Top Chef Season 17 All Stars Recap - Episode Fourteen

Greetings, Readers! Writing this week's recap has got me a bit verklempt. Not only is this the last Top Chef recap that I'll write for a while (maybe ever), but it also marks the end of fourteen long weeks of staying home, socially distancing, and all that other good stuff. When this season of Top Chef started, I was pretty sure I'd be back at work by this point. Back to the usual routine of twice daily bus rides fully of smelly and rude people, sitting in an overly-cold office for 8 hours, daily walks around Oriole Park at Camden Yards, listening to my co-workers chatting loudly instead of working, and watching the weirdo who eschews wearing shoes walking up and down the filthy hall carpet on his way to the even dirtier men's room down the hall. But no. I am still at home, with a 1 minute commute from bedroom to dining room table/work desk, which I share with my husband of 20 years (jesus christ, when did that happen?). The only thing--other than my employment and relationship status--that has remained constant in my life, pre- and during the pandemic, is my thoughts of food. I think of food pretty much every waking hour of my life. What to eat, how it will be prepared, where to obtain it. I conjure up recipes in my head regularly, not always bringing them to fruition, but enjoying the process nonetheless. Food is what has kept me somewhat sane over the last three months. To that end, I have enjoyed Top Chef this season because the show is primarily about food. But it is also about a group of people who have spent a great deal of concentrated time together and so have become good friends. And I have envied the interactions between these people, watching them coexist these last 14 weeks, even as I have not been able to see and touch my own friends. Of course, these same chefs have also had to endure the trials and tribulations of pandemic life just as I have, but with the added burden of wondering if their businesses will ever recover. Will life ever be the same? Will we ever have the relative frivolity of a food competition show like Top Chef again?

I'm going to try to make this recap brief. But then I say that every time and fail miserably.

There's no Quickfire again this week. The cheftestants--Bryan, Melissa, and Stephanie--find a note from Padma that urges them to eat breakfast before meeting her on the very foggy and damp terrace. Tom's there too, and they both compliment the chefs' performances so far before reminding them that their next challenge involves the best four course meal of their lives. Again Padma stresses that it be a progressive meal, which, as I have stated before, normally refers to a meal eaten in various locations rather than at one table. But I think the Top Chef meaning of the word is a meal that goes from appetizer to dessert. Not four courses of soup, or pie, or pate en croute. They want soup to nuts, but not necessarily soup or nuts. 

Out of the fog emerge their helpers for the contest: Kevin, Malarkey, and surprisingly, LeeAnne. Gregory has not been feeling well (his back still acting up, I assume) so LeeAnne agreed to take his place. Big of her to agree to travel to Italy, huh? The Final Three draw knives to determine who chooses first. Stephanie is number one and her choice is...Malarkey? She claims she chose him for his skill and enthusiasm. Bryan then chooses his bestie Kevin, leaving Melissa with LeeAnne.

Each pair gets their own SUV and heads off to do meal planning and shopping in Florence. Melissa of course is planning to continue her fusion (though she admits its a dirty word) of Italian and Chinese cuisine. Lee Anne is very opinionated, offering strong advice on how to prepare octopus and suggestions for ingredients Melissa might want to incorporate into her dishes. Melissa, however, is able to say no and shoots down most of Lee Ann's ideas. Stephanie tells Malarkey that she is going to make several things that she's made in the past, dishes that mean something to her. Personally, I think they sound a little done, particularly the kataifi-wrapped shrimp, which was a thing a few years back. Hopefully she doesn't shoot herself in the foot. Or shoot Malarkey for being annoying. Finally, Bryan--who last episode was deeply wounded by criticism that his food has no heart--wants to make dishes that are less his usual modernist tweezerings and more food with soul.

After spending a thousand euros on ingredients (much like my weekly food budget these days), the cheftestants head back to the Renaissance and cook for 5 hours. Everyone seems very enthusiastic about their menus. After the day's cooking is complete, they head off to a farmhouse in the countryside for a dinner promised to them by Tom. In a rather lovely twist, the meal has been prepared entirely by Tom, Padma, and Gail. It's a very nice gesture.

We then see our trio of finalists at home, skyping with their loved ones. Stephanie chats with her BFF Kristin Kish, winner of Top Chef season 10, whom she met in culinary school. (Stephanie also participated in that season, but was eliminated in one of the initial qualifying rounds.) Melissa converses with her excited mama, and Bryan calls Michael Voltaggio for some supportive brotherly love.

The next day, the chefs have another three hours to finish their dishes and serve them to a group of highly regarded chefs including Marcus Samuelsson. Their first courses are well-regarded by the judges, whose only quibble seems to be that Melissa's char siu sauce is a bit sweet. Tom praises Stephanie's kataifi shrimp, saying it's perfectly cooked. (So maybe the judges aren't sick of that particular dish quite yet.) The dish reminds Stephanie of her late brother, and her tears cause Gail to shed a few herself. Each of the three finalists serve pasta for their second course--so appropriate in Italy--and these dishes are also praised. There are a few more issues with the third course, mostly with Stephanie's veal breast dish which is a little dry. Bryan's squid ink foccaccia is also criticized for not being absorbent enough. (By the looks of it, it wasn't foccaccia, either.) Dessert also seems to please the diners, which means the judging will be difficult. 

You all know that I've been rooting for Bryan, who was competing on Top Chef for the third and final (so he says) time. You all also know that he didn't win any Quickfire Challenges and few Elimination Challenges this season. So something was off with him this time around. If Bryan couldn't win, I would have loved to see Stephanie get the prize. She was clearly an underdog who came on strong toward the end of the competition. Melissa was strong the whole season and clearly a chef to be reckoned with. And while I liked her just fine, and loved her concept of adding Chinese elements to just about everything she prepared (Chinese cuisine is my very favorite), she was not my choice to win.

So of course she won.

Congratulations to Melissa King for an amazing run. She's the winningest competitor ever, and only the 6th woman in 17 seasons to earn the title of Top Chef. She was also the Fan Favorite.

Sorry, Bryan, you will always be my favorite.

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Top Chef Season 17 All Stars Recap - Episode Thirteen

I went to the office yesterday for the first time in 12+ weeks. It was strange. Only my supervisor was there, plus a guy from another department. The corridors were dark, the air was silent. And I kinda liked it. My regular readers probably have figured out that I don't like people very much, with few exceptions, so I found the deserted hallways soothing. Still, I'd rather not go back to work anytime soon. The occasional visit to do some essential chore that cannot be done from home is fine, but working from home is a life change that I have definitely gotten behind.

That is not true of the culinary world, of course. Thirteen weeks into the pandemic and restaurant people are tired of losing money. Honestly, I get it. But opening restaurants for indoor dining isn't going to help the bottom line very much. Restaurants need 80% capacity to survive, not 50%. Maryland is opening restaurants today at 5pm, after only a week of outdoor dining. Frankly, I'm sick to my stomach that businesses are valued more than people (and remember, I don't like people). We (that is, the state of Maryland) haven't yet finished our first wave of the virus but apparently are eager to get started on the second. Good luck to those people who are so desperate to get out and be aspirated on by others. My husband and I will continue to stay at home.

On to today's recap, which should be fairly short as there was no Quickfire Challenge.

When the episode begins, our remaining four cheftestants--Stephanie, Melissa, Kevin, and Bryan--are still facing Judges' Table. Prosecco Padma is still babbling on in half-Italian, half-English. She tells the chefs that super sponsor San Pellegrino is sending them to Parma in Emilia-Romagna where they will embark on a food tour of two of the region's most important foods: Parmesan cheese and Prosciutto. Their tour guide will be Lorenzo Cogo, the youngest chef to receive a Michelin star in Italy.

Padma also reveals the next Elimination Challenge, in which each of them will be responsible for two dishes, a primi and secondi--essentially a pasta course and a meat course--featuring the region's prized cheese and ham. These delights will be served up to a gaggle of Michelin-star-winning chefs who will judge the chefs harshly because they are stupid Americans who don't understand Italian food.

The next morning, they drive through the gorgeous countryside to their first destination, a cheese factory called Caseificio Gennari, where they don stylish blue coveralls and caps so they don't get their American filth on the product.

They are gifted with an 80-pound wheel of Parmesan to use in their dishes. Bryan hoists it on his shoulder and they are off to their next destination, Ruliano. There they taste some of the prized ham of the region, are told they should never cook the ham, and receive a leg of prosciutto to take with them. Bryan hoists it on the other shoulder and books a flight back to the states.

Shopping for this contest involves a series of adorable markets in Parma, where the produce is gorgeous despite it being November. Stephanie picks out a giant cabbage that looks like it just came out of the ground. Kevin finds some beautiful red and white borlotti beans in their pods. Bryan purchases a fish with bright red gills--a sure sign of freshness. Melissa sees scallops and thinks of XO sauce, which is made with dried scallops and Jinua ham. She feels prosciutto might be a good way to link her Chinese heritage with Italian food.

After shopping, the chefs head to Antica Corte Pallavicini where they will dine, spend the night, and prepare their meal. In that order. Before dinner, they wander through a creepy cellar full of hanging hams; Melissa wonders if a serial killer will make an appearance. They have a ham tasting, and Kevin is in hog heaven.

We seem him close his eyes in ecstasy, make that swishing movement with his mouth as if he was tasting wine, and have a porkgasm right on the spot. But the tasting is just foreplay for the main meal, a multi-course dinner during which the cheftestants do the inevitable musing about their "journey" to that point. God, I hate that word used in that way.

The next day, the chefs hit the kitchen and commence to cookery. Stephanie, despite the admonishment not to cook the prosciutto, decides to use it as a substitute for meat in a ragu. In other words, she uses a shit-ton of the precious ingredient, cuts it into tiny cubes, and cooks the hell out of it. For her second dish, she's putting slices of prosciutto within cuts in her cabbage and braising the whole thing. Again, defying the recommendation that she not cook the meat. Daring and perhaps dumb, but she's feeling confident. Melissa, too, is working with the prosciutto in an unconventional manner by using it in her XO sauce. She's working the parm into her primi as a flavoring element for her brodo. She's also using the French technique of making a raft--a mixture of coagulated egg and other ingredients that floats on top of and draws impurities out of a stock--in order to clarify it. It's a fiddly thing to do; she accidentally allows the raft to break, so she has to start over.

On the boys' side of the room, they're going in the opposite direction by barely draping the required porcine product over their dishes. Kevin found some pork at the market and is just tickled with his plan to make pork with pork on top. He's using the borlotti beans to make a pasta i fagioli with a Parmesan garnish added at the table. Bryan is making pasta alla chitarra which he will top with an egg and a nasty foamed up version of Parmesan fonduta that looks like marshmallow fluff. Mr Technique is also doing bass draped with prosciutto on top of a pumpkin seed pesto.

Prosecco Padma et al enter the dining room. Apparently the chefs gathered were the recipients of a collective 16 Michelin stars. Most are Italian natives, excluding California chef Evan Funke. His Italian accent is nonexistent but he is a master of pasta. It's a tough crowd.

The girls present first and leave elated. Despite cooking the prosciutto, Stephanie gets raves for both her pasta and the sauce which was well-balanced with both ham and cheese. Melissa's use of Parmesan rind in her brodo along with the Asian flavor of yuzu created something that had great depth of flavor. Then the boys get kicked in the head. Kevin's bean stew is fine, but the tablespoon of parm he adds at the table makes the dish too salty. And Bryan's pasta is good, but the judges don't like his aerated parm fonduta. I mean, they really hate it. Possibly because they expected to taste marshmallow fluff.

Both Stephanie and Melissa are praised for their secondi, braised cabbage with fonduta and scallop with XO and radicchio, respectively. Kevin's dish, however, is "not so good-a" because his pork is tough and the drape of prosciutto seems more like an afterthought. Bryan basically treated the ham the same way, but it's his pesto that gets slammed. Apparently it doesn't work-a well with the other ingredients.

Bryan should probably change his last name to something far less ethnic, cuz his Italian card just got revoked.

Judges' Table is pretty predictable. Evan Funke joins Pads, Tom, and Gail for the party and they roundly praise both Stephanie and Melissa. Stephanie points to herself, "me?"

She's surprised that she is going on to the finale, though Melissa is actually the winner of this challenge. That means the boys are on the bottom. Bryan's dishes may not have had soul, but at least the pasta he made was the best of the evening. Kevin isn't so lucky. His pork "ate tough" and was overseared, his raviolo was too salty, and the ingredient he was supposed to feature--the prosciutto--was an afterthought. Kevin thought his cooking was soulful, and maybe it had more soul than Bryan's, but the technical flaws were enough to send him home.

I'm happy that Bryan gets to go on to the finale, but I had hoped he'd get there on his own merit, rather than slipping through because someone else's food was worse than his. I'm sure he feels the same way.

Next week: the cheftestants will need to cook the best 4-course meal of their lives, along with a little help from their friends Kevin, Malarkey, and LeeAnne. Looks like Bryan is getting an advantage working with Kevin. Will opinionated LeeAnne sink Melissa, who looks to be the strongest chef in this competition? And how will Stephanie fare paired with Malarkey? Stay tuned!

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!

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Top Chef Season 17 All Stars Recap - Episode Eleven

Welcome to the end of Week Eleven! Is everyone still relatively sane out there? I know I get close to wigging out sometimes, but so far I have kept it together. No shame if you haven't, of course. Some people are having a hard time with all of this isolation. I'm not a people person, and I actually like staying home, so it's less difficult for me than for others.

While it's still Pandemic Central in the US, with who knows how many weeks to go, we're almost done with this season of Top Chef! Two weeks of finale and that's it. I feel like it flew by pretty quickly, especially compared to the last couple of seasons I watched. (They were interminably long, at least 47 weeks each.) This season has also been helped greatly by the handsome presence of Bryan Voltaggio. I'd better be getting two more weeks of him!

So what happened this week? First, we got the results of Last Chance Kitchen. Kevin was the reigning champ, and he kept his title by beating last week's ejection, Karen. But that wasn't enough! Once Karen was out, the final five cheftestants swaggered into the kitchen. They weren't late to the party, they were the next part of the challenge. Tom announces that despite his exhaustion, Kevin would need to fight three more matches, and if he won 2 of the 3, he'd get back into the main competition. His new opponents were of his choosing: Bryan, Malarkey, and Gregory. The latter two went down, so Kevin was back in the game. We knew that was going to happen, right? But suppose he didn't beat 2 of 3? Would Last Chance Kitchen have been an exercise in futility? Well, apart from Karen coming back a few weeks ago. But she was eliminated again, so yes, maybe futility is the right word.

The next day, after Kevin gets some well-deserved rest, the now-six cheftestants head to the Top Chef Kitchen and find tipsy Padma, drunk on Champagne, lounging in airline-style seats with Jonathan Waxman. Waxman is a pioneer of California Cuisine, but Padma says his biggest achievement is being her friend. Hello, Champagne Padma! (Thank you, Stephanie, for that nickname.) This alter ego reminds me of the old Cannabis Padma--a little off. Definitely slower. Perhaps more fun. Or not. I'm not sure Padma is ever fun. (Keep in mind, Padma's Lawyers, that I am being satirical here, also, offering an opinion.) Anyhoo...the Quickfire Challenge involves making a memorable meal that might be served on an airplane. It must include salad or veg in addition to a main course. Items need to be only as tall as the service trays, as they must be able to fit in an airplane cooker.


Bryan laments that he hasn't yet won a quickfire. Maybe if he followed the rules once in a while? But he's oblivious - he's just cooking VOLT food all the time. It's as if he doesn't own other restaurants that don't serve tweezer food. He's decided to make braised chicken thighs with green lentils and a side salad with green goddess dressing. Will that be enough to win him a prize? (I can't eat lentils, not even for Bryan. If I were a judge, the answer would be...of course he wins! I am biased.)

Meanwhile, Champagne Padma offers Jonathan some nuts to nibble (not hers). She also inquires as to his favorite (probably his own).

Knives down! Padma and Jonathan stay where they are--seated, with champagne--and the cheftestants bring the food to them. Padma struggles with the parchment that Stephanie used for her rockfish en papillotte, and with cutting Malarkey's tough pork chop. Are both dishes really that difficult to deal with, or is it the champagne? Annnnd....Bryan's lentils are undercooked. Champagne Padma dings the three of for their offenses. Meanwhile, both she and Jonathan enjoyed Kevin's meatballs, though they were a bit too tall. Melissa's beef curry served with tofu salad was the biggest hit of the day, however, earning her the win and a benefit in the next challenge.

Champagne Padma then reveals the location of this season's finale: Tuscany. Only five of the six remaining cheftestants will go. Everyone wants to go. I want to go. (Maybe not right now, but someday.)  First, the Elimination Challenge, which is to create a dish inspired by the food and philosophy of Michael's Santa Monica, an iconic restaurant celebrating its 40th anniversary. Jonathan Waxman worked there, along with a pantheon of cooking greats: Roy Yamaguchi; Sang Yoon; Mark Peel. Even Top Chef winner Brooke Williamson. The cheftestants will visit the restaurant for dinner and to meet owner Michael McCarty, a pioneer of California Cuisine.

After the chefs shower and change, all six of them pile into one Sponsorship Mobile and head to the restaurant. Bryan is driving, as usual. He must enjoy sitting in traffic. Once at the restaurant, they are served some classic Michael's dishes by current chef Brian Bornemann. They include an angel hair pasta with chardonnay cream sauce and diver scallops, grilled quail, and heirloom beet risotto with monkfish wrapped in crispy prosciutto (courtesy of Brooke Williamson, who was a sous at Michael's by the tender age of 19). Then comes sweetbreads with veal loin, chanterelle mushrooms and white truffle, followed by grilled lamb saddle with potato galette and red currant cassis sauce. Finally, they get duck two ways, a grilled breast and confit thigh with wild rice and blood orange sauce. The knife block appears, and Melissa gets her advantage. She chooses the dish she wants to reinterpret first. The remaining chefs choose knives.

Melissa: quail
Kevin: duck
Stephanie: scallops
Bryan: lamb
Gregory: monkfish
Malarkey: veal

After dinner there's shopping. Back at the Top Chef Mansion, bros Kevin and Bryan chatter about being able to go to Italy together. And Malarkey facetimes his kids Sailor and Schmailor. It's their 9th birthday, and dad's a schmuck because he has to be away, feeding his enormous ego in yet another cooking competition, missing time with his family. Womp womp.

The next day, the chefs travel to Michael's and get set up in the tiny kitchen, which is apparently 80s style. It's so jam packed with pans, squeeze bottles of condiments, and other kitchen paraphernalia, it looks like my kitchen. I hope they have more counter space than I do. Everybody tells us what they're going to cook, and I groan when I hear that Malarkey is going to make a duo. Duos are pretty much the kiss of death on Top Chef, and he knows it. But he filled his shopping cart with pomegranate and other fruit that aren't going to work with truffles, and he has to use them somehow. Gregory is making a risotto, which also tends to be unpopular with the judges. Melissa is going to Asian-ify her quail, which makes sense from a culinary standpoint, and Kevin's decision to turn duck confit and wild rice into a croquette sounds amazing. Bryan is going to elevate the shit out of his lamb, because that's what he does. I can almost hear the tweezers clicking.

Jonathan Waxman joins Tom on the Sniff N Sneer. He's such a pleasant-seeming person; I always enjoy seeing him.

Out in the restaurant, the judges arrive and take their place at a long center table, with other invited foodies filling the remainder of the room. Champagne Padma is nowhere in sight. Instead we get regular Boring Padma. Will someone please bring her a bottle and a glass?

Gregory's dish comes out with Stephanie's. His monkfish and beet risotto was meant be accompanied by a crispy prosciutto chip, but he remembered them just as time was up--too late. Jonathan claims to love his interpretation, but was expecting that porky bit. Though everyone seemed to enjoy Stephanie's version of scallops and pasta, served with fancy little caramelle, Roy Yamaguchi opined that it was one dimensional. Bryan's treatment of lamb, served with fondant potato, was simple and refined, but lacked "wow." Kevin's duck dish was a hit, especially the croquette.

Some of Malarkey's specially-plated dishes didn't make it to the judges; apparently other diners got to enjoy them. But the judges were probably full by then and were willing to share. As usual, there were too many things on his plate. His "duo" was essentially two separate and disparate dishes, ones that didn't taste good together. Finally, Melissa's quail was deemed to have highlighted the bird itself, always a plus.

Back at the kitchen, Melissa wins and is the first to reserve a seat to Tuscany. Jonathan tells Stephanie that the race was close between her dish and Melissa's, so she's going to Italy as well. And so are Bryan and Kevin, who jump up and down and embrace each other. But will it be Gregory or Malarkey getting that final plane ticket? While the judges missed Greg's crisp prosciutto and felt the fish got lost, Malarkey's dishes didn't evoke the original Michael McCarty dish. Malarkey starts a speech about being exhausted and having had a great ride. Padma wants to know if he's quitting.

He doesn't have to quit. Malarkey is out. Finally. (Not that I don't like him, I just find him annoying.)

Next week: Part one of the finale, in Italy!

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!

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Top Chef Season 17 All Stars Recap - Episode Ten

Episode Ten, or, The Panna Cotta Caper.


Did I think, when I started recapping this season of Top Chef, that I'd still be doing it from home in Week 10? Yes, actually. I was thinking we'd be home at least 12 weeks, but it's looking like it will be far longer--for me at least. I feel like I have some form of Stockholm Syndrome. Not that I have fallen in love with my "captors," but that I have come to strongly agree with the whole stay at home thing and am not planning to go anywhere anytime soon. Sure, I miss hanging out with people, one or two in particular, but as an introvert, I don't crave it. I did get to spend a little time with a few friends this week--outside, 6+ feet apart, on a windy day--and it was nice. We talked about food, the fate of restaurants (one friend was a chef, another the doyenne of the Baltimore food scene), and Top Chef. My chef friend thinks Gregory has what it takes to win it all. Maybe Melissa. You all know I'm rooting for Bryan, but I don't dislike anyone this season. Hell, I'd be happy if Stephanie won, as she is very much the underdog in this competition.

I wasn't really feeling this episode. It wasn't exciting to me. But then very little is these days.

When the cheftestants enter the Top Chef Kitchen, they find Padma standing with Sherry Yard, pastry chef extraordinaire. Yard has won 3 James Beard awards and spent nearly 20 years as executive partner for Wolfgang Puck's restaurant group, in charge of pastries for Spago, etc., and is eminently qualified to judge the Quickfire Challenge.

Each cheftestant must create a dessert to wow Sherry. They have access to a basic pantry of flour, eggs, butter, etc, but they must "win" more exotic ingredients via a blind taste test. This Quickfire is my favorite every season, and it's nice to see it get a little twist. I get a perverse pleasure of watching people put strange things in their mouths. (Get your mind out of the gutter!) A spoonful of gloppy/milky/mealy ricotta cheese or hot sauce makes for some interesting facial expressions. This season, each chef gets 5 minutes to taste and identify as many of a selection of 20 items as possible. Items that are identified correctly may be used in their dish; also, the more correct, the more time they get to cook. Two chefs with the highest score get an hour, the two lowest get 30 minutes, and the two in the middle get 45 minutes.

Everyone leaves the room except Bryan, who starts off the blind tasting. His palate is good enough to score him 45 minutes of cooking; the same goes for Melissa. Stephanie has the highest score, with 15 of 20, and gets an hour, Gregory also gets an hour.

Karen and Malarkey suck balls at this game, correctly identifying 8 and 7 ingredients (out of 20) respectively, and get a mere 30 minutes to work. Honestly? Are their palates that bad? I'd love to participate in a blindfolded tastings and think I'd do pretty well.

I don't know why chefs choose to make panna cotta in a competition with a time crunch. Like Chopped. Thirty minutes isn't enough to get gelatin to set, even in a blast chiller. Karen finds that out the hard way. Malarkey is smarter, choosing to bake a cake in the wood oven. If one of those things can cook a pizza in 90 seconds, a cake shouldn't take much longer, huh? He also makes ice cream for the third time in this competition. Melissa was smart to have several desserts in her arsenal already, including an olive oil pistachio cake that she makes in a muffin tin and serves with a custard she turns into ice cream with the help of liquid nitrogen. Stephanie also uses science to make the ice cream to accompany her peach and tarragon crostata because the ice cream maker is still full of Malarkey's residue.

 And then we have Gregory and Bryan. Bryan has created desserts for his restaurants, so it's not like he doesn't know what he's doing. But maybe he doesn't? He serves a bowl of wet sawdust that is allegedly lychee curd with macerated peaches and coconut. Gregory also makes a bowl of that involves coconut and milk chocolate curd and a whole bunch of toppings but also looks like wet sawdust. Or even worse--oatmeal. I dunno. If I was served a bowl of curd with stuff on it in an expensive restaurant (which means it would be a $12 bowl of curd), I'd probably throw it at the chef and demand some cake.

Padma and Sherry are especially stone-faced. There seemed to be far more smiles and compliments during the last 9 tastings. These ladies find the most fault with Karen's un-set panna cotta, and Bryan's bowl of sawdust...not because it was sawdust, but because the ingredients were too flavorful and competed with each other. Melissa's and Malarkey's cakes put them on top, with Melissa getting the win and an advantage in the Elimination Challenge. Which is...

The Cheftestants will cook for a group of elite Olympic athletes making dishes inspired by Japan. Huh? Well, the Summer Olympics were going to be held in Japan this year. Yeah, I completely forgot this was an Olympics year, too. Emphasis on was. The event has been reschedule for 2021, and there's no saying it will happen then, either. But when Top Chef was filmed, last fall, there was no hint of the coronavirus disaster that would put much of our lives on hold. Ah, don't we all long for those good old days, those innocent times, to return? Those days of sitting in traffic as we commute to work, flipping the bird to those assholes who cut us off on the beltway, and buying gas more than once every 10 weeks! Those days of being able to push our shopping carts right up against the person ahead of us in line because we are in such a goddamn hurry to put our stuff on the conveyor belt! Those days before every toddler in the neighborhood had a skateboard, scooter, or bike and got in my way as I attempted to walk my kid-hating dog! (I quite miss those toddler-free days, actually.)

But I digress.

Before the chefs do anything, they get to eat some fancy Japanese grub. Niki Nakayama and Carole Iidi-Nakayama, co-owners of the restaurant n/Naka are on hand to feed the cheftestants and discuss the art of kaiseki, or a multi-course dinner of very special dishes. The challenge is for each chef to create one course of a 6-course progressive dinner to be served at the LA Coliseum. Now, I'm not sure why they felt the need to use the word "progressive." When used to describe a meal, it normally means that each course is eaten somewhere else, be it a home or restaurant. Though each course will be prepared by a different chef, it will be served in the same location to the same people sitting at the same table. Or will it? Perhaps, being that the diners are Olympic athletes, the chefs will be chasing them up and down the aisles while doing backflips? While that might be fun, it would smack too much of that terrible season filmed in Texas, specifically the episode in which the chefs were made to source ingredients while riding a bike around the Alamo in 110 degree heat. Ugh. Coincidentally, the finale that year was made to recreate the 2010 Winter Olympics, replete with events such as the biathlon (with guns!), cooking in a moving ski gondola, and the newest and perhaps most dangerous event, hacking ingredients frozen into a block of ice with an icepick. God, I hated that season.

And I digress yet again.

After the chefs ooh and aah over the delicate meal, Melissa gets to use her advantage. She chooses which course she wants before assigning the rest. But she's nice. Rather than stick her competitors with something they might not want, she attempts to match them to their strengths. Better to win (or lose) against strong competition. The bonus for this week's winner is a trip to the 2020 Olympics! Or wait...2021. (2022?) Much better than Gregory's prize of several weeks ago--a trip to his living room to watch the new Trolls movie while on a Zoom meeting with Nini, his date for the event.

The courses shake out like this:

1st course Sakizuke (app) - Bryan
2nd course Owan (soup) - Malarkey
3rd course Yakimono (grilled) - Karen
4th course Mushimono (steamed) - Melissa
5th course Shokuji (rice) - Gregory
6th course Mizumono (dessert) - Stephanie

This kind of thing seems particularly up Bryan's alley. His restaurant, Volt, in Frederick, Maryland, used to serve a 21-course meal called Table 21, a bargain at $120 per person. (Currently Chef's Counter is 15 courses for $150.) It's been 10 years since I ate Bryan's Voltaggio-style kaiseki, and if we ever get out of this pandemic (and if Volt is able to reopen), I think it's high time to experience it again. Mostly to see Bryan frown at me repeatedly while threatening me with tweezers. (Let me have my fantasy, ok?)

The cheftestants then hit up Whole Foods for a late night shopping trip (it's dark outside).

It's so dark that Malarkey calls Bryan by his brother's name. Though they have the same coloring, I don't think the two resemble each other all that much.

The next day, the chefs head to the iconic LA Coliseum. IIRC, the word "iconic" was bandied about a lot this week. It may even been used correctly. As they cook, the judges (including Nilou Motamed in place of lookalike Gail Simmons and both Nakayamas) arrive with athletes like gymnast Nastia Liukin and beach volleyball player Kerri Walsh Jennings. Bryan serves his scallop crudo dish first to many compliments. Malarkey, Karen, Melissa, and Gregory have all done something displeasing, be it a lack of acid or seasoning or an errant bit of crab shell. Stephanie is then roundly praised for her panna cotta served in a lemon.

Back in the kitchen, Padma announces that the unanimous winner of the challenge is Stephanie. Surprise! After Bryan looks sad, they tell him that they also loved his dish, which seems to mollify the loss. The two of of them are told to stand to the side as the remaining four chefs are scolded for their mistakes. Malarkey's celery root overwhelmed his dish. Karen's duck was unevenly cut and the skin should have been crisp. Melissa's chawanmushi was delicious but there were bits of shell. And Gregory's dish was a festival of bland.

You can probably tell that I ran out of steam while writing about the Quickfire. I think that happens every week. Please let me know if you want me to cut the narrative there and add more to the Elimination section of the recap. I might not do it, but at least I know.

Karen is out. Time to face Kevin (and apparently everyone else left) in Last Chance Kitchen.

Next week: something something almost over something.

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!

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Top Chef Season 17 All Stars Recap - Episode Nine

Happy Friday, readers! How are you all doing? It's sunny and warm in Baltimore today, quite the change from the overnight lows in the 30s earlier in the week. I've been eating too many carbs recently and feel like a dead cow floating down the Ganges. I'm trying to break a diet plateau, and I hope my month of near-excess does the trick. I'm sure you will see me complain here if it doesn't. (Hopefully that will not put you off coming back to read future recaps!)

This week's episode of Top Chef has a wee bit of Girl Power in it. No, none of the Spice Girls make appearances. No celebrities at all, actually. Instead, we get season 16 winner Kelsey Barnard Clark playing the role of Quickfire guest judge. TBH, Kelsey was the chef I least wanted to win last season. Hunky Eric was my first choice, then Sara. I only watched the finale, but that was enough to make me root for the other cheftestants. No explanations. I'm just putting it out there because this is my blog and I can. Another Top Chef winner, Brooke Williamson, is the guest judge for the Elimination Challenge. Are they hinting at a female winner this season? (Melissa, methinks.) Not-So-Fun Fact: there have only been five female Top Chefs out of 16 seasons of the regular show, 2 of Just Desserts, 1 of Duels, and 5 of Masters.

The clock at the Top Chef Mansion shows that it's 5am and the cameras are already being intrusive. We see Gregory wiping sleep out of his eyes while he's still in bed, and Bryan disembarking from his top bunk, sadly fully clothed. The chefs sit down to breakfast and there are complaints about the coffee. Bryan apologizes, as it's his fault. He's apparently still mopey about his friend Kevin's departure after Restaurant Wars. Bryan suddenly gets up and walks toward the other side of the room and pretends to discover an envelope on a side table.

Director: "Ok, Bryan, go over to the little table by the fireplace and pick up the note."
Bryan: "What's my motivation? Why would I suddenly walk across the room?"
Director: "Um, maybe you need more coffee?"
Bryan: "But the coffee pot is in the other room. I should know--I made coffee this morning, and everyone hated it." [bursts into tears]

Maybe it didn't go down like that. Or maybe it did.

Right, the note. It was from me. "Meet me downstairs in 15. Bring your speedo. Don't tell the other chefs. xo"  I lie. It was actually from Padma, announcing that the cheftestants would be attending "summer camp." Why did I put "summer camp" in quotes? If you remember Malarkey's ranked list of chefs from Episode 5, you might recall that it was dated "9 24 19." Considering that each episode takes roughly two days, and hoping that the producers give the chefs a day off now and again, today's episode was filmed in the first days of October. Regardless (or irregardless, if you're not particularly bright), the general response to the thought of going to camp with Padma was, "um, no thanks." Malarkey prefers to cook indoors, in the city. Lee Anne is suffering from PTSD from her brief appearance on Top Chef Colorado (season 15) in which she had to hike in the snow and suffer altitude sickness. Despite not really wanting to go, the chefs have no choice. They pack warm clothes, load into two of their sponsorship mobiles, and hit the road.

According to Google Maps, their destination is about 90 miles east of Los Angeles, or three days of driving in LA traffic + an hour once they leave the city. Once they arrive, they realize that something is very wrong. It's no ordinary "summer camp!" It's a special Vacation Bible Camp! But before the cheftestants get to have some good clean fun, they have to pass the Quickfire Challenge. Each chef needs to create a grilled dish with show sponsor Bush's canned beans. To make the challenge even more fragrant, the winner will receive $10K and a lifetime supply of Beano. I don't know about you, but I find grilling beans to be exceptionally difficult. They keep falling through the grates....

The chefs use all the varieties of Bush's beans, from seasoned baked to plain varieties. Most choose to do things that are bean-forward, but not our Bryan. He is his own worst enemy this season. Rather than cook a meal that fits the challenge, he tends to cook something that fits with his particular fiddly, tweezer-needing, style of cuisine. His dishes are always amazing, because he is an amazing chef. Also cute. But his good looks aren't enough to make the judges forget that he has never quite seemed to fulfill the challenge. At least not the Quickfire. So it goes this time, as Bryan's bean-juice-marinated meat is on the bottom with Stephanie's weird veggie burger and Melissa's under-filled fried pies. The top toques are Karen, Gregory, and Lee Anne, who laments that she has never won a Quickfire. Until now, that is, with her bean empanada. She plans put the 10K prize toward her wedding expenses, mostly catering.

Padma then tells the cheftestants that they are not the only guests at the camp! There is also a gang of  mommies from all over the country there to drink copious amounts of wine and bitch about their husbands. GIRL POWER! And also Jesus. And because these wenches need sustenance to go with their booze and bitterness, they will be provided brunch. And Bibles. The lucky cheftestants will be providing said brunch; each of them will be responsible for 2 items, each feeding 200 mouths.

But first, the chefs get to play. I mean, prepare their souls for everlasting life and denounce the evils of the world.

After changing into camp-branded apparel, the cheftestants are first made to sit through a lecture on the sinfulness of tattoos, homosexuality, eating shellfish, and worst of all, wearing garments made from a cotton/poly blend. Like chef's coats. They are then made to zipline over a local wildfire to show them just how hot Hell can be.

Afterward, they grill Field Roast plant-based sausages for supper--because pork is evil--and go to bed, boys in one cabin, girls in another. Meanwhile, the mommies are singing Christian karaoke downstairs until 3am.

Just a couple hours later, the chefs pull out their earplugs and prepare for a morning of scrounging ingredients and cooking for the 200+ hungry mouths that at exactly 9am will descend on them like a plague of locusts. There is no Whole Foods near Camp Killmenow, so the cheftestants must use whatever ingredients happen to be in the larder. I imagined SPAM, Twinkies, Wonder Bread, Dinty Moore beef stew, pasteurized process cheese food slices wrapped in clingfilm, more canned beans, and myriad other things that the average camper eats in this great land of ours, and was pleasantly surprised to see that there were also fresh ingredients like spinach and eggs, too.

There's only 4 hours for the chefs to plan dishes, choose ingredients, and cook. Melissa says it's like "straight-up Hunger Games." Malarkey decides he's going to make "sharkshuky," though there's neither fish nor the letter R in that dish. A lack of tomato products makes him change course for something with shrimp, proving that the temptation of Evil is hard to resist.

While the chefs are cooking, Tom comes in for his Sniff N Sneer with Brooke Williamson. She's had some sort of work done. Her hair is definitely highlighted, but maybe also face and/or lip fillers? I can't understand why attractive people do that to themselves. Before long, they slide down that slippery slope into Real Housewives territory. It's probably not a coincidence that both shows are on Bravo.

Someone should revamp Leviticus to mention Polymethyl methacrylate and silicone.

Shortly, the Karens mommies flood into the dining hall and start fighting over bottles of champagne. They all need a little hair of the dog to help combat the wine they drank while caterwauling to Amy Grant and MercyMe. (Don't judge. Jesus drank wine.) The chefs are waiting for them, set up like lunch ladies beyond the buffet, ready to serve and explain their dishes. The judges get in line with the rest of the crowd. There is some squealing when the mommies get to meet Lee Anne, and even more squealing when they spot Bryan there, too. Hands off, ladies! He's mine.

The highlights of the meal were Bryan's carrot salad and Karen's corn cake. Gregory had originally intended to put eggs in his dish of mushrooms and tomatoes, but realized that eggs for 200 would be impossible to pull off. The judges loved his swap of spinach. They also like Stephanie's "breakfast salad" and her biscuits. Everything else was crap. Well, not crap. Malarkey's steak was pretty ok, but his shrimp and chorizo soup was bland and the overcooked shrimp were sure to invoke the wrath of God Almighty. Melissa's romaine and grapefruit salad landed her on the bottom along with Malarkey, and neither of Lee Anne's dishes--an accidentally steamed berry clafoutis and dense donuts--were going to get her into Heaven.

I was feeling the girl power of this episode (also Jesus) until Bryan was declared the winner. I mean, yeah, he finally won a challenge this season, but it also threw the theme I was planning to use in my recap under the bus. Also, he has tattoos! To make matters worse, Lee Anne was the eliminated chef. Clearly her dishes weren't half as sinful as Malarkey's shrimp!

Next week: the remaining 6 cheftestants must create a 6 course progressive Kaiseki meal for Olympic athletes. Which would be great, if any of them knew anything about Japanese food....

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!

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Top Chef Season 17 All Stars Recap - Episode Eight

Woo...it's the week we've all been waiting for!

Week Eight!

Wait, I mean...Restaurant Wars!

But let's start with Week Eight. How has that been for all of you? Have you retained your sanity? Are you working or not? How much eating and drinking are you doing during our enforced staycation? I'm spending a lot of money on takeout and delivery and booze, but I'm also cooking. Not a lot. I can't work a grueling tough boring 8 hours and then be expected to put a hot and delicious meal on the table. And it has to be delicious. I have never been and never will be a person who relies on a lot of convenience foods (not counting canned goods like beans, tomatoes, clams, tuna). Things you won't find in my pantry: instant ramen; mac and cheese in a box; Ragu; hamburger "helper." Hey, if you can't or won't cook, I guess you eat that stuff. But I can't deal with the salt content. Also, I have pretty mad cooking skillz and prefer to do things from scratch. The coming weekend's meals will include Mr Minx's amazing meatloaf which I plan to supplement with a side of caramelized cabbage, and homemade 4-cheese mac and cheese (we have so much cheese!) though I haven't decided if it will be the stovetop type or the baked kind (leaning toward the latter). What you will find in my pantry: 6 kinds of fancy French mustard; various gluten-free baking products (thanks to a partnership with Bob's Red Mill); nuts and seeds; tons of chocolate and booze. Reading that sentence over again I realize those ingredients would make one hell of a Chopped basket. "Your basket contains tarragon dijon, gluten free brownie mix, chia seeds, and Lyon Rock N Rum!"

Now on to the tasks at hand: using more colons and semi-colons; writing about Restaurant Wars!

Normally, the team leaders and restaurant concepts are decided in a Quickfire; this season that work was completed in a prior episode. Last week we saw that Kevin and Gregory won with their concepts. This week they put them in action. But first: choosing teams.

Stephanie Izard is still hanging around. She's so tiny, she barely comes up to Padma's shoulder. She claims she has to see how this thing ends.

Kevin and Gregory draw knives to see who gets first choice of their hopefully champion dodge ball team. It's Kevin, who smartly chooses Bryan (he'd be my first pick, too). He tells us that they were in season 6 together and promised to support each other into the finale this season. Gregory looks over the remaining chefs and chooses....Malarkey. Padma is surprised.

I think everyone at home did, too. Melissa was the clear choice here, and Kevin snatches her in the next round. Gregory then takes Lee Anne, Kevin picks Karen, and Gregory is left with Stephanie.

Padma then asks which contestants had been on Restaurant Wars-winning teams in the past; I was surprised to see Stephanie raise her hand. I had thought that her only time on Top Chef was during the ridiculous two-week time-wasting "qualifying" round before Top Chef Season 10 Seattle started in earnest. However, she had also appeared in Season 11, coming in 7th place. Mea culpa. We stopped watching after Season 10.

The teams are told that the winners will get 40K, which is exciting. They first need to plan their menu and design their spaces, which is also exciting. Ingredients are to be procured at Food 4 Less and 7-11, and the decor from Target and Bob's Discount Furniture. Not so exciting. They drive to their respected spaces, matching empty concrete bunkers in DTLA, to plan. Exciting?

Malarkey and Karen volunteer to be front-of-the-house. It's a thankless job, and I don't know why anyone would volunteer to do it for Restaurant Wars. Not only are they responsible for cooking something, but they also have to coordinate the assembly of the restaurant and train the waitstaff. And they have to deal with guests, which of course is the worst thing, because people are hell.

Most of the episode is boring. There's a tiny bit of drama at Target after Malarkey picks out the same melamine plates as Kevin. Kevin gets bleeped and Malarkey apologizes but doesn't mean it.

Gregory decides against making the same oxtail dish as last week, though he keeps a whole fish on the menu. Kevin plans on country captain as his main again, but with approximately 478 side dishes, the thought of which make his crew roll their eyes. Cuz of course they'll be making them.

Both Malarkey and Karen had a real chore setting up the restaurant. We see Malarkey screwing legs onto tables, etc. It's a good thing they didn't have to shop at Ikea. Karen got a late start with setting up her place. I can't imagine why. The two dishes she was preparing for the restaurant were pretty minor.

Speaking of dishes, what did they serve?

Kann
Fried green plantains, salt cod patties, pikliz (Stephanie)
Mixed salad with habanero-lime dressing (Lee Anne)
Twice-cooked pork, stewed chicken, white rice, kidney bean sauce (Gregory)
Whole roasted red snapper (Malarkey)
Pineapple upside-down cake with rum raisin ice cream (Lee Anne)

The Country Captain
Trio of canapes: Chicken liver mousse on brioche (Melissa); Smoked trout puff with caviar and crab louie (both Bryan)
Main course of Country Captain with yellow rice (Kevin) served with  hasselback potato in raclette (Melissa); dilly beans, shrimp and grits, cucumber pickles (Bryan); Madeira glazed mushrooms, and red pepper relish (Karen)
Dessert: warm banana pudding (Kevin)

Honestly, I don't think they get enough time to get their shit together to produce a really stellar meal and design a restaurant experience on top of it. But nobody wants my opinion. After a quick 2 hours of cooking on day 2, the restaurants are open and guests flood in. There are to be 100 of them in 4 hours. Kann's first seating seems to go well, Malarkey appears to be nervous but keeps things moving. There's a bit of squabbling in the kitchen between expediter Lee Anne and the waitstaff, but eventually food does get served. The Country Captain, on the other hand looks like a total meltdown. There are just too many dishes to prepare, and except for the canapes and dessert, everything needs to go out at the same time. There's confusion as to which table already had canapes and who was next. There's a crowd forming out front for the second seating. Karen claims that the first seating just isn't leaving, but it's likely because it took so long for food to come out in the first place.

The judges eat at Kann first and leave pretty happy, despite an initial waiting period for food. There's no oxtail, but everything else is delicious. Then they go next door and notice the people milling about. Luckily, they seem to get a table right away. Maybe not luckily, they get to eat soon too. Not all of the food is delicious. The Country Captain is clearly different from the previous version, and not as good. Bryan's shrimp and grits is substantial enough to serve as a second entree rather than as an accompaniment. Karen's mushrooms suck. And Gail takes umbrage with the texture of the bananas in Kevin's dessert. The judges also notice that Kevin doesn't bother to come out to say hi, though Gregory had.

Judges Table: They waste no time in declaring Kann the winner. Not only do the cheftestants win 40K, but each of them gets a year subscription to OpenTable services for their restaurants.

The judges opine that The Country Captain served too many dishes. The mushrooms sucked. The canapes all had the same texture. Dessert seemed too dry. They want to know why Kevin shouldn't be sent home right then, and he throws himself on the sword. He takes blame for all of his restaurant's issues and Padma tells him to pack his knives.

Kevin next gets to compete against Nini in Last Chance Kitchen while hunky Eric perches on a stool and watches. He'll probably be back. Kevin that is, sadly not Eric.

Next time: dunno. The preview was confusing. Couldn't tell if it was for the next episode, or for the next several. Also, the finale will be filmed in Europe. Bryan says he already has his plane ticket. Hope he has one for me! No wait...we're still stuck at home for the foreseeable future....

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!

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Top Chef Season 17 All Stars Recap - Episode Seven

Welcome back, faithful readers (all three of you)! I have watched another episode of Top Chef and toiled over a fabulously decently almost kinda entertaining recap to keep your mind off of the shit going on in the world, if only for five minutes. Nobody will get sick in our little Top Chef world, and more importantly, nobody will die. Though some people might not cook too well, and someone will definitely be eliminated.

Before I begin, I'd love to get to know you a little better. After all, you're reading my writing, and I have no idea who you are. Well, I know John and Dave and Lara. Wait, that's all three of you! Never mind then....

Let us proceed then to the Top Chef Kitchen, where Padma is wearing a skin-tight yellow dress, looking like a giant and very exotic banana with boobs, and standing near an imposing pile of wooden crates. Before she introduces the Quickfire Challenge, she mentions Last Chance kitchen. If you remember--that is, if you haven't done so much covid-era boozing that you still have brain cells left--Tom whipped on his chef's coat after the Elimination Challenge last week and declared the immediate start of Last Chance Kitchen. All of the previously eliminated chefs entered the room at that time, I guess to fake out those folks at home who aren't watching the web series. Nini and Karen, who were victims of a double elimination, must face both each other and current LCK winner, Lisa, and make a well-balanced sweet and salty dish. Nini comes out on top, which forces Lisa out. There is then a second battle between Nini and Karen, in which they make a "family meal" style dish. Karen is the winner of that challenge, which puts her back into the main Top Chef competition. Nini remains behind to battle the next eliminated chef. All of this to say that Padma brings out Karen to join the other chefs; last week's "double elimination" was actually only a complicated single elimination.

Padma then introduces the guest judge for the Quickfire--actor Danny Trejo, who happens to love food and cooking and who owns three locations of Trejo's Tacos and one of Trejo's Coffee & Donuts. The cheftestants must create a perfect taco to appease Danny so he doesn't go all Machete on them.. But here's the catch: the only cutting implement they can use is....can we get some dramatic music please! Dun dun DUN! The top create is opened to reveal machetes, one for each chef. Duh. You forgot about those crates already, didn't you?

Cheftestants do the usual scurrying/elbowing each other out of the way thing to grab ingredients. For some odd reason, everyone but two chefs grab fish as their protein. Yuk. Honestly, I've only ever eaten one fish taco that I've enjoyed, and that was the skate taco at Mission Cantina in NYC. I find them to be bland and uninteresting. If you like 'em, that's fine. I prefer pretty much any other meat (except chicken, which is usually either dry and flavorless or just flavorless). The exceptions are Kevin, who makes a spin on al pastor. Instead of pineapple, he uses bananas, no doubt inspired by Padma. He also uses store-bought tortillas, while everyone else seems to be making their own. It's all rather ambitious for a typical 30-minute Quickfire, and Kevin's no dummy. Stephanie apparently isn't either. She sees everyone else going for fish so she grabs some ground lamb. Now, she's never made a lamb taco, but how hard can it be? At least she doesn't have to mince it with her machete.

Speaking of machetes, some folks are having a little difficulty using the giant knife. Meanwhile, Bryan is doing fancy French knife cuts. He's slicing an avocado in wafer-thin slices like it's nothing. I have no doubt that with more time he'd tourne potatoes and brunoise onions, too.

Time is over and Gregory can barely get his clumsy handmade tortilla filled with fish and odd dried chile salsa before Padma and Danny come over to taste. Not only is his tortilla a mess, his taco is just too salty. Lee Ann's battered fish taco has a cheese-crusted tortilla, which Trejo enjoys. Eric fills his tortilla with what looks to be a mere tablespoon of his rockfish and chorizo concoction, and that's no bueno. Padma and Danny continue to bob their heads and grimace at each chef in turn, enthusiastic over Karen's vaguely Korean-esque fish taco and loving Stephanie's rebellious lamb creation. Surprisingly, Stephanie, who has never won anything ever (in her season, she was eliminated in a dastardly and completely unnecessary pre-competition competition) gets the nod and the last immunity of the season.

Whew. That seemed like a lot of words, huh? I'm tired of typing. I think I am going to find a snack. No! Not a liquid one! It's only 10:40am, for shit's sake! Honestly, we've been eating mostly healthy food over the last 7 weeks, and while we're drinking alcohol, we're not drinking more than 3-4 times per week and never more than one drink. I tell you, we're angels. Except for the amounts of pizza I've been putting away. Hey - I'm supporting local, non-chain, restaurants!

Ok, back from the snack. Fresh blueberries and pineapple, thank you very much. I love fruit, and it satisfies my mouth full of sweet teeth.

Padma mentions Restaurant Wars, which makes the cheftestants excited. "Restaurant Wars is...next week." Awww... This week, however, they're trying something new. The cheftestants are going to develop their own pitch for a restaurant, with mood boards and dishes to be presented to the judges.

Speaking of judges, this week's special guest is Top Chef Season 4 winner Stephanie Izard and restaurateur Kevin Boehm. They've opened many successful restaurants between them and are uniquely qualified to determine which cheftestant presents the best ideas. Unlike Padma and Gail, who haven't opened restaurants. The two best pitches will be the themes for Restaurant Wars, and the crappiest will send its creator home.

First the chefs need to do some arts and crafts. They head back to the Top Chef Mansion where they find fabric samples, random plates and cutlery (though sadly no machetes), poster paint, stickers, and big tubs of glitter. Within a few minutes, the chefs are beadazzling all of the food in the fridge and fingerpainting the countertops. Well, in my fantasy version they are. In actuality, they are seriously considering their dream restaurant concepts. Except Stephanie, who is a personal chef with no dreams of opening her own place. Kevin, Bryan, and Malarkey are old hands at this, having opened approximately 274 restaurants between them, the vast majority of which belong to Malarkey. For some bizarre reason, many of his restaurants are named after fabrics: Searsucker (sic) was first, followed by Herringbone, Corduroy, Gingham, Burlap, Gabardine, Pleather, Doubleknit, Spandex, Quiana, Kevlar, and Chiengora.

After shopping, the cheftestants get to their cubbies in the TC Kitchen and prepare dishes that would represent those offered in their dream restaurants. While they're cooking, Padma, Tom, Gail, Stephanie, and Kevin Boehm wander through and take their seats at the Altar of Judgement. Tom must have been playing with small children recently, because he states, "look at all the num-nums."

First we see Kevin's restaurant, The Country Captain, named after the famous southern curried chicken dish. He prepared a version of the namesake dish using braised and roasted chicken. The judges all murmur appreciatively. Next up is Eric, who everyone can clearly see is in the weeds and needs help from Bryan and Lee Anne. His concept is called Middle Passage and he seeks to express the African diaspora through food. Sadly, he offers overcooked duck, oversalted broth, and just plain bad technique. Gregory's concept is Kann, after the Haitian name for sugar cane (and pronounced the same way), and he serves oxtail and a whole fish, both of which look amazing. Bryan sets up his board and I can see the concept is Thatcher and the Rye. Immediately I know that it's named after his son, Thatcher. Is it creepy that I know the name of his son? Is it worse that I know he also has two daughters, Piper and Ever? Okay then. He wants the restaurant to be everyday accessible Mid-Atlantic cuisine, but as per usual his food is on the fine dining end of the scale.

(The book is Catcher IN the Rye, so the name doesn't really work.)

Karen's Three Black Crowes serves modern dim sum, though the judges feel her dishes skew more Italian than Asian. The judges aren't feeling the food at Lee Anne's Hanai Mama--one dish was too salty and the other not seasoned enough. Also what differentiates her concept from other Hawaiian restaurants? (Because there are Hawaiian restaurants everywhere, right?) Stephanie named Lucy C's after her dog, and serves food that she should have just given to the dog like salmon pate and schnitzel. The judges joke that she should have named her place "Immunity," short for "Good Thing I Have Immunity, Otherwise I'd Be Out of Here." Malarkey thought the concept he invented during the Quickfire - Baja Asian street food - would sell well to Millennials. He then reveals that the restaurant is named in honor of Shrek--Donkey and Dragon, or D2. The dude is wacky, but he does have a LOT of ideas. Finally, Melissa serves up Sabrina, named after her grandmother, featuring Modern Asian California cuisine like ahi tuna and corn agnolotti, which the judges agree was the best-crafted dish of the day.

Last week there were two losers, and this week there will be two winners. Malarkey makes it to the top with D2, as does Melissa with Sabrina, but the two concepts that will be going on to next week's Restaurant Week battle are Kevin's Country Captain and Gregory's Kann.

On the bottom are Stephanie, who has immunity and is therefore safe, Lee Anne, and Eric. Neither had a strong concept, and Eric's seemed confused. His food fell short as well, and he was sent to Last Chance Kitchen to battle Nini.

Next week: Considering I mentioned it a few times already in this post, you should already know that it will be Restaurant Wars!

* Any products in this post that are mentioned by name may have been provided to Minxeats by the manufacturer. However, all opinions belong to Minxeats. Amazon links earn me $! Please buy!

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Top Chef Season 17 All Stars Recap - Episode Six

We're at the end of Week 6, both of Top Chef and of attempting to "flatten the curve." I've been teleworking with a heavier workload than usual and my hands are sore and my right arm is achy. I am not feeling this recap at all, mostly because I have to type it. Ouch. But, as they say, the show must go on.

When the Top Cheftestants enter the TC Kitchen, they find Padma with Chris Bianco, "one of America's greatest pizza masters." But no, this isn't a pizza challenge. It's a flour challenge. For this Quickfire, each chef must create a dish that uses any of several alternative flours, but not all-purpose wheat flour. There is no immunity for the winner, but he or she does get $5000.

The chefs somehow manage to choose different flours. Melissa takes almond while Bryan takes Hazelnut and rye. Gregory uses tapioca, Malarky attempts coconut, Lee Anne buckwheat, and Stephanie blue corn. Nini is smart and chooses rice flour, which is used in Vietnamese dishes. Karen uses garbanzo flour. Eric and Kevin are the only repeats, with their choice of cornmeal. Eric also uses cassava flour.

Malarkey attempts to make ice cream again, and he hopes to serve with it donuts. Coconut flour is essentially ground-up fiber; I think it would be like baking with extra fine mulch. Which is kinda what it ended up looking like. He tells Padma and Chris to close their eyes and pretend he's got a fabulous dish, but they're not fooled. At least his ice cream came out well this time.

What we'd love to hear Padma say someday soon.

Of course he's on the bottom, but then so is my boy Bryan. Voltaggio made a crumble with hazelnut and rye and olives  that he put on fish, which he also served on a pretty green sauce Though it was delicious, Padma and Chris didn't think that the flour portion of the dish was in the forefront. Poor Bryan.

Clever Melissa made the little French almond cakes called financiers with her almond flour. Nini also made something that is customarily made with an alternate flour--Vietnamese crepes, or banh xeo. Padma and Chris enjoyed both, but gave the win to Gregory for his light and delicious tapioca pancakes.

For the Elimination Challenge, the cheftestants will help celebrate the 100th season of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra. Or the "LA Phil," as Padma called it. Do they really call it that in Los Angeles? The "Phil?" Are they trying to make it sound more hip and trendy? Or are they just too lazy to pronounce the whole word? When she said it the first time, with "Phil" coming at the end of a sentence, I thought maybe the audio had blinked out, cutting off the end of the word. My brain said, "what's the LA fill? are they celebrating a landfill? wait, is this Florida?" Padma then said something about "conductor" Gustavo Dudamel, and my brain understood that "fill" must mean "philharmonic." Which I admit is a mouthful, but damn, people. We shouldn't go around talking like Paris Hilton or Kim Kardashian or whatever piece of uneducated ass is valued by the hoi palloi these days.

The chefs draw knives, each of which is marked with the name of one of the five tastes: sweet; bitter; salty; sour; umami. They then must pair up with another chef with a differing taste in order to create one dish that blends both. Nini and bff Karen get together with a umami/sour pairing. Gregory and Stephanie are working with salty and sour. Lee Anne and Malarkey (who seem like mortal enemies at this point, yet they are so much alike) must work with umami and bitter. Kevin and Melissa must make a dish that sings with salty and sweet. Finally Eric and Bryan are sweet and bitter. And hot and hotter.

Once the cheftestants are paired up, Padma gleefully surprises them with the announcement that this contest will end in a double elimination. Yowza. Those are never fun. Nini reminisces that she was booted last season as part of a double elimination. Maybe "reminisces" is not the right word. In any case, the chefs are then told they're heading to the Walt Disney Concert Hall for inspiration. There, they'll not listen to music, but will be lectured on the subject by Dudamel. After this, they'll shop, and the next day will cook at Timothy Hollingsworth's restaurant, Otium.

In the WDCH, Melissa remarks that the ceiling looks like cabbage. I'm not seeing it. The whole structure is a modern fantasy, the exterior resembling a grouping of random objects clustered together. The interior is all beige and brown curves, with a gigantic pipe organ that looks like an lumber accident waiting to happen at the Home Depot, or a handful of giant pick-up sticks that had been frozen in mid-drop. Or enormous french fries. The ceiling does not resemble cabbage.

Just before the cheftestants head to Whole Foods to spend their $700 per pair, there's a commercial for Perdue Chicken in which Jim Perdue, via cell phone selfie video, thanks everyone from farmers to shelf stockers. “Folks who are rarely seen, even more rarely thanked, yet they’re always there when we need them the most." Yeah, this is probably all the shelf stockers, cashiers, etc., who are helping us purchase food during this time, will be getting. Lord knows there won't be a raise in their futures, not for merely putting their lives on the line.

The chefs go wild at the grocery store. Lee Anne snatches all of the endive before Eric can get his hot hands on them. Unperturbed, Bryan says something about having plans B and C, so substituting ingredients is no biggie. Malarkey, however, isn't as calm as his namesake. Shopping with him is like shopping "with a monkey on crack," according to Chef Wong.

Nini and Karen put their hands all over some fish.

One of the elements of Bryan's and Eric's dish is a peanut-based sauce called maafe that they plan to use to "lacquer" their pork loin. Bryan opines that the sauce sounds like something "I want to lacquer all over me." Me too, Bryan. All over you, that is.

Once at Otium, chefs scramble for places on which to set up. Cooking goes fairly quickly before Gregory and Stephanie present their first dish, a sour/salty melange of sea bass glazed with miso, mirin, and sake, with sauteed celeriac, pickled apples, bacon, and yuzu. The judges love it, saying every element is both salty and sour. Kevin and Melissa then bring out their sweet and salty roasted ceiling...I mean...cabbage, with fish sauce caramel, apple, and cured pork crumble. It is a simple dish that brings a "bang of flavor" to Padma's mouth. Sparring partners Lee Anne and Malarkey, who battled over every ingredient that made their plate, please the judges with their umami/bitter combo of beef with miso anchovy hollandaise, bitter greens, charred orange puree, and a mimolette crisp. the dish is pretty but neither overwrought nor over-thought, which is typical of both chefs. Bryan and Eric then present their sweet/bitter dish of pork with maafe lacquer and bitter greens. Gail says the dish is subtle and focused, but could use more sweetness. Tom says the way the pork was sliced threw off the ratio of meat (too much) to lacquer (not enough). Finally, Karen and Nini serve the judges a umami/sour dish of tomato broth with poached cod and pickled cucumbers. It's not a particularly attractive dish, though Tom thinks it's beautiful. He says it reads sweet and sour, not sweet and umami. He then says the tomatoes should have been roasted rather than compressed and served raw. That tomato umami needs to be brought out via cooking.

Despite quibbles here and there, the judges admit that the whole meal was pretty amazeballs and that it would be difficult to eliminate anyone, much less two chefs. They'd be going home for making fantastic food. But rather than pulling a Project Runway and deciding not to kick anyone off, they make a decision and go with it. Kevin and Melissa's cabbage dish is declared the winner. Gregory and Stephanie and Lee Anne and Malarkey are declared safe, leaving Bryan/Eric and Nini/Karen on the bottom.

Poor Bryan must be getting a real complex this season (the hardest ever, he says) being on the bottom all the time. He should take comfort, well, a tiny bit anyway, that his dishes were all really delicious. He just might not have followed directions to the letter.

In the end, the judges determine that Nini and Karen missed the mark with their raw tomato, and they are sent directly into Last Chance Kitchen. Karen is too tired for this shit. She has to battle Nini. The winner then goes after Lisa, who beat Jenn in last week's episode.

Next week: machetes! skinny Stephanie Izard! Shrek?

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