Lee also goes the couscous route with a braised sculpin fish over the boring style of couscous served with the broth he braised the fish in. The critics tuck in, have a few bites, and send Lee away. Barbara Fairchild finds everything tasty and loves the broth. Jeffrey points out that you really can't taste the fish. Tanya decries the lack of contrasting textures. If only he had used a more exciting brand of couscous.
Sheetal heads out to face the critics, fretting that her dish is too salty. She should be more concerned that it looks unpleasant -- a red glob of sauce covering the fish to green bits of cauliflower. It's the world's most unappetizing Christmas decoration. But what do the food critics think of the tomato curry sculpin filet with curried romesco? Barbara isn't too pleased with the bones in her fish. But at least the curry powder isn't overwhelming. You'd hate to disguise those bones with too much curry.
And then there's Sharone. "I feel like I'm such a better chef than the rest of them," he says into the camera. He's certainly chattier, as he apparently tells the food critics his life story while serving them his spring asparagus citrus salad with grilled sculpin and that oh-so-tricky seared sculpin liver. "It's the foie gras of the seas," Jeffrey tells his more dubious colleagues. Once Sharone's gone -- presumably to prepare his 20-minute soliloquy -- Barbara remarks that she's surprised by how bland the dish is. And if the liver is the foie gras of the sea, it's not particularly good foie gras. Tough to guess how this one will shake out.
Gordon and crew are back with the food critics' scores. They'll start off with the highest-scoring dish. "That individual will go straight through to the final four," Gordon points out. As will whoever has the second- and third-highest scoring dish, though they'll presumably have to sweat it out a bit more. Anyhow, the highest score is 11.5 -- that's out of 12, by the way -- and it belongs to David. He responds by simultaneously twirling and whooping. I like to think Joel Robuchon celebrates his positive reviews the same way.
Let's switch gears and find out who had the worst score and caused the critics to write things like "badly put together," "underseasoned," and "shockingly disgusting." In other words, it was not better than Cats, and they will not be seeing it again and again. Come on down, Sharone -- you have the lowest scoring dish with a paltry 4 out of 12 score. Yet another promising culinary career cut down in its prime by fish liver.