By Keckler
Starting off at the Redondo Beach Farmers' Market, the cheftestants are told that the turning up of the heat on their Quickfire will actually be turning down the heat. That's right, it's all raw! Gasps galore, because apparently none of them has ever eaten a salad. Secretly, I'm convinced the task was raw because it was yet another typical day with those Krapmore appliances. During the Quickfire, Michael gave me a reverse smoke beer neti when he bitched about Frank's prepping, "he's humping some gorilla on his prep table or something." Even though Marcel used words like "forte" and "soingé," he won Immunity with a watermelon trio that included a watermelon "steak."Throughout the episode, Frank spends a lot of time ragging on Michael, calling him his "dumb little brother" and saying that he couldn't cook his way out of a paper bag unless it had French fries in it. I don't quite follow it either. Maybe it has something to do with the carrot and the horse. Frank's stupid metaphors are always stupid. To be fair though, Michael does manage to forget his eggs during the breakfast-themed Elimination Challenge.
Starting off the challenge, the cheftestants are told only that they will be cooking for athletes and they will be cooking breakfast. They have to shop and plan for the challenge without even knowing what the kitchen setup will be like. Very early in the morning, the cheftestants are plopped down on a beach where they have grated fire pits as their only means of cooking. Mia's kind of a dick about putting her skillet in Marcel's place on the fire pit and reminding us AGAIN that she cooked for cowboys, so I totally grinned when she dropped her salt in the sand. Elia ends up winning the challenge with her ham, waffle, syrup, egg, and parsley thing (which looked totally awesome), and Frank is sent home for having a totally fucked-up notion of making a quiche. Dude, you need a crust to make quiche. You need an oven to make that crust. There are no two ways about it. Why the hell would you choose to make quiche when the kitchen set-up is up in the air? Idiot. Also, scary and intense. I'm glad Frank the Bully was sent home, where he can continue blogging about himself in the third person.
Since Andy Cohen and all the other Bravo VPs don't want us discussing it, can we talk about Padmadala's outfits tonight? First of all, I loved her long green skirt with the metallic dangly detail at the waist and the girly pink tee-shirt. They both hugged her minor curves to great effect and made her look like the cover of The Official Preppy Handbook: India Edition. See? Still sexy but not a whole lot of skin that hot grease could snack on. Then, we get her out to the beach and she... lord. She has that weird psychedelically patterned head kerchief with her hair lanking down around her face -- all of which conspire to make her look like a Hell's Angel girlfriend, who is really from a wealthy family but lied about her background when she ran away with him and every so often the Hell's Angel boyfriend flips out and beats her but she read a lot of Kerouac and really just wants to travel around with him so she tolerates it until he nearly kills her but she's saved by a mysterious stranger. Wait, I think that a Quantum Leap episode. So, beyond the head kerchief, she's wearing a denim mini-skirt and a bikini. Well, they're on the beach, so the bikini would be fine were it not for the fact that Colicchio and Gail are totally bundled up AND for the fact that Padmadala is wearing a shearling vest OVER the bikini top and OVER the shearling vest, she's wearing a FULL-LENGTH cardigan. If it's that cold, why the bikini, Padmadala? WHY THE BIKINI!?
The episode opens and as usual with a morning cheftestant check in. Elia does some Pilates and says she can't let her emotions get the better of her. Aw, does that mean no more chocolate facials? I love Esthetician Elia! Son of Sam tells us, "I feel like I have a great chance at the title, I feel like people feel I'm a force." Yes, your midichlorians are off the chart. We cut over to a nearly naked Frank -- my poor husband, Mathra, thought he was really naked and yelled so loudly the cats still haven't left the safety of the bathtub -- whose upper arms are covered with (Chinese? Japanese?) characters that read, "Don't mess with Frank the Bull or you get the horny white man who tattoos himself with Asian characters and doesn't use spellcheck." Frank the Bully tells us how wonderful he is.
The cheftestants meet Padmadala at the Redondo Beach Farmers' Market, where she tells them they will be making dish of all raw ingredients. No cooking allowed. Gasps all around. Whatever, make a salad. Padmadala introduces their guest judge, Raphael Lunetta, who is a former Food & Wine Magazine favorite and is also the chef-owner of Jiraffe Restaurant. They have thirty minutes and twenty dollars to shop at the market. They have an additional thirty minutes to put their dishes together in the Krapmore Kitchens. Why even reference Krapmore when they aren't even using any of the krappy appliances? You know what I think? I think this was yet another day when the Krapmore appliances were offline, so they HAD to make everything raw. When they do get to cook, it's over a fire pit. No Krapmore there. Know how we know? The fire pits actually worked! The cheftestants shop. They all talk to us about what ingredients they're buying, but the only one worthy of reporting on is Michael telling us he doesn't eat raw food. I don't even know why I find that hysterical, but it's mostly because I don't think Michael realizes that those green stringy things he eats with Buffalo wings are raw.
Back in the Krapmores, the cheftestants flurry with their food. Betty tells the camera, "I'm keepin' mah fingers crossed, I need to pull something out. I've been on the BOTTOM for way too long!" Betty, we don't need to hear about your sex life. Five minute warning. Okay, and now for the most hysterical part of this episode. We pan over to Michael's prep station where he mutters, "Heeeey, duuddde... watch the table, man." We cut over to Frank the Bullshit (tm abbotrabbit), who appears to be grating something. Michael tells us, "I'm getting to the end, where, like, I'm plating up and Frank's working to me and he's humping some gorilla on his prep table or something, you know? Shaking everything, it's like a freaking seven-point-oh earthquake. I hope Frank goes home." Bravo's all about equal time, so we get Frank telling us, "Mike's is definitely a hack. I don't think Mike could cook his way out of a paper bag unless it had French fries with it." Whatever, dude, you were walking around the farmers' market with a black and white composition notebook like some overly-sensitive college coffee house poet. Time's up.
Betty's presents her predictably messy halibut ceviche with a Kyoho grape guacamole. She aspirates oddly and dramatically at the end of "Kyoho." Chef Lunetta thinks it's "interesting." Meaning, "You suck, and this is gross, and my god woman, why are your teeth so big and white?" Betty toots her own wrinkled horns by saying her halibut was beautiful and fresh and she went a step beyond the other cheftestants by not using produce alone. Marcel didn't like Betty's presentation at all. Mia talks about her fresh corn salad with Heirloom tomatoes, chili, avocado, and creamy lime dressing. I really want to go on a whole rant about how there is no meat or beans in her salad, so why the "chili" instead of "chile," because we drew very careful lines in the sand about that when I developed and edited a line of Williams-Sonoma cookbooks, and it actually became a punch line for jokes among the editors. Geeky jokes, to be sure, but still jokes. Why am I not going to rant? Because Merriam-Webster accepts it as a variation on "chile." Not that I put much stock in dictionaries these days, but still. We are given NO reaction from the judges on Mia's dish, so we know she's not going to win. Ted Ilan did a summer squash with tomato sauce and a walnut and almond pesto. It actually looks and sounds really tasty. Chef Lunetta thinks it would make a great appetizer.
Moving on to Cliff, the judges sample a radish, French beans, and bronze fennel salad with a tomato butter purée. Tomato butter? LOVE. Elia did some raw tuna with onions, spinach, sesame, lime, ginger, and garlic. She explains, "It's more of an Asian seasoning, but I put some olive oil and mustard into it." Lunetta proclaims it, "Delicious." Frank made a scallop carpaccio with a lemon vinaigrette and piled a salad of cucumber and radish in the middle with smoked salmon. Chef Lunetta thinks, "Presentation-wise, it's very pretty." And taste-wise? Son of Sam explains his "crudo" of zucchini and summer squash with a "quick pickle" of peaches, plums, and Kyoho grapes. Michael -- whose name, I noticed for the first time is now "Mike" in the Bravo graphics -- stones his way through his dish. He's entertaining, so let's listen in, "Here I have a, like, watermelon napoleon with, uh, avocado, cilantro, salmon jerky." The NOTpoleon falls over as Lunetta cuts into it. That doesn't bode well for this competition even though I've had the same thing happen to me at countless restaurants. I mean, they're visually appealing and then you cut into them and you make a big delicious mess. I specifically recall that happening to me with a beet and goat cheese napoleon at Chive in San Diego. The slices of beet slipped right away from the chevre layers, so I ended up using my fingers. Not pretty, still tasty.
Moving on to Marcel, we learn about his watermelon and tomato trio. Oh, the trios. He's got a watermelon "steak," which looks like an expertly cut piece of watermelon in the shape of a filet mignon, tomato carpaccio (doesn't that just mean raw and sliced thinly?), and nasturtiums and opal basil. Where's the trio? Shouldn't it be tomato and watermelon three ways? I count -- at most -- two. Oh, I see, he's got something liquid in a glass, which he just calls "a nice little refresher," so I really don't know what the hell it is. Ted Ilan sucks on a bottle of water and sneers in Marcel's direction. He tells us, "I think the watermelon steak, realistically, is kind of a silly idea. It's more like a dessert." Shut up, Ted Ilan. I still don't know why, but I don't like you. ["I like you enough for two people, Ilan! Don't worry!" -- Joe R] The judges seem to like the dish.
Padmadala gathers everyone around, and Lunetta says he was very impressed by everyone. HOWEVER, he has some critiques. He dings Betty for her messy cut of her halibut ceviche and vegetables. Betty squawks at us, "I'm CHOSEN in the BOTTOM again!" If she doesn't go soon, I'm going to have no paint left on any of my walls. Lunetta criticizes Mia for not using an heirloom tomato in her fresh corn salad. I'm confused, she supposedly did use an heirloom tomato. Is it because she didn't use the other one? What? Lunetta also didn't like how Michael's watermelon NOTpoleon fell over when he cut into it, "The thought was good, but the execution needed a little bit more depth." The top three are Elia, Frank, and Marcel. Marcel is the winner. HA on Ted Ilan! Marcel is thrilled, "My performance could not have been any more soigné." Oh. OH. Marcel? Why did you have to go and trite yourself out like that? So many chefs I've despised have overused "soigné" when talking about themselves and their kitchens. Ew. Just... no. Yuck. Stop. Ted Ilan tells us, "I think Marcel thinks more about how he's going to make his food rather than tasting it, but the chef judge seemed to like the dish and the fact that he called it a steak when it was really just a hunk of watermelon." Whatever, Ted Ilan, Marcel has immunity.
Padmadala tells them that the Elimination challenge is all about breakfast. And Padmadala, just like all television personalities can't come up with anything more original to say about breakfast other than "it's the most important meal of the day." Mia goes off to us, "I think everyone knows I'm the Queen of Breakfast. I worked as a Sunday brunch cook at a high volume restaurant, so I can spit out the breakfasts, no problem." Strange, that's just what her customers did. The cheftestants will be making breakfast for some unknown athletes after their early morning practice, and the big catch is, they have no idea what sort of kitchen equipment they will be working with when they get to the designated area. They have thirty minutes to shop and thirty dollars to spend.
The cheftestants shop. And bitch. Pretty much everyone's going for and carefully examining eggs. Michael tells us he had no idea what to do and thought about just getting some yogurt and throwing granola on top of it. However, as would happen to Michael, he was drawn to the packaged rotisserie chickens. "It's already cooked, you know what I mean?" he tells Marcel. "I was like, 'I'm gonna go with a roasted chicken breakfast taahcoh,' you know?" he asks us. The cheftestants go home and go to bed.
Around three-thirty in the morning, some of the cheftestants are up and about. The girls bond about being women in kitchens and hope the three of them are all still there at the end of the day. Elia tells us that it's hard to be respected as a woman in a kitchen. Fuck being respected as a woman, it's hard to be respected as a chef in spite of being a woman. This makes Elia want the title all the more. Oh, I want it for you, Elia! The cheftestants pack up and prepare to move out. Unfortunately, before that can happen, Marcel has to do a little kick-shuffle dance, singing, "I'm not gonna git el-im-i-nated." He calls it "The Elimination Dance." Really and truly. I'm sorry I saw that. Also, shouldn't it be called the "Immunity Dance"? Marcel's kind of stupid for all his soigné-ing and follicular feats.
The cheftestants arrive at a beach in Malibu. A lone surfboard is upended in the sand. Now, I know I don't live in LA, but the last time I saw a surfboard doing that was on The O.C. during that stupid college acceptance bonfire thing. The surfers at Ocean Beach don't seem to do that. The cheftestants survey the grated fire pits, the pots and pans, and the sand. LUAU! Well, but they probably don't have twenty-four hours. And I don't think anyone brought a whole pig. (I'm not counting Frank, mind you.) The cheftestant are chagrined. I know I already bitched about it, but I can't handle Padmadala's outfit. I don't blame her, I'm sure it was all wardrobe's fault, but the poor thing has, like, no meat on her bones -- she's gotta be so friggin' cold her nipples could bevel diamonds for Tiffany's. Padmadala explains the fire pits are their kitchens and they will be cooking for the hungry surfers "out there." She gestures at some cut-in footage of surfers. Aside from the usual sneerspects, the cheftestants will also be judged by "former pro surfer" Chef Lunetta. The cheftestants have forty-five minutes to prepare their food.
Food flurry. Mia knocks her container of salt into the sand. She annoys me later, so I'm happy about this until I realize she's probably allowed to go back for more. Cliff bitches about sand getting everywhere. Marcel and Mia jockey for space on their fire pit. From what we see, it looks like Marcel puts his skillet down and Mia just moves it completely out of the way, so she can put hers down in its place. Mia says something about it being her "area." "Dude, that's where my pan was. I put my pan down," Marcel says. "I'm gonna move it," Mia tells him, "I'm just letting you know." Well, isn't that NICE of you? Marcel tells us he wasn't sweating Mia and her musical skillets. Mia reminds us, "I cook for cowboys and I'm a professional barbecue-ologist." Like that's a real thing. Michael suddenly realizes he's forgotten his eggs. He pronounces them "aiggs." Dude's a mess. Frank smarms to us, "Mike's like my dumb little brother. I'm actually shocked Mike's gotten this far. Actually, I'm shocked Mike even got to Los Angeles." He giggles raspily. Michael shreds his chicken and hopelessly asks, "Can anyone spare an aigg? Anyone got any aiggs?" Betty feels bad for him and hands over some eggs, telling us, "Because that's what happens in a kitchen, it's a team effort." Hey, Bitchy? Where was that team effort last week when you blamed Marcel's team effort for your bombed out brûlées? Son of Sam and Cliff hand over a few aiggs as well. Michael's stoked and announces, "Versatility, baby." I do not think that word means what you think it means.
With twenty minutes remaining, Frank's plan of quiches isn't going well. "Ideally, to pull of a quiche, I would need an oven," Frank tells us. And that's where Frank's a wank. You pretty much can make quiches only in an oven. So, why the HELL would you choose to make something that was so dependant on a very specific appliance when you were told ahead of time that there was no telling what sort of appliances they would have? Remember Candice's microwaved quiche disaster? Frank has to rethink his shit. Just make a frittata. Seagulls swoop in and start pecking at Frank's ruined crust. "THE SEAGULLS! THE SEAGULLS!" Betty bawls out. SHUT UP!
Elia tells us she's making a waffle concoction with syrup, melted cheese, fried egg, honey, and olive oil. "It tastes really good," she assures the cameras. Mia tells us, "Surfers, you know, they love the ocean, they love seafood, so I think that I chose a winner with the crab cakes Benedict and the mango cream sauce." Do surfers really love seafood? I mean, they smell their fair share of dead fish, and I wouldn't think rotting gills gets all the gastric juices flowing. Plus, surfers pee in the water. She fries crab cakes in a cast iron skillet. Son of Sam glowers and mixes his eggs with a wooden spoon. Throwing air-quotes all over the place, Sam tells us had an idea to do a "Green Eggs and Ham" because he's Sam I Am. Sam I Am a serial killer. Unfortunately, the "green" was a basil pesto that, when added to the eggs, turned them sort of grey. Son of Sam tells us he improvised, changed the name, and went with scrambled eggs, toad-in-a-hole style.
Food flurry. Padmadala, who has ditched her full-length cardigan but is still wearing the shearling vest over her bikini, calls time.
"Surfers" make their way to the fire pits. I really don't know how many of them are real since a lot of them don't even look wet. Betty bitches about so many surfers showing up. They were expecting ten and they're getting forty or fifty. Son of Sam plates up some burned-looking bagels topped with eggs (they've turned the color of oatmeal, which is what I thought it was until I remembered his Seussian pursuits) and a fanned strawberry. I know he's trying to give it some color but strawberries? On top of eggs? Not really. If you want to embrace a culinary cliché, surely a tomato rose would have been much better. Son of Sam tells us rather dead-eyedly that he's freaking out and totally thinks he could get sent home.
The surfers descend on the food like gulls on a dead seal. (No, not Frank, god!) Some guy holds up Mia's crab cake and mumbles, "This is excellent." Colicchio -- who didn't get in his daily Sniff 'n' Sneer -- says, "Did you hear that Mia? They say it's really good." "They" by the way, might be some bikini'd nymphets hanging out on the edge of the shot. Lest you think Mia let a dish go by without christening it with something more horrific than the current celebaby names, Bravo's graphics tell us this dish is "Mama Mia's Crab Cakes Benedict with Mango Cream Sauce." So, I'll sort of assume that the mango cream sauce is in place of the usual hollandaise (I don't think she could have made a real hollandaise on that fire pit without it breaking all over the place over such uncontrollable heat), but where are the poached eggs? Colicchio grins at the nymphets, "So, do you guys eat breakfast like this every day on the beach? This happens every day?" "Oh, yes," they dazzle. "Cool, I could move here, I like this," Colicchio says, turning around in confusion before getting out of the shot. One of the girls sort of looks back at him, like, "Who was that old dude? And why was he flirting with us?"
Instead of standing around like a bunch of surfers, the judges are much more civilized with their eating. For a table, they have a surfboard balanced across what might tragically be two tiki god statues. They tuck in and the cheftestants illustrate their dishes. First is Elia's "Organic Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner," which is waffles with fried beans, ham, cheese, fried eggs, and maple syrup somewhere. "They're good," Elia promises the surfers. Elia tells us that she sold out of her food in the first seven minutes, and that all the surfers were eating it like a tostada and said it was "the bomb." "Scrumptious," a surfer tells the camera. The judges sample Elia's dish and really like it. The like the sweet and salty components. On the beach, Ted Ilan cuts and serves his Spanish tortilla on "pan con tomate" (bread with tomato) with chipotle aioli.
Betty tries to entice people with her revolting-looking dish -- I believe someone on the forums called it a "flesh Twinkie" -- of Black Forest ham (that's ham? Maybe someone should make sure the pig that ham came from isn't anemic. It's all grey and nasty; it looks like turkey) wrapped around eggs, corn, and leeks and served on "rustic" toast. The judges don't mind the flesh Twinkie and think Betty's presentation is really nice. Betty gleefully tells us that as she looked around, she could tell that some of the guys were "really sweatin' it." Frank explains his jacked-up quiche, which is now a zucchini and salmon scramble. to it is a plastic cup filled with "cannoli cream," strawberries, and a folded stroopwafel. I could wax nostalgic and braggy about memories of my Dutch grandmother making stroopwafels in her Michigan kitchen while letting me lick bowls and spoons and stuff, but I really have no such memories, so I won't.
Frank complains that because he couldn't regulate the heat on the fire, he dried his eggs out. Not to toot Betty's claxon, but her eggs worked out fine. I think you "regulate" heat on a fire pit by a lot of off-heat, on-heat. Plus, just like any grill, there are cooler spots on the fire where the flames aren't at their full strength. The judges don't like Frank's dish. Gail especially hates brown and rubbery eggs ["She does? When does she mention that? Besides 'for the last twenty minutes of the episode'?" -- Joe R] and thinks the cannoli cream has no place with such a mess of a dish. So, would they rather he have trashed the cannoli cream cup and just had them eat crap? I mean, I see what she's saying here, that the cannoli cream is all superior and shit, but still, to say that it has no place with the eggs implies that he never should have handed it out at all. In his place, I would have been thinking the cannoli cream was the only thing that could save his brown and rubbery ass. Cliff describes his chicken-apple sausage and sweet potato hash with chive-scrambled eggs. He thinks he's in big trouble because he knows his dish looks like a plate of mess. He really wanted to slide a sunny-side-up egg on top of the hash but couldn't pull it off. Elia did. Elia rocks. I love Elia. The judges concur that Cliff's dish is sloppy and gritty. Colicchio points out how surprised he is not to have had sand in any of the other dishes until now. And the messes just keep on coming. Sam's dish looks like ass. Sam knows his dish looks like ass. The judges think Sam's dish looks like ass. "It looks like grey eggs and ham," Colicchio snorts. Gail announces, "I don't find this look at all appetizing."
The surfers finally find someone who speaks their language as Michael is all, "You wanna taahcoh?" "Taahcoh, man? Ri'on!" Michael tells us that people say he talks like a surfer, "So I'm gonna to be able to totally relate to these people, be all 'BRO! Breakfast taahcohs, duuude!' They're gonna think my taahcohs are mackalicious." He's a cartoon. It's awesome. The judges really like it because it's tasty and it's portable.
Taking a page from Michael's book, Marcel tells a bare-chested surfer that he's "fucking stoked, I was, like, 'Yeah, dude!'" Then he asks, "How are the waves out there today?" Like Marcel's ever even hung three. Marcel's breakfast of champions is poached eggs -- I'm really impressed he managed to do those over a fire pit -- hash browns, gravlax (Scandinavian cured salmon, usually using aquavit and dill) and cream cheese with bacon lardons (pieces). Marcel says his plan of attack was to spend most of his time pushing and selling his dish to the surfers and then he dissolves into really scary surfer-speak, "Like, yo bro [weird sinister giggle] try my poached eggs brah!" I don't know how to accurately describe just how his voice got all pinched and high-pitched and nasally. It was hysterically creepy. Michael dings Marcel to us for "macking on little fourteen-year-old girls." They're fourteen? Really? "He's, like, confused, he's, like, twenty-six but sometimes I think he's sixteen." Okay first of all, Michael? Pot sent you a telegram. It says: "You're black. Stop." Second of all, age isn't what I was thinking Marcel was confused over, and according to some obliging citizen, that "confusion" is further underscored by the tramp stamp on Marcel's lower back. The surfers fill out their comment cards. One dude didn't like Sam's toad-in-a-hole bagel because when he picked up the bagel, everything fell through the hole. D'oh! Sam tells us his only hope is that someone had a crappier dish than his.
The challenge over, Mia and Elia decide to run into the water. A few others join them: Betty (of course) and Marcel. We see Marcel grabbing Elia and dragging her into the water. He tells us, "I may have accidentally or probably purposefully tackled Elia along the way, but it was all in good fun."
At the Judges' Table, Colicchio gives the cheftestants props for finding sand in only one dish. Gail gets really animated and adds, "People take for granted how difficult it is to cook an egg well." The challenge of cooking for the surfers is restated. Padmadala says the surfers favored Ted Ilan, Betty, Elia, and Mia. The judges talk over all these dishes, and Padmadala goes to get Betty, Mia, and Elia. With the three girls standing in front of them, Padmadala tells them they were the three best. Relief all around. They talk over individual dishes and Gail tells Elia, "I have to say, when I first heard about what you were doing, I was very apprehensive. Generally, I don't like the sweet and the salty all piled up together." More McGriddles for me, then! However, Gail was completely won over as soon as she tasted Elia's dish. Chef Lunetta compliments the yolk on Elia's eggs. Gail turns to Betty and asks her how she came up with her presentation. Betty's response isn't really that important -- she talks about thinking about how to keep things warm in the flesh bundle -- but what drove me crazy is how she dramatically put her hands up to her temples as she says, "What I was trying to think of is how can I keep all these elements warm." She just annoys me to a ridiculous amount. Elia is the winner -- YAY ELIA! -- and she is thrilled. This is her second win in a row. YAY ELIA! Betty tells us she's happy that the top three were women. Padmadala asks them to send back Cliff, Frank, and Sam.
The boys arrive. Frank explains that he had a quiche planned, which quickly had to morph into a scramble. He knows he overcooked his eggs. Gail compliments his cannoli cream but wonders what the connection between the two was. Frank says that if he had made a quiche -- which is creamy and rich -- they would have been more obviously connected. Frank knows he should have done something different. "I should have switched to individual omelets," he nods. Somehow I think that would have been difficult as well. Turning to Sam, Gail tells him it was really unappealing, and that it was the surfers' least favorite breakfast. Sam thinks he's a good chef and has proved himself time and time again. Gail chastises him for not being able to adapt. Defensively, Sam interrupts, "I didn't know the surroundings. I didn't know if there was going to be a cutting board, I didn't know if there was going to be a spatula, I just had no idea. To me this whole challenge was a gamble. Elia made the choice to use frozen waffles, I mean, she took a gamble and she utilized it and she won. I took a gamble and that's why I'm standing here." Hm, am I the only one who thinks that Sam mentioned the frozen waffles specifically to bag on Elia? It seems as though the "I mean she took a gamble" thing was very tacked on as a way to justifying his tattling. Which is sort of pointless, actually, because I just assume the judges know everything that goes into the dishes. Either they demand a full accounting from the cheftestants themselves or they get the receipts -- either way, it's full disclosure. Cliff is not really sure why he's there. He knows it wasn't visually appealing and explains the whole sunny-side egg idea. Gail tells him it was sloppy and looked like it had the least effort, however she concedes it didn't taste the worst. Colicchio tells Cliff his dish was the only one seasoned with sand. Cliff grabs at his face and squats down in abject consternation. They're excused for the nonce.
No major barracking in the back.
The judges discuss. Gail really rails on Sam for whining about how hard the challenge was when so many others did a really good job. She calls his whining "lame." Heh. Finally, they call the three losers back in and, after a ridiculously protracted and roundabout surfing metaphor from Colicchio, Padmadala knifes Frank. Padmadala asks if he has anything he wants to say. "Um, yeah, everybody in this room? And in the pantry? Is welcome at my house for good food, good wine, and good friends." Ick. He just icks me all over. I'm so glad His Scary Intenseness is gone.
In the back, Frank announces, "I am the sacrificial lamb." Not bull? You can hear Mia's "Awww," but I doubt anyone was really that surprised. Frank perfunctorily hugs everyone. When Marcel gets his, he's got a face of stone. Frank tells us that he thinks he's better than people who are still there. Isn't it quaint to have that particular statement come right after he and Michael did that whole handshake pulled into a one-arm Man Shoulder Hug thing? Frank blathers ridiculously, "A true chef is a gentleman and shall remain that way." Yeah, gentleman always threaten to beat other people so bad that their poor breast-cancer-surviving mothers won't recognize them. Why did I mention breast-cancer-surviving mothers all apropos of nothing? I don't know, Frank, why did I?
week: The real Ted Allen is back. I wonder if they'll use a split screen.