man, you should have heard them. Heh. Amanda says she can be professional in judging but others cannot. Tiffany: fennel and peppercorn crusted ahi tuna in gazpacho sauce with cucumber and arugula salad. Angelo: poached sockeye salmon with cilantro and chile condiment in pineapple tea. Andrea: steak tartare, tuna tartare with chile oil, and mushroom fennel tartare with roasted beets. Stephen: chilled beef with crispy rice and jalapeno oil. Tamesha: scalloped with pickled rhubarb, cilantro, basil, and long pepper in rhubarb jus. They like Tiffany’s dish. Andrea’s tartares need more seasoning. Stephen’s beef has vanished; Ed can’t taste it. Tamesha’s scallops are really spicy and the scallops have a weird texture. Angelo’s dish has a lot of condiments. Kevin says he thinks Angelo should win though. Everyone else says Tiffany so she’s up. They all put Tamesha up for elimination. Interesting. I expected Kenny and Alex and Amanda to be the mean group.

In the Stew Room Andrea lets Amanda know she got a huge piece of cartilage. Angelo tells Kenny they all decided he was in the bottom. Angelo’s just so smug, seriously. Padma calls in Tiffany and Kevin. Tom tells Tiffany they agreed with the nominations. Kevin’s sauce came together, and Tiffany’s dish was seared perfectly and they all wanted to keep eating it. Michelle tells Kevin he’s the winner. He also wins a week in Hawaii.

Kenny and Tamesha greet the Loser gong. Padma makes sure to say that their peers put them there. Tamesha says she used long pepper before in that jus. The texture was bad because it sat in the jus for too long and was also only seared on one side. There were a lot of flavors and the scallop got lost. Tamesha stands behind her dish. Tom tells Kenny that his dish had two parts but they didn’t come together. Kenny says the seasoning on each part was the same: capers, red bell pepper, scallions. There was a lot of other stuff, though, and no one could taste that they were the same. Padma asks him why they think their peers put them there, and Kenny immediately says it’s because he’s a threat. Michelle tells him that she, as a person who just got there, could talk about the problems with his dish until the end of the show. Woah.

Tom says Kenny’s lamb was kind of gummy and one of his purees was bad. Tamesha’s flavors fought with each other and she cooked the scallop poorly. I think maybe there was more? But my cable cut out and I’m sure it was not anything new.

Kenny’s dish didn’t come together, and Tamesha’s dish might be better with work but it wasn’t good tonight. Tamesha is sent home. Oh you knew that was going to happen the minute you knew she was up against Kenny. She’s pretty upset and feels it’s bullshit. Tiffany says that Angelo tasted Tamesha’s dish and knew the flavors, and yet didn’t say anything. Tamesha herself wishes she’d controlled her dish more.

Next week: Tiffany’s got a fiancée and should probably not flirt with Ed, Kenny drops a pan of food, Ed loses a pea puree which ends up on Alex’s dish. Clicky clicky

Top Chef 7/14/10--"Farm Policy"

Previously on “Top Chef”: Everyone had to make baby food, and I know that they couldn’t have actual babies on set because of allergies or whatnot, but I still think that would have been really cool. As it was, no one mentioned that Angelo included honey in his dish which you can’t feed to babies, but it didn’t matter because Tamesha and Kenny won. Then everyone had to pair up to make dishes for the Hilton, that I think were supposed to be designed for room service or possibly a to-go type thing. There was a weird elimination concept, which resulted in Andrea and Kelly cooking mediocre food twice and then winning the challenge. Kenny and Kevin made short ribs, which didn’t have enough sauce, and Arnold and Lynne made mussels with squid ink pasta, which was raw. The pasta, not the mussels. In the end both Arnold and Lynne went home, both for raw pasta and because they were supposed to make food that would appeal to hotel guests. The judges felt that short ribs would be easier to sell than squid ink pasta. (click for more)

Kenny says it’s somber in the house now because now everyone has relationships with people. So it’s hard when they leave. Angelo is telling Tamesha to take action and let others chase her. She says he is easy to talk to and she looks up to him. Angelo says she’s the only one he likes to hang out with, but that he also is attracted to her because he sees himself in her. Isn’t he married with a baby? He wants to “extract” her “inner passion”. He whispers to her, but it’s only about keeping focus and not worrying about what others are doing. Like, say, Kenny. Kelly thinks she should watch out because somehow helping Tamesha is part of Angelo’s grand strategy. Meanwhile Ed is hanging out with Tiffany. They’re having a good time anyway.
Many many crabs greet the contestants today. Live blue crabs. Hee. Padma introduces Patrick O’Connell, who has many awards and Kevin cooked for him at Bocuse d’Or. Woah. Kevin cooked in the Bocuse d’Or? My opinion of him just jumped way up. That is hardcore. Padma says “We’ve got crabs”. Angelo then says “Well, I had crabs. So…just brought back bad memories.” Thanks for sharing. Padma just says “your time starts now” and they’re off.

1 hour to cook. Tim knows to grab tongs. Ed’s baking his live crabs in the oven. Angelo is making soup and commenting on Ed. Andrea is trying to get the meat out of these crabs, which are pretty small. Tamesha was allergic at one point so she doesn’t know how to pick crab meat. Angelo helps her. Kenny says he’s got three dishes so he is a beast. Kevin wants to do chowder and he’s talking about his family so that’s not the best sign. Amanda seems amused that everyone is so busy. Tim feels good with simple flavors.

Tiffany: hot and sour crab soup, arbor chilies, spaghetti leeks. I guess, leeks cut lengthwise like pasta. Ed: jumbo lump crab with Thai basil, mango, and cucumber salad. Angelo: blue crab broth infused with lemongrass and ginger. Tim: beer steamed crabs with avocado, passion fruit, and heirloom vinaigrette. He picked the crabs and put the meat in a ring mold. I heard those were going out of style? Maybe? *shrugs* Stephen: crab salad in sweet bell peppers, brandy basil dressing. Tamesha: crab chowder with lemongrass, ginger, cardamom, and coconut milk. Sounds like Angelo’s. Amanda: crab salad with sauterne, ginger, and juniper gelee. Sauterne is a sweet white dessert wine. And my spell-check likes it. Weird. Kevin: blue crab chowder with potato, celery and espelette oil, and frozen bacon crumble. Andrea: warm crab salad, citrus gastrique, Mexican red chilies. Kenny: crab 3 ways (sigh); Korean crab bisque, crab bruschetta, and warm crab with sesame.

Andrea’s dish had heavy potatoes and overwhelmed the crab. Amanda’s gelee was too pungent. Kevin’s dish was so confusing the crab got lost. Kevin especially is pissed because this is the fourth challenge he’s been in the bottom. Good dishes: Ed’s dish brought out the “natural components” to the crab, Kenny’s trio was good, and Angelo’s dish was delicate. The dish that best showcased the taste of the crab was Ed so he wins. Nice. And he wins immunity too. Tim seems kind of bitter.

For the Elimination challenge: field trip time! Go to an organic and humane farm for the best ingredients. And! You’re all on one team! Ha! They have to make a minimum of 6 family-style dishes, and each one has to be responsible for something on the table. Not an entire dish? Just one thing? Tamesha knows there are a lot of egos in the house (cue shots of Angelo and Kenny) so she wishes it was individual. They can’t see the ingredients or equipment until they get there, but there will be some pantry stuff.

Everyone goes home to try to come up with a game plan even though they have no idea what is waiting for them. Kenny thinks they should pull names for the courses, Angelo disagrees, so they argue about it. Angelo thinks he has to step up and be a leader, which to him means getting his way. Tiffany tries to get them back on track but they totally ignore her. Stephen tries to get everyone to agree to serve a fruit plate as dessert but that fails too. The scene ends in the middle of the argument. Well that was fun. Oh, they want to continue after the commercial. Kenny wants to let people just come up with whatever, except that means if one pair does lamb, they’ll have a veg and a starch and then there are 6 different starches on the table, as Amanda points out. Yeah, she has a point. If you’re serving family style you can’t do that. Kenny thinks that wouldn’t happen and Amanda is crazy. Finally Tim tells everyone to check their fucking egos at the door and come together. SERIOUSLY. At some point Kenny asks if everyone just wants to work in the same teams they had yesterday, and everyone does except Ed. Ed doesn’t want to work with Alex. No offense though. But in the end he has immunity so he doesn’t care that much. They all break up into their previous pairs to decide what they want to do, without talking to each other. Tiffany isn’t very happy to work with Tim, so she’s pretending she doesn’t have a partner. Ed’s pissed too because he would have rather paired up with Tiffany. So he goes over to talk to her anyway.

In the morning, I think it’s super early morning, Tamesha talks a little bit about her family and how she feels everyone should have been more mature. True that. They arrive at Ayrshire Farms which is very pretty. They pull up to some very nice tables of meat and produce laid out for them. They’ve got 3 hours. Commence arguing about what everyone wants. Cooking outside! Hee! That’s always entertaining. Hotplates and grills. Immediately there is hoarding of space. Kenny is taking over because he feels Kevin doesn’t have enough confidence. They’re making hot and sour eggplant. Kelly’s making “accompaniments” and Andrea is making the pork loin. She’s worried because it’s cold out. Amanda is making “pedestrian” minestrone. Stephen is making salad with as many components as he can shove in there. Tim took a ton of vegetables and Kelly tries to cut him a deal, which…I think ends with her taking some beets? It’s hard to tell what happened, aside from that Tim isn’t pleased. Tiffany says she’s letting Tim do whatever instead of telling him what to do this time. Tamesha has cherry compote to go with Angelo’s duck which he “made love to”. That’s a quote people. Alex loves to work outdoors. Tamesha is doing something and all of a sudden a bowl falls over, dumping a ton of cooked cauliflower on the ground. No one seems to know what exactly happened. I don’t think Tamesha was near enough to it. Angelo thinks they can reuse it but Kevin refuses, so he gets some zucchini and broccoli. Tamesha gives some advice to Andrea, but all of a sudden Kelly is like “don’t let her make your decision” like Tamesha has no idea what she’s talking about. Kenny tells Andrea the same thing. Andrea is cutting the loin down so it will cook in time. Tim’s turnips are starting to get bitter and he’s worried about it so rather than do anything else to it he’s going to keep it rustic. Amanda is confident with her soup. Andrea is worried about her pork. Kelly decides to make a strawberry rhubarb crisp so they have dessert. She knows this may screw her. Stephen likes his salad. There are 40 farmers coming up the road, along with the judges (Tom, Padma, and Eric) in scarves and “rustic” clothes. You know…the kinds of country clothes that you know have never seen dirt ever.

Commercial interlude: Kenny owns a velour bathrobe. Tim loves it. Andrea and Amanda go through various nicknames. Amanda’s are more offensive in that they all have “black” in them. Actually all the girls think he’s smooth.

Kenny wants to win because he didn’t cook the main entrée. But he wants his dish to be so awesome it takes over from the main dishes. I think. They serve and bail. As a result everyone has to ask each other how they liked various dishes. Amanda: country vegetable minestrone with smoked tomato broth. Yum. Guest judge Patrick was shocked by the rusticity. All the vegetables are cut small except the carrots which didn’t cook through. Stephen: farm salad with balsamic, onion, egg, apple, cabernet vinaigrette and garlic dressing. It’s in a bowl, for some reason. Patrick hates the bowl. Tom is horrified the lettuce is bruised. Kenny: hot and sour curried eggplant with peppers and carrot tops. Kevin: broccoli cous cous scented with lemon zest. That sounds fabulous. The curry is spicy but Tom is OK with it. Tim: roasted turnips and asparagus with honey. Made no impression with anyone. Tiffany: collard greens with Swiss chard, turnip and chanterelles in duck broth. The greens are very undercooked. Andrea: garlic and five-spice grilled pork loin with shallot-apple balsamic jus. Kelly: five-spice roasted apples and roasted beets. They went well together and all is cooked well. Angelo: ginger grilled duck breast with oregano honey. Tamesha: cherry compote, red wine balsamic vinaigrette, grilled asparagus salad. The duck breast is OK, and the cherries, but the asparagus is boring. At least to Tom. Alex: Provencal beef tenderloin with ratatouille. Ed: ratatouille with eggplant, summer squash and tomato. The tenderloin is stuffed with the ratatouille. Eric is not a fan of the stuffing, but Patrick teases him that the French taught everyone stuffing by stuffing things with truffles. Eric points out that ratatouille does not equal truffles. Kelly also made the dessert: strawberry rhubarb crisp with basil scented whipped cream. Why do people put basil in desserts now? Is that a thing? Is it good? I don’t know. Tom points out she didn’t have to do it, but it seems to have turned out well. Eric cleaned his plate.

Back at Judges’ Table, Padma calls out Kevin, Kenny, Andrea, and Kelly. They’re the winners. Kevin explains that his cauliflower fell on the ground, and that he was glad to have vegetables and not a protein because it was more of a challenge. Kenny wanted big flavors and something spicy to keep warm. Padma liked it, and Tom points out that Padma is tough on curries so that is high praise. Andrea says she cut down her pork loin, and Tom praises the sauce and the sides too. Kelly says she and Andrea both thought they should make dessert if they had time. Patrick says Kenny is the winner. He’s pleased, as well he should be.

Loser gong! Tim, Amanda, and Stephen are the losers. Padma says the mistakes were very obvious because the rest of the dinner was so nice. Tim says he was going to do a mousseline, but decided against it. Eric points out that he had already cut his vegetables so small that the turnips vanished into the dish and the seasoning was off. He added asparagus for color, he tells Tom. Tom nails him for not liking his dish, and not being able to fix it. Stephen gets nailed for serving salad in a bowl, with gloppy dressing, even though the average American eats salad out of a bowl. He wanted to add crunch with apple, but he served a big piece of apple to each person so that didn‘t work too well. Amanda says minestrone to her is all the things that were in her dish, but Eric is like “Don’t you think it should have pasta too?” and Amanda has to cover her ass and say she’s never made it with pasta. Tom schools her on why you cut things uniformly: so they all cook evenly. She can’t even answer, and they keep on her that it was amateurish.

Stephen’s presentation was pretty poor, and his salad had a ton of things in it for no reason. Tim’s turnips were cut too small to serve whole, and a puree would actually have worked very well with the dish. He did a ton of work for nothing because no one could taste the turnips. Eric is still pissed that Amanda called it “minestrone” when there was no pasta in it. Plus they still hate on the carrots.

Tom says everyone made a mistake that doomed their dish. Tim is sent home. He wishes he could have gone out for overcooking lamb. No, that’s what he says. He has a hard time saying goodbye to everyone, but he knows he’s going to keep in touch with everyone. He tells everyone to season their food.

Next week: they get to judge each other, Angelo helps Tamesha and Stephen but not anyone else? Alex doesn’t tell Amanda her chicken might be bad. Everyone is mean. Clicky clicky

Top Chef 7/7/10--"Room Service"

Previously on “Top Chef”: The chefs are forced to make pie, and most of them seem to handle it fine. No one had a horrible crust except Tracey, who had to make a second pie last minute anyway. Kenny won, even thought it looked like he made less of a pie and more of a cake with bananas in it. Looked good though. Then everyone had to grill for Capitol Hill interns. In the initial chyron it said “make one entrée and two side dishes” but then most people seemed to make only one side dish, unless we’re counting sauces as side dishes, which I guess could be happening. Stranger things have happened. Several people need help starting their charcoal kettle grills but no one burns themselves. Amanda is slightly annoying, but even Angelo likes her ribs. However Arnold beats her out with lamb meatballs. Tracey’s sausage sliders have too much fennel and aren’t cooked properly so she is sent home. (click for more)

Arnold is satisfied with winning and being recognized by the judges. Andrea is sad about Tracey but “you have to focus on the game”. She’s tired of being in the middle. Tim jokes that he knows where Angelo stashed the cash. He says it’s not where you were (the bottom) but where you end up.

The contestants are greeted by baby toys. Blocks and rubber ducks and whatnot. Tom and Padma are there. Tim’s like, oh, they can’t have us cooking baby food. HA! Silly boy. Both Padma and Tom have babies at home, so they must make a dish for the adults, and then a puree version for the babies. Awesome. And hilarious. Lynne says “What goes through my head is, ‘Oh crap, I’ve never had a baby. I don’t know what babies like.’” Well, I’ve never had a baby either, but I’m pretty sure they’re not super picky. Oo, are they bringing in the babies for the judging? PLEASE let them bring in babies for judging. 45 minutes. Oh, and also Tom and Padma will each be picking a winner and those winners will get $10,000. Arnold says his money would go to orphanages. Alex says something about “a hooker and an 8-ball.” No immunity though.

Alex tells us he’s practiced making a baby but not baby food. Thanks for sharing. Kevin’s wife is pregnant so he’s pretty confident. Tamesha used to take care of her little brother. She says adults need flavorful but kids need something a little more bland. Amanda yells a lot while cooking. Kenny’s first wife died when his daughter was a year old so he’s used to taking care of her. Aww! Stephen bitches about how Kenny has some diced apple--too much and babies will choke. All through this are shots of everyone’s kids. They even give them baby food jars. Kevin doesn’t finish in time.

No babies. Weak. Kenny: curried chicken, mango salad, confit of butternut squash, and maitake mushrooms. I guess Tom and Padma are tasting the baby food themselves. Tim: sautéed lamb with mushrooms, shallots, and ginger. Kevin: pan-seared duck with baby carrots. There is supposed to be corn and banana puree also. Maybe that is the little dollop on the plate. Kelly: roast pork loin with grilled peaches and fresh ginger. Her pork loin looks cooked but somehow unappetizing. I’m not sure why. Also when Padma tastes the baby food there’s a lemon seed in it. Lynne: chicken with sweet potato and fruit compote. Angelo: poached tuna with fenugreek broth, tomatoes, soy sauce, and honey. His baby food seems to be in layers. Alex: seared duck, with spinach and basil puree, dill couscous, and mushroom. Tamesha: salmon with vegetable chowder and lobster stock, Thai basil, and licorice oil.

Tim’s lamb was overcooked, although his baby food was OK. Alex’s baby food, on the other hand, had a ton of dill and was watery. Kevin ran out of time so his duck was sitting in a pool of blood. They make sure to include a shot of the dish he served the judges so you can see it. I guess on the display plate for the camera he had time to let it rest. Kelly’s pork was bland. Good: Lynne had good flavor, and Tamesha’s puree had texture and Tom loved the licorice oil. Padma liked Angelo’s “elegant” baby food and Kenny’s flavorful food. Tom picks Tamesha as his winner and Padma picks Kenny. They’re both thrilled.

For the Elimination challenge today, they must welcome Beth Scott, who is VP of Restaurant Concepts at the Hilton. The Hilton (supposedly) is looking for a new signature menu dish that is healthy and sophisticated. And they want the contestants to make one! I put “supposedly” because I very much doubt that Top Chef was talking to the Hilton and Hilton was like, “Hey, you know what? We were JUST talking about how we need a new signature menu dish! Could your contestants come up with one for us? That would be great!” If that was true that would be fantastic. They want easy quick dishes that are easily executed. They must make breakfast, lunch, and dinner dishes that will be on the menu if they win. Tom says it’ll be tournament style, competing in pairs. All teams will make breakfast. Then they will decide what teams are safe. The non-safe teams will compete with lunch dishes, and then two more teams will be safe. Then the last three teams will make dinner, and one team will be eliminated. That means two eliminations. And they get to choose their own partners, which could be good or bad. Amanda bitches that no one wants to pair up with her--except Stephen, because no one wants to pair up with him either. She of course wants to win to stick it to everyone else.

$200 for shopping. Everyone is buying food for three dishes. Tiffany is concerned because she’s paired with Tim and he’s been on the bottom lately. Lynne doesn’t work well with others. She says. But Arnold has cooked with her before and he says it went well so he’s not concerned. He says if he wins, then he’s won a lot and “people might think I’m more than a Louis Vuitton bag”. Kenny talks about his wife again and being a chef at a 5-star restaurant. He’s talking about himself a lot. Alex wants to make pancakes and Ed is skeptical but lets him do it.

When they get back into the kitchen there is Spike (still with the asshat! Gah!), Mike I., and Bryan waiting for them. Mm, Bryan. Plus Beth from the Hilton, Nora Pouillon, Tom, Padma, and Eric Ripert. They all get to watch the chefs cook, which is interesting. 30 minutes to cook. Oh, I lied, all the judges just got up and filed out of the kitchen. Lots of running around and at least people are talking to each other. Tiffany took the lead on breakfast for her team, as did Lynne. Kelly is putting a ton of emphasis on breakfast. Alex and Ed are almost out of time because they had to make everything last minute. When time is called they don’t have the hollandaise on the plate.

Commercial interlude: Angelo flirts with Tamesha and interviews about how she’s sexy. Ed notices. Then Angelo talks about her “inner lining” which makes no sense. Tamesha says “not if he was the last man on earth.” OK, not really. She for sure is not interested though.

Alex and Ed: prosciutto potato cake, egg with lemon pancake, bellini cocktail. Spike and Beth did not even get a cake. Damn. Both Alex and Ed seem to blame Ed for it, although someone had to put the pancakes and the egg on the plate after the cakes went down and those aren’t small cakes that you could miss. It’s pretty obvious that plate is missing something. Angelo and Tamesha: egg, bacon, and cheddar broth. It looks like a soft boiled egg with bacon and some kind of sauce. And toast. Tamesha thinks her egg is perfect, but Bryan says that the yolk is overcooked. Plus I think the chalaza is still in the dish. That’s the ropy thing attached to the yolk. Bryan laughs that he got dinged for that when he was on the show. Arnold and Lynne: tortilla Espanola with chorizo and bacon, olive pear salad and papas bravas. Arnold even has a plan for to-go containers. I think that’s what they were talking about. So a Spanish tortilla is like a frittata, a thick omelet or a quiche without a crust. Not a flat thing you wrap stuff in. Papas bravas are fried potatoes. Tom doesn’t like the texture. Kenny and Kevin: poached egg on herbed brioche, prosciutto, manchego cheese, and Spanish olive tapenade. It looks pretty good. Spike says there’s no texture and Tom says there’s too much going on. Amanda and Stephen: poached egg, pancetta (actually she says “pancetta confit“…which is pancetta cooked in bacon fat), potato rosti, and grape ragout with hollandaise. “Ragout” means slow-cooked, I think, which you can’t do in half an hour, and a rosti is like a giant hash-brown pancake. This doesn’t seem terribly healthy. Also when Amanda starts describing her dish for some reason her voice is several decibels louder than anyone else’s voice has been. Spike likes the pancetta while Padma does not. Angela and Kelly: bacon cheddar whole wheat waffle, poached egg, roasted tomato salsa, pickled chilies, and a mango, lime, and mint yogurt smoothie. Someone went healthy. It sounds good though. No one seems to like any of it particularly. Tiffany and Tim: crab cake eggs Benedict, grilled asparagus, and potato bacon hash in hollandaise. Excellent crab cake, but the hash is unnecessary.

I don’t know what it was, but I haven’t looked up that many cooking vocab words in a long time. Amanda and Stephen, & Tim and Tiffany are safe. Everyone else has 45 minutes to cook lunch. Kelly complains that they haven’t gotten any feedback, just the news that their dish wasn’t the best. That is a good point. If you make it to dinner, you’re cooking to not go home, and not to win. Kenny complains that his flavors and techniques were solid so he’s heated. Kevin thinks their sauce is a little too thick but also that Kenny knows what the judges are looking for. So…I guess that means they’ll be critiquing their sauce later. Angelo is heated too. He says the kitchen is tense, “like you wanna get out of the pool and there are piranhas trying to bite you.” I think he demands that Tamesha do a wider chiffonade of something. Maybe. Alex is taking the lead and making sure they get everything on the plate. They’re still running around like crazy, and Ed says he never tasted the scallops so he’s worried.

Alex and Ed: sea scallops with ricotta gnudi and broccoli rabe. Gnudi are the inside of a stuffed pasta like ravioli, but without the pasta. They like the gnudi but Bryan says if he had pureed the ricotta first you get a smoother texture. Angelo and Tamesha: slivers of beef, jicama and Asian pear salad with mint, cilantro, and kim chee vinaigrette. It’s raw beef, if that matters. Angelo thinks it would travel well. There are a lot of onions, Mike wants something crispy, and Tom says if you put it in a spring roll wrapper then it’d be pretty portable. That would make a good spring roll I think. Arnold and Lynne: tuna cannelloni with forbidden rice salad and tomato vinaigrette. The tuna is in a roll with carrots, fennel, and cucumbers inside, on top of rice, so it looks kind of like sushi. They like it but it’s not really “easy to execute”. Arnold says it is not an option for him to have to cook dinner. He looks upset so I fear this is from later and he‘s had to cook dinner. Kenny and Kevin: chickpea pappardelle pasta with grilled chicken and tahini sauce. The flavors are good but the chicken is lost. Andrea and Kelly: crispy skinned red snapper and panzanella salad with mustard vinaigrette. Panzanella salad is a salad with chunks of bread, but bigger and less dry than croutons. They tell the judges they didn’t cook the beans in the salad because of time and budget. Padma says she’d send it back, Eric wouldn’t send it at all, and Tom doesn’t understand how they didn’t have time to cook canned beans.

Angelo and Tamesha, & Alex and Ed are safe. Angelo spends his interview gloating about how he beat Kenny. Andrea says she didn’t expect to have to do dinner, then they splice in her talking about an award she’s won, then back to worrying about being eliminated. You can tell it’s a splice because it’s so random, and I remember her saying that exact sentence a couple of weeks ago. One hour for dinner. Kelly’s bitter and complains about feeling like she’s on the bottom of the competition, possibly because she is on the bottom of the competition. Kenny is super heated now. Arnold tries to be positive. Andrea discovers that Kenny and Kevin are also making short ribs. Lynne preheats an oven and Kenny and Kevin take over it while she’s gone. No one apologizes but it’s a pretty low key argument. Lynne’s super concerned she’ll overcook the pasta so she refuses to cook it too soon. She and Arnold have an argument about it and then I think Arnold wants to put it in anyway, then begs her to move on. She says that if it’s overcooked it’s on him, and he’s like “fine”, but she bitches that it’s not fine because she’ll get eliminated too. She’s pretty pissed. He points out that all the rest of the dish has to get set up too, but she’s just all, “I’m not putting it in, fresh pasta 12 minutes ahead of time? I don’t think so.” He’s got a point though. Kevin is pissed because Kenny is putting horseradish in stuff without asking him. Andrea thinks the boys don’t have enough sauce on their short ribs. Arnold freaks out because he no longer trusts Lynne.

Kenny and Kevin: braised beef short rib, squash, potato and carrot confit, and tempura horseradish. They wanted something familiar to everyone. The judges seem favorable but they want more jus. Andrea and Kelly: braised beef short rib, polenta, shiitake mushrooms, and citrus gremolata, with herbs and crispy shallots. Right when she says they have short ribs they cut to a shot of Tom sighing and looking irritated. He tries to hide it but you can tell. They also have good short ribs but Mike thinks the polenta is stiff. Arnold and Lynne: pineapple red curry mussels with squid ink pasta and focaccia with coriander and cumin. The pasta? Is not cooked. The sauce is fantastic though. Spike thinks it makes sense conceptually.

Padma asks for the bottom three teams. Are they going to have a winner this week? How will that work? Padma answers my question by saying one team had the best dish of the day and one team is going home. Nora says that Kelly and Andrea had the best flavors and are the winners. Not only do they get their dish on the menu (they never say which one, which is stupid), but one of them will get a 6 night trip for 2 to Venice, airfare included, and the other gets a 6 night trip for 2 to Barcelona. Sweet. Heh, they have to pick blind. Not like either one is a bad choice. Andrea’s never left the country so she’s excited.

Lynne thought their flavors were good but the pasta was undercooked. After all that. Arnold says he thinks it was fine, with a nervous smile that makes it seem like he might be trying to boost Lynne, as opposed to trying to convince the judges. Or it might just be because he thought the dish was better than that. They wanted black pasta and black mussels on purpose. Kenny and Kevin had no glaze on their ribs, although they claim they did. They said they stopped because it was too salty, except that they talk about “sodium levels” which is fairly pretentious. Tom goes back to talking about salt, and tries to find out if they stopped because the ribs were too salty, or because they thought they had enough glaze. They thought it was glazed enough. They liked the flavor of the sauce, but Eric couldn’t taste any horseradish. Tom makes them back up their dish and beg for their lives. So to speak. Kevin says people would like it, it tasted good, and they’re proud of it. Arnold says his dish was different from everyone else’s, and if he was judging he’d like to see some creativity. Only Kevin and Arnold talk about why they should stay, which is kind of interesting. Kevin says their dish was good, and says “we”, but Arnold doesn’t mention Lynne at all in his speech. You know what? I thought when they got to the bottom they’d judge all three dishes. I guess we’re only considering dinner. So I guess Kelly and Andrea’s short ribs are going on the menu.

Tom appreciates that Arnold and Lynne took a risk. Padma thinks that the dish might be a hard sell on a hotel menu. Eric laments the undercooked pasta. Tom wanted more glaze on Kenny and Kevin’s short ribs. Kenny tells everyone he doesn’t deserve to be in the bottom. Eric didn’t taste any horseradish, and Tom says they should have had horseradish just as the garnish and not in the sauce too. In the Stew Room Kevin starts getting heated and says you have to tell “them” how to eat the food and how it’s meant to be. Amanda responds with “Who are you to tell people how to eat food? You’re no one and no one will listen to you”. Kevin starts in with “are you nuts?” But instead of attacking Amanda and telling her she’s no one he says “Of COURSE you have to tell people how to eat your food.” Eventually he applauds and says “OK, OK, shut up”. Amanda sulks and mutters “I’m just saying”. Kevin says he knows so I guess the fight’s over. I agree with Amanda though: if you feel you have to tell me how to eat your food, either your food is complicated for no reason or you just like bossing people around. If I can’t figure out how to eat a dish, then I feel stupid, and no one likes to feel stupid.

Tom says that Lynne and Arnold thought outside the box and the only flaw was undercooked pasta, and Kenny and Kevin needed more glaze and horseradish. So of course they send Lynne and Arnold home. What? I had to read the blogs, and aside from the fact that the pasta was apparently raw, not just undercooked, Tom says that the dish was also supposed to appeal to guests, which short ribs do. Arnold says he was true to what he does and I think he’s pleased with that. Lynne’s kind of upset. Arnold interviews that he had no idea that Lynne wasn’t pleased with some of the dish. Did you miss her giant passive aggressive rant? Lynne, for her part, says it was a mistake to let a younger chef take the lead. They’re both irritated to go so soon.

Next week: teams, yelling, Angelo vs. Kenny, outdoors again. Tamesha knocks food on the ground. Clicky clicky

Top Chef 6/30/10--"Capitol Grill"

Previously on “Top Chef”: The horrible puns continue as everyone has to make sandwiches, only while attached to each other in pairs. Angelo and Tracey win (…again), and Tracey says she has a crush on Angelo but later talks about taking care of her partner’s child so…who knows? Later everyone has to make nutritious school lunches on the normal government budget. They worked in groups, and Angelo wanted Kenny in his group, because he has immunity so if they lose there’s a higher chance Kenny will be eliminated. You’d think no one would do such a thing, but Angelo made celery sticks with peanut butter. On Top Chef. However, Jacqueline got screwed on her dish since Amanda demanded sherry for her own dish. In the end, Jacqueline used two pounds of sugar in her pudding and was sent home. But Angelo at least didn’t win; instead Kelly won for making tacos with pork carnitas. (click for more)

There is an exercise ball in the bathroom. One of those ones you sit on instead of a desk chair. Weird. Amanda knows people thought she should have been the one to go home but she’s taking things one day at a time, or whatever. Kenny gets a letter from his girlfriend and talks about how it’s “the Angelo show” but he’s going to be on top again and since when do contestants get letters and cards instead of phone calls? Angelo whines about being in the bottom, and also that Kenny threw him under the bus, talking about how he knew there weren’t vegetables but he got talked out of it. He never proclaims his innocence though. Arnold knows people are already getting into disagreements.

Padma greets everyone with Johnny Iuzzini who is a pastry chef. Gail’s there too. Why is Johnny there? He’s going to be hosting/head judging “Top Chef: Just Desserts” with Gail. Nice! He’s cute too. So of course, you know what that means! Dessert Quickfire! Johnny talks about planning, and how desserts really need planning and can’t be finished last minute. So today they will be making pie from scratch. Mmm, pie. (Kmanpat: “But can they beat my grandmother’s coconut cream pie?”) Stephen thinks they’re all afraid because Jacqueline just got sent home for making dessert.

2 hours, and go! Kelly shoos Arnold away from a station, saying all her stuff’s there. Arnold interviews about how annoying she is, even though she wasn’t that annoying. Or two faced. Kelly has dessert experience and is thrilled. Angelo, finally, admits he’s not good at something, which is making pie. So what’s he doing? Making curry pie. Oh no, I’m not joking. He’s making like, curry sweet potato pie. If you aren’t good at the challenge, I don’t think you can just ignore the challenge guidelines and do whatever you feel like. Sadly though I must admit curry sweet potato pie is something I might want to eat. Tim quietly freaks out and makes apple pie. Tamesha’s never made a pie either. I mean…I’ve made pie a bunch of times, but I don’t know that I could make the crust from scratch without a recipe. Lynne says she’s the oldest one there, and that being a culinary instructor, she doesn’t really need a recipe. I forgot who she was for a minute. Amanda doesn’t like pie. Who doesn’t like pie? She’s making apple rosemary bourbon vanilla pie. She just doesn’t want to be in the bottom. Andrea tries to ask Tracey what she’s making but Tracey has no idea. Or doesn’t want to talk to her. Someone takes Arnold’s pan. He compares pastry chefs to mad scientists. Also “pies live in the clouds with unicorns”. Alex is making an almond crust, with tapioca. He’s probably got a decent idea, in that the average non-baker can probably fudge a graham cracker crust or an almond crust, as opposed to traditional pie crust. It might be thick though. Alex asks Ed to taste something but he claims to hate chocolate. Then he smack talks Alex in confessional. I don’t know if I trust someone who doesn’t like chocolate. Also someone who’s putting celery in his pie. Tracey doesn’t like the way her pie looks, nor the fact that she put too much butter in it and now it tastes like butter. She decides to start over but I don’t know if she has time. Kenny is making bananas Foster pie, but not a traditional pie with a crust and filling. More like a claflouti, which is like a pancake with fruit in it. You put fruit in the pan and then pour batter over it. Stephen’s pie is apparently “curry apple whisky date”. I guess. He’s pleased anyway. Tracey has somehow managed to get another pie together.

You guys! I just noticed! No letterbox! I’m so pleased. Kenny: bananas Foster pie with currants and Chinese five spice. It looks like banana bread, not that that’s bad, but it’s not really pie. Amanda: apple pie with rosemary and bourbon, and hazelnut crust. She warns them that she’s not a pastry chef, but Johnny says his grandmother’s not a pastry chef either, and she can make pie, so it’s kind of a copout. Oo, burn. Stephen: curried apple-date pie with saffron anglaise. It’s sour. Kelly: spiced raspberry and dark chocolate ganache tart. Yum. Arnold: kalamansi (a type of lime) and Key lime pie parfait with Korean soju, which is mint sauce. And it looks like it fell apart and he had to put it in a bowl. Angelo: sweet potato pie, curry spices, crumble crust. You know how usually sweet potato pie looks like pumpkin pie? He left the sweet potatoes in chunks and put crumble over it. Tracey: blueberry almond crunch pie with light cream and almond brittle. It didn’t set up so it’s liquidy. Tiffany: peach cobbler with cornmeal crust, buttermilk-lemon crème anglaise. The judges mention how dark it is, and she says she put molasses and dark brown sugar in it. Lynne: mango pie with basil & vanilla crust. She’s made little cut-outs to decorate the top and everything. She’s never put basil in the crust before. Ed: banana cream pie with salted peanuts and celery spuma (foam, basically). He claims it’s his grandmother’s pie, but Gail knows his grandmother did not make celery spuma. Alex: white chocolate, tapioca, and chevre pie with almond crust and raspberry puree. Johnny says that if there’s egg in it then it’s a quiche. So? Get on Kenny and his banana bread. I would classify quiche as “egg pie”. It’s got a crust and filling and you bake it.

Least favorite: Alex’s texture was poor, Tracey’s crust was burnt and the bottom was raw (she’s embarrassed), and Ed’s extra nonsense with the celery and peanuts didn’t fit the pie. Ed of course doesn’t understand, and Tiffany thought his pie looked great so she kind of freaks out. Kelly’s pie was perfect. Stephen’s pie also had a great surprising flavor combination. But then out of nowhere Johnny says Kenny’s the winner. That’s fine and all but I still maintain that’s not a pie. Stephen really wants to win.

Elimination challenge: make a picnic for Capitol Hill interns that includes one main dish and two sides. They’ll be serving at Mount Vernon. Alex jokes about taking advantage of an intern. Everyone gets their own grill to cook on. Arnold is not really excited about that.

$400 for shopping. Kevin buys flank steak. Tracey is making her own sausage and says it’s not difficult, which is a bad sign. Amanda for some reason says she used to be a drug addict. The camera in confessional is right up close to her face. It’s out of nowhere. I’m not sure where that came from.

3 hours to prep. There are 150 interns to cook for, which is a lot. Arnold is making lamb meatballs skewered with lemongrass. Kenny talks about how his dad used to grill and helped him when he was younger to grill also. Arnold complains about the workload. Tracey talks to herself, which irritates Stephen. He thinks she’s going crazy. She can’t get the mixer to work right to stuff her sausages into casings, so she says “screw it” and decides to make sliders. Tim never only grills one meat at home so he’s got ribs and pork loin. He’s sort of watching Amanda but claims to have “grill skill” so he’s not worried. Angelo’s concept is “Asian picnic”. Amanda starts yelling at Alex because he’s put his food into “her” oven. She claims she wrote her name on it, so even though it was empty he shouldn’t have touched it, and he claims she didn’t put her name on it. Tom walks in while this is happening. It sounds like she took Alex’s food out of the oven, much like you do at the Laundromat when people‘s clothes are in the dryer but they‘re nowhere to be found. Yeah…that kind of backfires when the person shows up and you’re still there. Tom asks Amanda what’s up with that, and then establishes that 1. she took Alex’s food out without his permission, and 2. when Tom asks if there’s a label on the oven, she admits there wasn’t, but she says that’s what they do, is label ovens. Then she mentions “prison rules” which are not explained. Point for Alex. Ed talks about tuna and hummus and a lot of stuff. He’s second guessing himself now. Turns out Arnold doesn’t actually cook as much as he’s front of house so he’s pressed for time. Stephen has Chilean sea bass, which is in a dish he’s made before. Amanda yells for tape, and Tiffany interviews that she hears Amanda yelling a lot and that it stresses her out just watching her.

Back at the house people drink and hang out. They also talk about their dishes. Angelo says Amanda is smart but can’t beat him. Amanda thinks no one takes her seriously.

Mount Vernon looks really cool. There are picnic blankets and baskets carefully strewn around the lawn already, and a long row of kettle grills. 1 hour to cook. Everyone has to start their own charcoal for the grill, and Arnold watches Kenny to see what to do. Tim’s ready to grill. Tracey asks how to turn the grill down. Kenny says Angelo has a lot of technique and admits he’s doing well. Arnold says his sister was an intern which means you’re someone’s bitch for a while. Then he claims never to have been the bitch. Tim has secret rub. When time is called people close the grills, so I guess you can’t grill after a certain time? Weird.

Guest judge is Jonathan Waxman. Awesome. Arnold: sesame lamb meatball with tabouli salad and gazpacho. That sounds good. Tamesha: marinated skirt steak with caramel soy glaze and fennel citrus salad. Angelo: Vietnamese lettuce wrap, and smoked egg salad. I wrote down “two sides”, right? No, I did. What’s up with that? Alex: grilled pork butt with lemongrass glaze, polenta and cucumber salad. See? Two sides. Then he ruins it by talking about “eating the ass out of this pig”. Ew, aside from the fact that “pork butt” is the shoulder. The judges love Arnold’s food, saying it’s fresh. Tamesha’s steak is overcooked. Alex’s sauce is a little sweet. Jonathan calls Angelo’s dish “magazine cover” but Gail says it tastes good.

Tim: pork two ways, pork loin and wet baby back ribs, with grilled vegetables. As he’s talking some geese buzz the table and almost shit on his food. Amanda: dry rub baby back ribs, grilled asparagus, bacon hazelnut vinaigrette. Kelly: bison burger with watermelon and tomato salad. Kevin: grilled marinated flank steak, rice and beans, and tomato and avocado salad. Tim’s meat is good but the sides are poor. Padma says maybe the bird knew something they didn’t. Kelly’s food is too simple. Amanda’s ribs are better than Tim’s, and Jonathan loves grilled asparagus. Kevin’s rice is bland and the beans are weird.

Lynne: leg of lamb with ras el hanout, zucchini “spaghetti” with balsamic onions. Kenny: harissa marinated pork loin, quinoa salad, grilled eggplant. Tracey: Italian sausage slider, with tomato, cucumber, red onion salad. Kenny’s pork is good. Lynne’s lamb is heavy and there’s cheese somewhere. Tracey’s sausage patty is too big, has too much fennel, and is undercooked. You know what? Tracey said at some point she was making lemonade. Where did it go? Some random intern says her sausage was too spicy and she’s all, “Well at least I did something with it.”

Tiffany: tamarind glazed wild sockeye salmon, Israeli couscous. Andrea: spicy root beer glazed skirt steak with potato salad. Stephen: bacon wrapped sea bass, ratatouille and olive pine nut couscous. Ed: spiced tuna loin with lentil hummus. Ed is confident because his dad was an executive chef and “he never thought of doing half the shit I do”. The judges like Ed’s dish a lot. Andrea’s skirt steak has too much root beer. Tiffany has bland glaze. Stephen’s sea bass is somehow stringy inside but tough outside. Tom thinks he didn’t render the fat enough. Angelo goes to try some of Amanda’s ribs and admits that they’re better than his dish. He goes around telling people how great they are. Tracey says there isn’t one bad dish.

Commercial interlude: Tracey is clairvoyant and is 85% accurate. Andrea freaks out while everyone looks on.

Stephen talks about how he nailed it. Padma calls Arnold, Ed, Amanda, and Angelo. These are the winners. Ed’s tuna loin was in a sandwich-type vehicle, and was “bright”. Arnold’s lamb had great flavor. Amanda’s asparagus was fantastic, ribs were fantastic, salad didn’t need to be there. They liked Angelo’s flavors. Jonathan tells Arnold he wins. He’s so pleased. Amanda says being in the top four is just as good.

The bottom four are Tim, Stephen, Tracey, and Kevin. Padma calls their dishes “disappointing”. Stephen never made his dish before, and the fish was unappealing. Tom tells him the bacon needed more grill time and the couscous was greasy and tasteless. Tim’s vegetables weren’t all cooked and the seasoning wasn’t that great, even though he had more than enough time to season everything. He didn’t push it to the limit. Kevin’s plate was “the safest Puerto Rican food I’ve ever had” according to Padma. He says that food is what all his Puerto Rican friends would do, and Gail asks him if they’re chefs, which of course they’re not, so she jumps on him like “YOU are!” he needs to step it up. Tracey isn’t surprised to be there, and knows she should have crushed the fennel first. Tom claims it’s insulting to Italians. I wouldn’t go that far. Jonathan says when things go wrong, that’s when you “pull inside yourself to fix it”. I thought her making sliders was a good way to fix it. He thinks Tracey gave up.

Stephen made a poor choice and didn’t really grill enough. Jonathan says the fish was inedible. They sense a lack of confidence. Tim’s zucchini was at least edible. Jonathan claims his 10 year old son could have made Tracey’s food. Kevin’s meat was fine, but the rice and beans was terrible.

Tom attacks everyone again. I think he likes this part too much. He says it wasn’t a good day for American chefs, like they were representing the nation or something. Tracey is sent home. She says it’s fair. She thinks if she’d prepared herself emotionally she’d still be there, she only left because she had a bad day.

Next week: two people sent home, more team drama, Eric Ripert is finally around, oooohhhhhhhh why are last season’s contestants there? Oh wait, Bryan V. That’s OK then. Clicky clicky

Top Chef 6/23/10--"Outside the Lunch Box"

Previously on “Top Chef”: 17 people met in Washington D.C. to start our new season. That is a lot. The first challenge was the mise en place race but it was done individually. Kenny is as fast as Hung, but Angelo won in the end. He’s pretty cocky, not like chefs aren’t cocky, but when he gets taken down a peg it will be satisfying. Then everyone was supposed to cook something that showcased where they were from, and also showcase themselves although that wasn’t made clear. Angelo won that too, although Kenny put in a good showing. Many people didn’t even get acknowledged. That’s what happens when you have that many people. John made some overly-sweet mousse and didn’t even make his puff pastry (actually, the only thing he made all day was the mousse) so he was sent home. (click for more)

Ed is shaving in the bedroom and some of the other boys make fun of him. But the bathroom was full, so what’re you gonna do? Ed sort of feels bad that John was sent home but he also wants to win. Jacqueline melts an obscene amount of butter in a pan. Andrea thinks she can beat anyone here.

Padma greets everyone with a smile and Sam Kass, assistant White House chef. Padma mentions that good governments are bipartisan (um…OK) and that they will be participating in a “Top Chef Bipartisan-dwich Quickfire”. PLEASE do not do this all season. Whatever new writer you hired to make all these puns, they are horrible. Everyone fake laughs. They have to pair up to create a sandwich in 30 minutes. I have to say, I’m right now noticing that Bravo is showing this episode in letterbox format for some reason, which is super annoying because it makes all the chryons smaller and harder to read. Thanks, Bravo. They pull knives for teams. Winning team has immunity. Kenny of course does not need immunity because he is awesome. Angelo says he owns a sandwich shop so he has to win. Yeah, that probably would be important. Padma is like, oh, by the way, and Tamesha knows there’s a twist coming, because 30 minutes for 2 people to make a sandwich is a ridiculous long time. They have special aprons. That are sewn together. So it’s like a three-legged race but your legs are not attached. Tim says “This is genius! Who got high and came up with this idea?” Exactly, my friend.

Kenny gets paired with Ed, so with one right handed person and one left handed person he’s thinking this is great. Tracey is paired with Angelo, a good thing for her since he has a sandwich shop and also she has a crush on him. Tamesha doesn’t trust Amanda to cut things while she holds them, so Tamesha claims the right side. Alex is terrified Tim will cut him. Everyone looks really stupid. Angelo makes some comment about “liquid love”. Ew. Tiffany is confident.

Angelo and Tracey: flounder marinated in fish sauce, sriracha mayo, and pickled red onions. Kevin and Andrea: “Philly Cuban”: roasted pork, pickle, whole grain mustard, gruyere cheese. That…just sounds like a Cuban. Tamesha and Amanda: prosciutto, Swiss cheese, Dijon mustard, and pepper salsa. Tim and Alex: “croque madam”: ground lamb, mornay sauce, and egg. It’s open-faced too. OK, I just turned on the repeat of “Top Chef” and there is no letterboxing. I can hardly read the captions and I have good eyesight. This was a terrible idea. Stephen and Jacqueline: saba vinegar onions, California avocado, and chicken. Kenny and Ed: Korean chili rubbed ahi tuna, cucumber mango slaw, on multi-grain bread. Also open-faced. Arnold and Kelly: curry rubbed grilled chicken, honey and sambal cucumber, mint, dill and cilantro. Yum. Tiffany and Lynne: flatbread saltimbocca, goat cheese, artichokes, peppers, white asparagus. It’s hard to eat, and Lynne says it’s a knife and fork kind of sandwich.

Stephen and Jacqueline were not creative enough, and Tiffany and Lynne had a poor texture. Tracey and Angelo had a nice vibrancy with the herbs and the spiciness. Ed and Kenny had perfect tuna and the slaw had a lot of flavor. The winners are Tracey and Angelo. Sigh. The more Angelo wins the more irritating he’ll get, I think. Kenny is heated. No one really claps for Angelo.

For the Elimination challenge, they will be making a school lunch. Nice. They will have to work with the same crappy budget the public schools get: $2.68 per student. Ha! In the end, what with subtracting labor and what not, they’ll have $130 per team for 50 kids. Arnold says he spends $130 on food for himself. They’ll work in teams of four, and each chef will be responsible for one item on the menu. And it looks like they’ll be just organizing the pairs, because Tracey and Angelo are allowed to pick the other pair of chefs they’ll be working with. They pick Kenny and Ed, so Kenny gets an interview about how he is Angelo’s competition and if they’re on the bottom, then the chances Kenny will go home are pretty high because of how Tracey and Angelo have immunity. Everyone else gets to pick their own teams. Kevin says that Andrea has kids, he has kids, Tim has kids, so he’s feeling pretty good about their team. No word on if Alex has kids. The teams will get 30 minutes to plan, and then shop at Restaurant Depot, so I guess they learned their lesson about having a budget challenge and then shopping at Whole Foods. 2.5 hours to prep today, and 1 hour at school tomorrow.

Tracey wants to take what kids are already eating and make it healthy. She also argues with Kenny that peanut butter and celery is healthy. I mean…relatively, I guess. Amanda argues that they should braise chicken thighs in sherry. The whole team argues about something, but I can’t tell what because most of it is bleeped. In the end Tamesha says something about Amanda not crossing her, so I guess they were arguing about that. Jacqueline offers to make chocolate banana pudding for dessert, which is fine with Amanda as she feels people who make desserts go home. She refuses to take one for the team. Jacqueline talks about mothering her youngest sister. Tim wants to make mac ‘n cheese, while Kevin is going to claim dessert. Kelly says kids “fucking love” tacos. Tiffany is not really keen to work with Kelly because she’s taking over. I think Tiffany would rather be in charge. Kelly also swears that kids love pickled onions. Tiffany doesn’t want to go home for someone else’s mistakes.

Amanda still wants to buy cooking sherry on their small budget. Somehow their team is at $173 and Amanda laughs that it looks like Jacqueline must have thought the $130 was for each person. She has to throw out the chocolate. A lot of teams are compromising to stay on budget.

Kelly’s team (her, Lynne, Arnold, and Tiffany) has a Mexican menu with the tacos and sweet potatoes and salsa. Kelly describes the tacos to Tracey and then says “This was my idea”. Immediately there is the dramatic music and quick cuts to everyone looking shocked. Except that from what I heard her taking over when they were planning…tacos were her idea. Andrea says everyone on her team is clear on their jobs. They seem to be getting along really well. Kenny’s team is doing well also, even though Angelo seems to be making celery with peanut butter mousse. That’s it? Good thing he has immunity. Everyone else is doing more work, but Kenny thinks it’s not healthy enough. Amanda is stressed. Her team is doing the fanciest food by far: chicken thighs braised in sherry, rice pilaf. Jacqueline adds more sugar to her pudding because her bananas are starchy. Tamesha tells Amanda to add tomato paste to her dish, and Amanda politely thanks her for her input but says she is not interested. Tamesha reiterates in confessional that she won’t hesitate to throw Amanda under the bus. It would matter more to me except that Padma already made it clear that since each chef is responsible for one dish, they’ll all be judged individually. Arnold’s still pissed Kelly is talking about herself.

Everyone heads home and relaxes. Tracey is reading a lot into the challenge because she’s raising her partner’s daughter and she knows they don’t eat well at home. Arnold and Tiffany bitch about Kelly. So…Arnold gets together with Tiffany and Kelly and they both attack Kelly for taking all the credit. I’m not sure what the point is here. I think it’s that Arnold wants to make sure he doesn’t go home for only making salsa because he helped other people? Whatever. I’d say it was a good thing that he and Tiffany sat Kelly down and aired their grievances but I think they just ended up confusing her and from what we saw, they didn’t give her much of a chance to respond.

Middle school! Kelly really wants to beat Angelo. It’s a very cramped kitchen, I’m sure because it’s not supposed to have 16 people and cameras and sound guys. Angelo has some special can to make peanut butter foam but the valve is broken. He tries to borrow one from Kevin who flat out refuses. Kenny complains that Angelo is not helping the team because he is too focused on his peanut butter. Tom appears and interviews that his mom ran a school lunch program, so he knows how difficult this is. Kevin is making fruit skewers with yogurt foam, which Tom thinks is brilliant because kids may not eat yogurt but they’ll eat whipped cream. Stealth! Jacqueline explains to Tom that they couldn’t afford chocolate or cocoa (or eggs) so she couldn’t make her chocolate pudding. Tom tries to stir up shit by asking if that screwed her, implying that everyone else on the team got what they wanted. Jacqueline is confident in her bananas. He kind of shrugs about her idea. Arnold explains how they are making tortillas and carnitas, and he says “we” a lot, but then from the back Kelly pipes up and says she’s ultimately responsible for the carnitas. The rest of the team is like, we totally all helped each other. Tom is irritated. “I actually don’t like when they say ‘we all did it’, that’s why they are forced to take responsibility for one thing.” Ha! Good point. Tom goes to mess with Kenny and remind him about how if his team is on the bottom Angelo and Tracey have immunity. Stephen thinks that Amanda’s dish with sherry is inappropriate for kids, and that they should change the name for the judges. Angelo finds a piping bag and claims he turned a rock into a wheel. Kelly all of a sudden champions coming together as a team.

Mob of kids! Andrea, Alex, Kevin, and Tim: coleslaw with yogurt; grilled apple cider BBQ chicken (no skin); mac ‘n cheese with whole wheat crust, skim milk, and low-fat cheese; fresh melon kabob and orange Chantilly dipped in yogurt. The judges really like everything except the mac ‘n cheese. True that. Low-fat cheese tends to suck.

Angelo, Tracey, Kenny, and Ed: chicken burger with fiesta rice (mixed in); peanut butter and celery with a tuile cookie thing; sweet potato puree with cinnamon; apple bread pudding with cinnamon yogurt. The sweet potatoes have too much pepper but the bread pudding is good, as is the burger. They try the celery, and Padma calls it a dessert because it comes with a cookie. It is lacking vegetables. Looking at this whole menu, I feel like peanut butter and celery, and sweet potato puree, are not things that should take 3 hours.

Lynne, Kelly, Arnold, and Tiffany: black bean cake and crispy sweet potatoes; braised pork carnitas tacos with pickled onions and cilantro; roasted corn salad with cilantro, lime vinaigrette and chili oil; caramelized sweet potatoes and sherbet. It looks pretty good. The bean cake is kind of spicy but they like the rest of it. Gail is not sold on the dessert.

Amanda, Stephen, Tamesha, and Jacqueline: braised chicken thigh with sherry jus; sweet onion rice with tomato, carrots, and green onions; bean and tomato salad with pickled red onions and apple cider vinaigrette; banana pudding with skim milk and strawberries. Stephen screws up and says his rice has 165 grams of fat instead of 165 calories. Hee. The food looks good. Not particularly healthy, but tasty. Jacqueline’s plan to get rid of the starch in her bananas by adding sugar has resulted in sweet starchy pudding. Some kid makes a face. Gail says the rice is mushy. Some kid says it would be cool if they got this every day. Jacqueline is so thrilled that I worry about the editing. Kelly says she appreciates her team’s help but that they’re taking part of her dish away from her.

Commercial interlude: Padma talks to kids about the meal and tells them all the things they liked were secretly foods they hate! It wasn’t whipped cream! Ha! Then she gets mobbed by children wanting hugs.

Angelo and Kenny rank their dishes, until Alex shushes them because Kevin’s fallen asleep and is snoring. When he wakes up everyone laughs at him. Padma comes in and collects Angelo’s and Amanda’s teams. Kelly is pissed because winners get called first. When the eight people arrive at the judges table Tom starts with a lecture about how school lunch should be flavorful but also healthy, and then Padma says they were the worst. What!? They changed it up! No Loser gong! Actually…I’m OK with that. It’s about damn time. Amanda just stands there with her mouth open. Stephen was trying to get vegetables into his rice but he blames the budget for not having what he wanted. Gail says that was the point. Jacqueline talks about her pudding and then admits she put TWO POUNDS of sugar into her pudding. Damn. Sam the guest judge says that’s what happens when you have inferior ingredients. Then he attacks Amanda for having the budget to buy sherry. She has no response. Ed’s sweet potatoes were too spicy for kids. Sam bothers them for not having vegetables, and Kenny says that’s why they put tomatoes on the burgers, and then Sam is all “Tomatoes are fruit!” but everyone knows they’re counted as vegetables. That’s why they count catsup as a vegetable. Then he’s like, the only vegetable was the celery, except that sweet potatoes are vegetables. Whatever. Tom asks Angelo if he would have made peanut butter and celery if he didn’t have immunity, and Angelo says “I can’t answer that right now.” Huh? Tom’s all, oh I’m not saying you would sabotage your team on purpose, because obviously you aren’t that type of person, to make a shitty dish while immune so you could get rid of someone else on your team. I love Tom. There’s brief confusion about who should have put a vegetable on the menu, and then Kenny claims he saw that but other people on the team made decisions without his input and they had immunity so they had to have agreement. Stephen for some reason jumps in and says that if someone knew they didn’t have vegetables then that person (Kenny) should have stepped up. Kenny slams their two pounds of sugar in their pudding, so Amanda fires back by saying processed peanut butter is possibly the worst thing ever, worse than their pudding. Ed’s like, whatever, you served the kids alcohol. Gail is like, hey, yeah, why DID you serve sherry, anyway? Hee. Amanda says she really likes chicken braised with sherry, and Gail is all, I like a lot of things, I like vodka, but I don’t cook with it. Exactly. The judges kick them out, and they all go back to the Stew Room to give the other teams the good news they are the winners. Or at least have high scores.

Angelo’s team had the worst menu, hands down. Kenny’s decision to not make vegetables hurt his team. Ed’s sweet potato was a good restaurant dish but was not good for kids. Padma feels both of them should have spoken up more because the other two had immunity. Tom thinks that while Angelo didn’t throw the challenge on purpose, there was “gamesmanship”, whatever that means. Meanwhile in the Stew Room Angelo is whispering to Tracey that he doesn’t like Kenny (after swearing her to secrecy). Amanda’s chicken was terrible, the kids didn’t like it, and Jacqueline’s pudding is horrible. Then they talk about the winners. The tacos were great, and Kelly’s team had a lot of food on the plate. Andrea’s team also did a really good job adding healthy foods into things that were usually not healthy.

Padma goes to the Stew Room and asks for Kelly’s team. They are the winners. Arnold’s salad was great. They all love Kelly’s tacos. Tiffany had the dessert, which had great texture even though it was low fat and she made some kids like sweet potatoes. Lynne’s dish was exciting so kids would eat it. Sam says that Kelly is the winner.

Kenny, Ed, Amanda, and Jacqueline get called back in. Tom attacks everyone and then Jacqueline gets sent home. She’s pissed she didn’t have more money, and claims she only was able to use 10% of the team‘s budget. But she was still going to have bananas, so…still too much sugar? She’s disappointed but proud of how far she got.

Next week: cook a picnic, someone doesn’t like Alex, Amanda gets defensive.

Clicky clicky

Top Chef 6/16/10--"House of Chef-presentatives"

(Housekeeping before we start: if you leave an anonymous comment I have to approve it, but I haven't figured out how to get Blogger to notify me when there are comments waiting to be moderated. So sorry if you submit one and it takes forever to show up.)

Hello everyone! Welcome to the new season of Top Chef! I feel like it’s been a long while. I know I didn’t recap “Top Chef: Masters” this season, but that’s because it’s hard to recap when everyone respects everyone else and it’s kind of boring. The critics are always nice and everyone screws up a lot less. I guess I could have commented on how Suser Lee never experienced anything, like tailgating. Eh. I hope you didn’t miss me! On with the show. (click for more)

17 chefs are in Washington D.C. 17? Sigh. But Eric Ripert has replaced Toby Young, so that’s something. I wish he had better things to do, but what are you going to do? Padma says “Hail to the chef!” which is almost as bad as the episode title. But not quite.

Tiffany Derry, 27, from Texas. She started at IHOP. She references Obama and says she wants to be the first African-American winner. Stephen Hopcraft, 40, from Vegas. He is here to “change [his] life and kick ass.” Tracey Bloom, 33, Atlanta. She’s been voted a top chef in Atlanta. Kenny Gilbert, 36, Telluride, Colorado. He seems to not be an executive chef like everyone else, but owns a catering company. I think. He does not explain what he does but brags that he cooked his first egg at 3 years old. Hey, I started cooking meals when I was in high school, and now I’m 33 and cook as little as possible. I don’t think your starting age matters a lot.
Everyone goes to a museum balcony to party. Or I guess I should say “party” because they probably aren’t really going to have a party with no tasks. Alex Resnik (33, Hollywood) talks about how great it is to have this season in DC where so many famous chefs are, and he namedrops for a while, ending on Eric Ripert. Which makes me wonder if he knew he was a judge. Kelly Liken, 33, Vail, Colorado. The average age of the chefs has gotten older the longer this show goes on. It’s the opposite of most reality shows where everyone is under 25. She says she doesn’t lose. Lynne Gigliotti, 51, Highland, NY. She is not an executive chef but is a professor at the CIA. Nice. I wonder if she’ll get bossy. She says she’s boring but her food tastes good. Arnold Myint, 33, Nashville. Arnold says in preparation for this show he got a wardrobe stylist and a facial. His bio is my favorite as it states he is a chef/owner of Suzy Wong’s House of Yum, used to be a professional figure skater, and occasionally appears as Suzy Wong to promote stuff. I think I just found who I’ll be rooting for. Kevin Sbraga, 31, New Jersey. He wants to represent Jersey. He knows Kenny and thinks that’s huge competition. Jacqueline Lombard, 33, Brooklyn. She owns a catering company and wants to prove a self-taught chef can beat these people, except her bio lists her culinary education as “French Culinary Institute, WSET (Wine and Spirit Education Trust, I think), and The Sommelier Society of America”. That would be, not self-taught. Timothy Dean, 40, Baltimore. His wife died recently and he’s going to win for her. Angelo Sosa, 35, Durham, Connecticut. He says his restaurant was the first Chinese restaurant to receive a Michelin star. No, he’s not Chinese. He claims this is war. Timothy is unimpressed with Angelo.

Suddenly a side door opens and Padma and Tom come out. No one cheers for them the way they cheer for Tim Gunn. John Somerville (42, Michigan) feels like he’s out of place. He is a chef de cuisine and not an executive chef. Also he has dreadlocks. I am not a big fan of dreadlocks. Tom and Padma introduce their first Quickfire: the mise en place relay race. They did that last season for the first challenge! Couldn’t the producers come up with anything new? Oh wait, spoke too soon. Last season was teams. This season is individuals. First leg is to peel 10 potatoes, and the fastest 12 will move on. Second leg: brunoise 10 cups of onions, 8 move on. Third leg: break down 4 chickens, 4 move on. Final leg: prepare a dish with these ingredients. Oo! I was watching “Next Food Network Star” and that was their first challenge: take chicken and potatoes, pretty much a blank canvas, and make a dish that shows who you are. The winner of this Quickfire gets $20,000. Wow.

Potato peeling commences. Most people are using paring knives and not a peeler like the average person. Kenny is apparently moving very quickly. Amanda Baumgarten (27, LA) says she has a good resume but knows she is competing against people with more experience. She is a sous chef. She also cuts her hand. Kenny finishes first and everyone pauses while Tom checks their work. Angelo moves on too. Someone has to redo her potatoes. Padma kicks the losers over to the side.

Onion time. And we all learn something new: “brunoise” doesn’t just mean to dice, it means to make 1/8” cubes. So specific. Only half of them can move on. Plus, 10 cups is a ton of onions. Kenny wins again. He’s like Hung. I cut onions and stuff so slowly, I’d probably still be there. Andrea Curto-Randazzo, 39, Miami, says she’s been recognized as one of the best chefs in America but she can’t dice onions.

Chicken violence. Kenny like, destroys the chickens in two minutes. The final four are Kenny, Kevin, Angelo, and Timothy. They will have 30 minutes to make something with chicken, potatoes, and onions. Kenny wants to impress everyone. Angelo feels like a ninja. At least I think he said “ninja”. The only other option is “Injun” and I’m pretty sure that’s not what he said.
Angelo: roasted wing and thigh, curried onion jam, potato noodles. Sounds pretty good. Kevin: boneless chicken wing with hot and sour broth, tomatoes, fennel, potato, and mushroom. Tim: garlic roasted chicken, potato galette, and oyster mushrooms. And cherries, somewhere. Kenny: duo of chicken with Moroccan spice, potato puree and onion confit. I’m not sure what the two types of chicken are.

Tim used too much cream, and Kevin had a very salty broth. Kenny had a great roasted potato and good flavors, and Angelo also had good flavors. The winner is Angelo. He’s proud of himself and thinks he can win every single challenge. Kenny thinks Angelo is an “obstacle” but not a “threat”.

Elimination challenge: create a dish that reflects where you’re from. Kelly says she does this every day because she creates regional cuisine. Yeah, I feel like that’s such a huge thing nowadays. It’s probably not even a challenge for most people. Actually, it kind of screws you if you cook ethnic food. The other part of this challenge is that they’re cooking for a party for the kickoff of the Cherry Blossom Festival. 300 young professionals. Just to make it more complicated, they’ll be divided into 4 groups and then will compete head to head within the groups. One chef from each group will be up for winning, one for elimination. The 4 finalists from the Quickfire get to be group leaders and pick their competition. Angelo picks Tiffany, Kelly, and John. Kenny: Tracey (who immediately assumes it‘s because Kenny thinks she sucks), Lynn, Stephen. Kevin: Arnold, Amanda, Jacqueline (who assumes she’s been left until last because she’s so awesome). Tim: Alex, Tamesha, Andrea. Ed Cotton (32, New York) is the last one left, and he says he’s worked for awesome chefs so he is really good. Angelo sticks him with Kenny, to put more pressure on him. Kenny is non-plussed. $300 to shop and 4 hours to prep. And then 1 hour to set up on the day of the event.

Everyone enters the house which is a really super nice townhouse. John writes in his journal, and yes, I did pause it and read it but it’s not that interesting. He talks about really wanting to cook something.

Of course there is a Whole Foods in DC! Ed’s worried someone will clean out the meat counter before him. Jacqueline feels chicken livers represent New York.

The kitchens are in a Hilton. Arnold (I think) has purchased an orchid for some reason. He has a mom-and-pop restaurant so he’s not used to all this top of the line equipment. Tim is using rockfish. Alex was born in Russia and is using that instead of California where he currently lives. Nice. Amanda warns us in confessional that she is not an easy mark. Kevin talks about Jersey and Pennsylvania but is labeled “Mid-Atlantic”. He is sous-viding lamb. Jacqueline has apple cups? I think? Angelo is making a foam. Oh, sorry, “froth”. Then he says he is confident and has an “orchestra” of flavors and “I can tell you when it’s going to hit your mouth, why it’s going to hit your mouth…that’s what I do”. (Kmanpat: “He can make sure it hits my mouth anytime.“) John is making maple mousse. Oo, a dessert! He’ll stand out for that. Tracey says Stephen is a “hick from some country town”. Cleveland is not a “country town”, as much as I never want to live there (sorry Ohio!). Kenny wants to keep dominating everything. John screws up setting the ovens and has to redo some macadamia nuts. Jacqueline decides not to strain her puree, so I’m sure that will be important. She’s already unsure about that decision.

Lots of shots of cherry trees in bloom. The site for the party is gorgeous, and a lot of people have flowers so I guess they were told to buy decorations too. Alex loves cooking for cocktail events. Jacqueline’s chicken liver puree is grainy so she decides to cook it again because that will make it smooth out? I’m not sure how that will work but I’m not a chef. Lots of frantic plating and last minute searing and cooking. Guests arrive. The judges arrive. Padma calls Gail “luscious” and tells us that she’ll be hosting “Top Chef: Just Desserts”. Woo! I was hoping that had actually gotten off the ground. Amanda is starstruck for maybe 20 seconds and then starts talking about her California dish. Apparently to her “Wolfgang Puck-era Californian cuisine” is “neo-classical”. I don’t know that’s the right term. I think Tom is laughing at her. Red snapper carpaccio, cucumbers, Clementine’s, sencha oil, daikon and caraway gelee. Arnold (Nashville by way of Thailand): Kaffir lime and Thai basil cake, palm sugar anglaise and “myint” julep. Kevin (mid-Atlantic): Pennsylvania lamb, Meyer lemon and pistachio marmalade, and spring onions. Jacqueline (New York): duo of Hudson Valley chicken liver and port wine mousse. She says there’s no fat in it, and Gail is incredulous. Amanda’s fish is messy, and Tom says Wolfgang seasons better than that. They like Kevin’s dish. Jacqueline’s mousse is still grainy.

Ed (Ohio): potato crusted rib eye, celery root puree, scarlet stadium mustard vinaigrette. I don’t know what “scarlet stadium” means. Ed (Boston): sautéed cod cakes with Boston baked beans and shaved fennel salad. Lynne (New York): camembert ice cream on waffles with bacon praline and caramel sauce. Tracey (Atlanta): Port Royal rock shrimp and grits with maple cheddar. Kenny (Colorado): cinnamon and coffee rubbed trout, goat cheese polenta and quinoa, and black bean mole. I want that. (Kmanpat: “You had me at ‘goat cheese.’”) Tracey’s shrimp is too bland. Ed’s dish has too much filling in the cod cakes and not enough cod. No one can taste meat in Ed’s dish, just fried. Kenny’s dish is wonderful of course.

Alex (Russia): deconstructed short rib borscht with crème fraiche. Tamesha (Barbados): jerked chicken sphere, soft polenta, with tamarind, papaya, mango, & cilantro. Andrea (south Florida via Italy): pork with chorizo potato gnocchi, calabaza and orange gremolata. Tim (DC): pan seared Maryland rockfish with pickled leeks, dill, and grilled crostini. Andrea’s gnocchi is good but isn’t really Miami. Alex deconstructed his borscht really well. Tim left the skin on his fish and it’s tricky to do that.

Tiffany (Texas): Cajun shrimp and crawfish salad, and chicken fried tomatillos. Kelly (Colorado): spice crusted NY strip steak, with asparagus, fiddlehead ferns and wild mushroom sauté. Angelo (Connecticut): arctic char with pickled shallots, tapioca, smoked bacon froth. John (Michigan): maple mousse napoleon with crisp macadamia nuts and vanilla sauce. Angelo’s had a lot of dill but Tom likes it. Kelly’s steak is well cooked. No one tastes maple in John’s dish.

The Stew Room is the same as ever. Padma calls Kevin, Alex, Kenny, and Angelo. They are the winners. Kenny’s food was well balanced and flavorful. Kevin’s dish, on the other hand, was very simple but excellent also. Angelo’s dish was “smart” and Eric praises the stupid foam. Alex deconstructed the borscht perfectly. Eric gets to announce the winner, who is Angelo. He claims everyone will chase him and he will “set the presidents”, whatever that means, but he totally said “presidents” and not “precedence”, not that that makes any sense either.

Stephen, John, Tim, and Jacqueline enter to the Loser Gong. Which they try to drown out with the rest of the music! Never! Stephen’s rib eye was so thin he overcooked it, but he thought he could cook it properly. Eric feels it looked like chicken nuggets. Gail takes Jacqueline to task for telling them up front she was trying to make low-fat chicken mousse, as chicken liver mousse is already unhealthy. No one expects it to be low fat. Jacqueline says she’s served this dish hundreds of times but never without her recipes. Tom asks if that’s “made hundreds of times” or “served hundreds of times.” She starts talking about how she thought it was under seasoned, not addressing the grainy aspect, and Tom interrupts her to make her answer his question. If she’s made it hundreds of times, why does she still need a recipe? Jacqueline says it’s not memorized, but I would argue that 1. after “hundreds of times” it should be and 2. it was grainy which has nothing to do with the seasoning, does it? No one tasted maple in John’s dessert and the pastry was soggy. He says the pastry was pre-bought, but it was just supposed to deliver the mousse to your mouth anyway. Gail says that his dish only had like 3 things, so telling them that a third of the dish was pointless isn’t really a good idea. John says he was stupid. Tim thought his dish was good, seasoned nicely. Eric tells him the fish skin was chewy and unpleasant. Tom twists the knife by reminding him he got to choose his competitors, and the other three won their groups. He knows he can cook better than he did, and he let himself down.

John admitted he didn’t make his own puff pastry, so his dish doesn’t really reflect him. Gail claims that was the whole challenge, but the challenge was “make something that reflects WHERE YOU’RE FROM” which is not the same as reflecting WHO YOU ARE. Also, since when have you cared that someone didn’t follow the theme? The mousse was grainy and Tom feels it was “amateurish”. Stephen’s dish was a bad idea, but it could have been great. Tom thinks he got caught up in the story. Jacqueline had a good idea, but the mousse was terrible. Gail thinks it should have had more fat. Eric thinks Tim should have known not to leave the skin on the fish, and having won the Quickfire he should have known better.

Commercial interlude: someone finds the beer in the Stew Room and make dice out of cardboard boxes to throw dice. A couple of people are like “I’m just here to cook, not to drink and have fun”. Sadly no one says “I’m not here to make friends”. Have some fun. Jeez.

Tom tries some revisionist history and says the challenge was to make something that both showed where you were from but also who you are as a chef. Then he says the same things to everyone that we just heard as judges table only meaner. Padma tells John he’s the first one out. He’s pretty upset but knows he took a risk making dessert. He plans to grow from this negative experience.

This season: um…people are stuck together? Angelo is a sniper. CIA, NASA, baseball, grilling, school cafeteria! Crying, yelling, that asshat Mike from last season (ok…Eli turned out to be worse, but still), Tony Bourdain (I *heart* Tony Bourdain), I think that is John Glenn (oh God I hope I’m right). Clicky clicky