By Chuck
Somewhere it must make sense that, for an episode that lasted an inexplicable 75 minutes, the Top Chef challenges were reruns. Colicchio pops up early for the Quickfire -- relay race, two teams of four, repurposed from seasons past. Sides are drawn, and Spike, Dale, Lisa and Nikki compete against Richard, Stephanie, Andrew and Antonia in a whirlwind battle of knives: Supreming oranges, turning and cleaning artichokes, cleaning and filleting monkfish and making a quart of the dreaded mayonnaise. Although Lisa supremes a mean orange, Stephanie clinches a win for her team with her measured pour, her strong arm, and her well-whisked mayo. This makes Dale very, very, very angry.
While immunity is now a thing of the past, the winners do get an advantage in the challenge. Forget restaurant wars -- this is wedding wars, with fourteen straight hours and five grand to cook for 125 guests each, with the Quickfire-winning team choosing for whom they cater -- bride or groom. Richard's balls select the bride, a meat and potatoes kind of gal. Nikki hits it off with the groom and his Italian tastes, but decides not to translate her lifetime of expertise into leadership.
During the difficult all-nighter, Dale over-extends himself, presumably hoping that the hardest worker on the losing team won't get sent home. Richard's micromanagement annoys Andrew. These poor people -- not only did they have the Quickfire, shopping, and the all-night cooking, they have to serve as well. It's all terribly exhausting, and I'm only watching. The judges proclaim the bride's side better and Richard's bossiness the winner (even though Stephanie took the proverbial cake -- it looked better but tasted worse than Lisa's homely groom's cake). Richard does a good turn by sharing the glory (and his Crate and Barrel gift certificate) with Stephanie. Spike and Dale goad each other into a pout-off at the judges' table, but it's Nikki who goes home for hanging around much longer than she should have.
Thank goodness for Bravo -- if they didn't rerun everything about 900 times, I'd be in big trouble, since my TiVo ate the recording of Wednesday night's 75-minute show. (It is not, I must admit, beyond the realm of possibility that in a haze of wishful thinking I sleep-deleted the episode, which is preferable to sleep-driving to Arby's for a sleep-binge, but still disturbing -- ah, Ambien.) The rerun, I see, is a standard 60 minutes, which I hope means they've edited the crap out of the episode, but in all likelihood simply means shorter commercial breaks -- let's find out!
Antonia's psyched that there are still four women left -- four men, four women, which is unusual for Top Chef -- usually there are more men left than women by this time. Nikki maintains that, as a woman, you have to be a fighter and a competitor -- which, of course, you don't if you're a man. Too bad Nikki seems incapable of taking her own advice. While I'd love to see a woman take top honors as well, I'm not sure who, out of these four, that would be -- it would have been Stephanie, but she's been a disappointment for the past few weeks (really, that tomato and peanut butter concoction seemed like a disaster). It's certainly not Lisa or Nikki, and I'm still not sold on Antonia. Come to think of it, I'm not sold on any of the guys either -- Richard's clearly the talent to beat, but he's such a tool. Oh, and goodbye Mark -- he was such a non-entity by the time he decamped for greener pastures that I won't miss him, although it seems that Andrew and Spike feel differently. They liked the mop-topped kiwi, but Spike, still in bed, asks Andrew if he's ready to move in, and it looks like those two will be just fine. That exchange was not in the version I'm watching, but I swear it was there in the extended remix -- unless the Ambien kicked in before I even took it -- which means they did cut the episode! Suddenly a TiVo accident seems like a brilliant strategy, although I hereby apologize for not capturing every fabulous moment of the lengthy original in my scintillating prose.
Surprise! Colicchio stands to Padma, who is sporting the pinnacle of Civil War-era military fashion with a tricked-out slate gray jacket. No guest judge today. Padma explains that it's time to "up the ante," sounding like she's just eaten a handful of marbles. Upping the ante means no more immunity for Quickfire winners, as well as a reworking of two favorite challenges from season's past. Said reworkings require two teams of four, so knives are drawn (it's Team Fork and Team Spoon for those of you who care about such things, although the names have no significance whatsoever). It's Andrew, Richard, Stephanie and Antonia versus Dale, Nikki, Spike and Lisa (who, thankfully, has decided to wrap a bandana around her dirty, stringy mess of hair -- too bad she can't do the same with her face). Wow -- that is a huge mismatch. I wonder who will win!
In case you've just joined the season, Dale explains that his team isn't super-strong, though they are "capable," which Dale says in the same tone he might use to say "paraplegic," or "blind." I seem to recall Dale saying that no one on the team really likes one another, but that sentiment didn't make the cut. Dale and his capable team will be competing with the creamier members of the crop in the relay race, Colicchio's personal favorite challenge and presumably the reason that he dragged his ass to the kitchen for the Quickfire. Awesome -- I like this challenge as well. It's fun to watch the task-oriented competition, and to see what happens when the individual performance so directly and visibly impacts the fate of the other cheftestants. The challenge consists of four tasks: the teams must peel and supreme five oranges, clean and turn two artichokes (so that they look like giant golf tees), clean and fillet a monkfish (two filets, please), and make one quart of mayonnaise. Damn, monkfish are ugly, prehistoric looking fuckers -- I would not have even the slightest inkling of what to do with that thing. (Not that I'd fare much better with the other tasks.) Two minutes to decide which individual does which task, with the winning team getting an advantage, but not immunity, in the Elimination.
Andrew reminds his team that he's "not an expert in mayonnaise" -- nor is he an expert in monkfish, so he ends up with the artichokes. Rumor -- or Stephanie -- has it that he's speedy. Rumor -- or Stephanie -- gets the mayo, Antonia the oranges, and Richard the monkfish. On the volatile team, Nikki doesn't want the mayo, since it's been years since she made any by hand (she and Lisa use a Robot Coupe -- so that's what it's called -- thank you, subtitles!), which offends Dale since anyone who calls themselves a chef should be able to crank out a quart of mayo, no problem. "Why are you still here?" he asks Nikki, by way of asking the camera. It's like he took the question right out of my mouth. Fear not, Dale, fear not.
Colicchio, standing between the teams with a whistle (oh, how he must love using that thing), starts the race. Lisa faces off against Antonia with the oranges, and gets her team off to a solid start -- she blows the doors off Antonia, despite her shaking hands. Antonia's focused on precision, since the orange sections must all be seedless and intact, but she's no match for Lisa, who delivers an approximately two-orange lead as Spike steps up to take on the artichokes. He gets two artichokes turned really fast, but then Andrew gets the all-clear whistle from Colicchio -- "and that's where the fire comes in." He handily denudes an artichoke of leaves and gets to work on the base with his "secret weapon" -- a vegetable peeler. "You are so fucking smart," says Antonia, as Andrew flies through the task while Spike, who seconds before seemed so cocky (how unusual), fumbles with his paring knife and breaks the stem off one of his artichokes (an explicitly stated no-no). They finish simultaneously, as Lisa laments the disappearance of the sizeable lead she created.
Richard and Dale begin disemboweling their monkfishes, removing the meaty filet strips and heaving the leftovers from the massive carcass into the garbage. While they seem to be moving at a similar pace, Richard clearly has the better technique -- I know this because Lisa explains to the camera that Dale's filets are hacked up and amateurish, as Colicchio looks on disapprovingly. Richard reveals that monkfish is tough because you can clean it for eternity, but decides he's satisfied with his work and finishes milliseconds before Dale. They both get Colicchio's mellifluous whistle, and it's time for Stephanie and Nikki to engage in battle mayo.
Stephanie separates eggs (she's using five yolks), working neck and neck with Nikki as the two teams mill about nervously behind them, offering support. In a move that confounds her teammates, Stephanie begins drizzling in the oil very slowly, but explains that she needs to create a solid base to be successful. As the two women whisk for their lives, Nikki's just dumping her oil into the bowl; Richard's surprised at his own level of emotion, while Dale's level of emotion, steadily rising, isn't surprising at all. As Nikki laments to the camera that her mayonnaise wasn't breaking, it becomes clear that Stephanie's strategy is paying off. Exhausted from the whisking, Nikki stops "for a breather" and to switch arms, as Stephanie, arm whirling like a dervish, completes her work and dumps the glop of her labors into a large measuring cup. Colicchio and his finger pronounce the results acceptable, and the team we all knew was going to win, wins. Thanks, Spike and Nikki!
The adrenaline rush and the thrill of victory inspire Antonia, Richard, Stephanie and Andrew to dissolve into a loud round of hugs and backslaps, while on the other side, Dale melts down, screams "FUCK!" and punches one of the lockers. Mature much? Presumably he's bummed both by the loss and by the knowledge that he's stuck in this foursome for the challenge, which is understandable, but that kind of temper is nothing more than a disaster waiting to happen. For her part, Lisa's none too pleased that she's stuck working with crotch-grabbing Dale, since it went so swimmingly last time.
After reminding us all that the winning team will have an advantage in the Elimination round, Padma explains which reheated contest will constitute the challenge. Remember restaurant wars? Not going to happen this season, grins Padma (although, the Yahoo listings suggest otherwise, with an episode titled "Restaurant Wars" slated for the Wednesday after ) -- "we're changing it up a bit," she says as the cheftestants look a bit confused and two people (white man, white woman) enter the kitchen. They are Corey (the lady) and J.P. (the dude), and they're getting hitched the day, and there's a round of "What?" and "Are you serious?" as the pieces start to fall into place. Instead of restaurant wars, it's wedding wars. Yippee -- another Top Caterer challenge! "Not that cool," says Andrew, speaking for the gang. And for me.
One team will cook based on the bride's tastes (for her and her guests), the other for the groom's -- 125 guests each. (While this makes it sound like the wedding will be 250 strong and like the bride's side won't eat the food on the groom's side and vice versa, that is not actually the case.) The team that won the Quickfire gets to choose bride or groom -- they choose the bride, which comes as no surprise since Richard's on that team. Spike may not be surprised, but he thinks it was (be it strategic, or ill-advised) a stupid choice -- since Spike didn't make that choice, it's also unsurprising that he thinks it's a stupid one. He's sure the opposing team will be subjected to a bridezilla who will want everything to live up to some vision she's has "since she was fourteen years old," which actually sounds like a late start for any girl who concocts wedding day fantasies. He does have a point, though, when he mentions "the fucking wedding cake."
The teams get a client consultation, followed by 45 minutes to plan, and an hour to shop (at Whole Foods and Restaurant Depot). Missing from this version are the details that the bride and groom co-own a restaurant/wedding venue (which is suspect and also kind of creepy, especially since the couple looks more like brother and sister than husband and wife), that the budget is $5000 per team, and that the cooking will take place over a fourteen-hour, all-night stretch. The last tidbit gives Andrew a "culinary boner," since he'll be cooking all night and, unlike certain people, gets off on that kind of marathon event. For me, it brings up less an erection than dreary memories of long nights of coffee and cigarettes in front of a flickering monitor (ah, college) and a sinking feeling when it starts to get light outside, followed by a miserable day of crankiness and a desire to eat my body weight in Chips Ahoy! This challenge has gone from zero to nightmare in about 60 seconds -- it's more like a hazing ritual than a cooking challenge (and, though I'm sure it happens all the time, would you really want to know in advance that the people responsible for cooking your wedding banquet would be up all night, and weren't really caterers in the first place? I guess if you co-own a restaurant and wedding venue, and you get to be on TV, then you most certainly would).
With all of the charm of a dishtowel between the two of them, Nikki and Spike try to glean J.D.'s wedding day wishes, only to discover that he enjoys Italian food and would like nothing more than to start his special evening with "bruschetta and assorted crostini." He digs white meat fish and thinks that "Chilean sea bass is, like, the greatest thing ever." Whoa, there, Mr. Exciting! Sounds like Corey's going to enjoy an intense and spicy sex life. This is confirmed when Nikki gives J.D. the kiss of death because, like ohmigod, that's totally exactly what she feels! Spike's excited that they've hit this jackpot -- Nikki's Italian, the groom's partial to Italian food, Nikki looks happy and should clearly be the leader in this, and will therefore take the fall if anything goes awry. I can almost hear him saying "Excellent" in his best Montgomery Burns voice.
Robotically professing her love for "meat and potatoes, pasta, pizza," Corey comes off as the couple's pants-wearer - if you fry it, she likes it, and if it's steak, it had better be well-seasoned (too bad the bride's not actually Colicchio in drag -- I'd wager that he makes one ugly chick). Antonia mentions the intense pressure, and the need to do something different, since the owner of a wedding venue has probably seen it all, and Corey definitely doesn't want a lot of "typical" catering items on the menu.
As talk turns to cake, the groom (really, does anyone care about their names?) talks up German chocolate as well as the tried and true hazelnut and chocolate pairing, while the bride says cake is her "favorite thing in the whole world" -- she wants layers and an "interesting" looking exterior. That's, well, an interesting word to use, since "interesting" could include a red cake festooned with dismembered baby doll parts, which I think would be cool, but I'm guessing the bride, unfortunately, wouldn't. Calling wedding cakes "a big fat pain in the ass," Stephanie mentions that people often spend many days and thousands of dollars on them. Yes, and you have to make one in fourteen scant hours, sucker.
Antonia and Stephanie head to Restaurant Depot, as do Dale and Lisa (Spike mentions that Lisa, with her thick skin, can handle Dale, while Nikki needs the, uh, loving touch of Spike, who won't oppose her ideas). The others head for Whole Foods, where they are buying flowers, among other things (OK, I really would not want my wedding floral arrangements selected by sleep-deprived non-caterers). Spike's confident that Nikki will lead the team to victory, even though she's not yet said word one about being the leader. Restaurant Depot (where $2000 of the $5000 will be spent) looks like an amazing playground, and the ladies and Dale run around stockpiling (and sending pictures of) vegetables, a cheese wheel and a cheese log. (Dale, thank goodness, can't resist miming the phallic implications.)
Over at Whole Foods, Nikki and Spike hunt for rapini (presumably after Nikki answers Spike's "What is rapini?"); Richard's on flower duty, since, as he says, he watches Martha Stewart (yay) and wears pink shoes (boo). After watching a movie Richard sent of the floral display, Stephanie hopes he doesn't choose sunflowers, and opines that boys can't choose flowers -- even ones who wear pink shoes. So why send Richard and Andrew to Whole Foods in the first place? Maybe they didn't know about the flowers when they split up. And why am I still typing about it when I stopped caring several lines ago?
The teams load up the Highlanders -- man, even three grand won't buy you much at Whole Foods -- and head back to the kitchen, arriving at 9:00 PM for their fourteen hour marathon cooking session, presumably already beat from the events of the day. After dutifully spelling out the terms of the challenge once again, Lisa discusses the need to make it great because it's someone's wedding (I hope she remembers that in fourteen hours) and their choice of simple Italian cuisine to please the groom. She explains that, as she's not much of an Italian cook, she'll be looking to Nikki for leadership and guidance, as Nikki, looking the schoolmarm in spectacles and that gargantuan bunhive, gathers the team around her to discuss divvying up duties and expresses disbelief that she's making pasta -- again. Gee, she sure seems to be steeping up to her role as executive chef -- way to use that lifetime of Italian experience!
Assorted crostini have given way to assorted flatbreads for the groom's appetizers, but the bruschetta managed to hold on. The buffet will include homemade tortellini (Nikki), mixed vegetables and cheeses (Spike's grilling the veggies), filet mignon, Chilean sea bass, and orecchiette with ragu. Dale snaps up all of the protein -- he's searing the beef tenderloin, cooking the sea bass, and making the ragu. Because Dale is a man who knows how to handle his meat. Lisa, "not a pastry chef," gets stuck with the groom's cake -- chocolate hazelnut. Does cake count as pastry? Can it just for today? She wants to get it done in plenty of time, just in case, because if it don't look good, she don't look good. Great, now I'm thinking about her dirty hair again.
For appetizers, the bride's getting two kinds of pizza, pulled pork sandwiches, and short ribs and blue cheese in phyllo, courtesy mostly of Antonia. The bride's buffet will consist of crispy chicken with almonds and basil, braised brisket, filet mignon, creamed spinach and potato gratin. As she lists the items, Antonia gives great California inflection, ending on an up-note so it sounds like she's asking questions: "Filet mignon? Creamed spinach? Potato gratin?" Is it possible to have a wedding without filet mignon? Stephanie's back in the dessert realm against Lisa with a dark chocolate and lemon cake, with a cream cheese lemon filling. (Chocolate and lemon is one of my all-time favorite flavor combinations -- there is nothing like scoops of high-quality chocolate and lemon gelato to cool off on a hot summer day.) Richard's managing meats, sauces, and braises (and Blaises!), bringing his usual quest for quality to the all-important wedding day, while Antonia's feeling Army-like as she peels a mountain of potatoes.
All's going well on the groom's team -- or is it? When Spike and Lisa confer with Nikki about how best to cook beets (Nikki uses sherry vinegar, water, and an oven; Lisa wonders about baking them with the salt on the bottom), Nikki goes out of her way to disavow any interest in being the sole decider. Lisa thinks this is a dumb move, since Nikki keeps talking about how she's pretty much made out of Italian food -- if Lisa was in Nikki's shoes, she'd be like, this is what I know, so do what I tell you. For Top Chef it is, indeed, pretty much textbook stupid. Dale's already on to Nikki's lack of game, and has sequestered himself in a corner to cook and scowl. He's not going to stop, he's just going to do one thing after another after another (thank you, editors, for the visual representation), picking up the slack (including Spike's zucchini) and just barely enduring the three imbeciles to whom he's been shackled.
Time ticks away, and by 2:00 AM people are definitely looking thrashed. Lisa and Nikki exchange meaningful glances over what Lisa calls Dale's "half-assed job" -- she's worried that he's doing too much and not doing it well, as we get more of Dale: turning meat, putting oil-smeared slices of bread in an oven. Spike's concerned as well -- since Dale's got his paws in so many dishes, Spike wants to take and own one dish that he can do it his way. The "ace in his pocket" turns out to be the sea bass. At 4:00 AM, Dale tells Nikki that he's going to make a ragu that will not resemble a typical tomato sauce, which concerns her because she's got a different idea about what a ragu should be, although she chooses to say that to the camera, rather than to Dale. Nicely led, Nikki. "I'm not going down for that," Nikki tells Lisa, and if we didn't know who would be going home before, we do now. Dale thinks Nikki wants all of the fun and none of the responsibility.
At 5:30 AM, everyone's exhausted and the energy drinks have emerged. Andrew shuts up, which, as Richard points out, is unusual. At 7:30 AM, Colicchio shows up and asks if anyone got any sleep last night. Very funny, asshole. He checks in with the bride's team first, and when Stephanie mentions her cake, Colicchio mentions the first-season wedding-themed episode. She promises to avoid eggshells, which sends him to the groom's side, and Lisa's cake, which looks like a brown Communist building. Nikki makes a point of telling Colicchio that, despite the thrill of a client that loves Italian, her team is "all across the board here," acting like she's giving them all credit, when it's almost like even she knows that she's just executed a major cop-out. When Colicchio then asks who is doing what, Dale can't even remember what he's done, which is a great authentic reaction when you've been up all night, but which of course is played as a direct result of Dale's over-extension. Don't dumb your food down, counsels Colicchio -- it's someone's special day.
As moving time approaches, Stephanie reveals that she's transporting her cake, which looks fairly polished, in layers to avoid disaster -- a smart move, if you've ever watched any of those ridiculous cake competitions. Lisa's looks solid enough to withstand an earthquake, although she looks a bit precarious as she and Dale slide it into a large box. "If it smashes," she says, "I'm going to need therapy." Really, Lisa, why wait?
The wedding itself looks nice -- in an outdoor courtyard/garden space (although the gate backs directly on to a street). The bride chose strapless, the groom white tie, both mothers dress tastefully (the bride is walked down the aisle by hers, and the groom looks like his), and Chicago lives up to its breezy reputation. In the venue's kitchen, there's about half an hour left on the clock, and everyone is clearly close to their last nerve, when Padma leads this week's judges in for an intro: Colicchio, Gail Simmons, and Gale Gand, the executive pastry chef and co-owner of Chicago's Tru. According to Stephanie, she's the shit. She's also about two feet shorter than Padma, but Stephanie's more concerned with the former detail as it pertains to her wedding cake, which, at five layers and petal-trimmed, looks extremely impressive, all things considered.
As service time approaches, Richard's getting nervous, but it's the bride who should be worried -- during the champagne reception, she tells an assembled group, "I used to say all the time, 'I just wish that he loved me the way that I love him, and then all of a sudden one day, he did.'" Uh, ew. First of all, editors, that was just plain mean. Second of all, when exactly was that "all of a sudden one day?" Maybe right around the time a Top Chef producer told the co-owner of a wedding venue that the show was coming to town and looking for a wedding venue for a televised challenge? And third, I could actually smell the desperation coming out of my TV. And finally, again, ew.
Back to the food, somewhere I bet the bride will be spending a lot of time in a few months. Natty servers hoist the passed hors d'oeuvres, with the bride's side going first, naturally. Antonia's short ribs and blue cheese in phyllo triangles with almonds and red wine gastrique please the mother of the bride. The pulled pork sandwich with homemade pickle looks more like a pulled pork tostada, courtesy of a pastry shell -- it tastes good, but it's messy, says the bride. The pizzas, with prosciutto, herbs, Parmesan and goat cheese (of which Antonia is particularly proud) go over well with the blushing bride. (I'd be blushing too if I said what she did on TV.) The groom's assorted pizza and flatbread looks underwhelming, confirmed by the facial expressions of the guests, and Dale cooked the slices of bread for the bruschetta to fiberglass hardness. Watching Gail Simmons try to eat it actually makes me laugh.
Jesus, this challenge is ridiculous -- and kind of gross. After cooking all night, the cheftestants have to staff the buffet line as well, all grimy and exhausted. Again, not something I'd want at my wedding -- the room looks pretty nice, though. Bride, first, again, samples her buffet, as they show close-ups of the dishes and Richard blathers on about how special the bride is, and I just remembered that they cut the entire bit about Richard telling Andrew to add star anise to the cream for the creamed spinach, and how this pissed Andrew off, but he did it anyway. The whole micromanagement line is gone. I wonder if Padma will say how much she disliked it in judging -- it's almost like watching the episode again for the first time. Except, not at all. Lit by the red glow of the craving station, Richard tells Padma that he's battling exhaustion with positive vibes from the wedding and explains the filet mignon with horseradish sauce and red wine syrup and the braised brisket of beef to the lady judges. Antonia's hovering over the almond and basil crusted chicken breast, which is apparently being served in very large pieces. Seated at their table, the judges praise the brisket and the filet (especially the horseradish sauce), but don't enjoy Andrew's chicken, which is just a sub-par repeat of his dish from last week's Common Thread challenge, made even less palatable by its extended layover in a chafing dish.
The groom's side begins with an antipasti selection -- mixed meats, vegetables and cheeses -- and it looks like he likes it, in theory at least, because he takes enough for his entire table. Nikki's butternut squash tortellini with brown butter and sage does look like pasta, and Spike's Chilean sea bass with artichokes, capers, olives and tomatoes appears well-executed. Dale used pork and beef in his ragu, and he's right -- it's not a typical tomato sauce, and while I prefer his type of preparation, it's all a matter of taste. More filet mignon with horseradish sauce, this time with fingerling potatoes. The judges aren't wild about Nikki's too-sweet tortellini; Colicchio thinks it just isn't very good, but he does like Dale's ragu -- way to crush the pasta queen, Asian food dude. While Gale Gand thought the variety of grilled vegetables was impressive, Padma thought they were ugly (one of the cardinal sins for her, I'm sure), and Gail Simmons found the whole antipasti thing tired.
Moment of truth: time to cut the cake. If nothing else, Stephanie made a pretty bride's cake, awash in carefully-placed flower petals and covered with white fondant, although the bride feeds it to her newly-minted husband like she's afraid he's going to bite her. The groom's cake, which now looks like an embellished Soviet apartment block, gets two thumbs up from the groom for taste and moistness. "It's hazelnut. Hazelnut," he says. The judges eat cake and look at each other. As service winds down, all eight cheftestants are, remarkably, still standing, as Nikki works to convince herself that her team did the right thing by striving to please the groom first with plates good enough for the judges. Oh, are you still here?
There will be no sleep until judgment gets passed down upon thee, and as the teams await the verdict, Spike does a good deed by recognizing the two cake bakers, even though it seems there's nothing in it for him. Colicchio doesn't mention wanting to ask the Quickfire winners why on earth they chose to cook for the bride, and Padma calls the bride's team to the judges' table. Colicchio wordily tells them that food is a crucial part of a wedding, that the judges get nervous because they know it's someone's big day, and that they've won -- it takes a moment to compute, seeing as they've been awake since who knows when at this point. Wow -- they totally sliced this judging round, omitting the entire discussion of the star anise incident as well as Gale Gand's congratulatory words to Stephanie on her impressive (under the circumstances) cake, and her admission that even she, Gale Gand, spends several days on wedding cakes, and moving immediately to Gale Gand calling Richard the winner for his responsibility and uniformly good dishes. Richard immediately hands his win to Stephanie, which is a very gentlemanly thing to do, and then discovers that Stephanie also gets a $2000 gift certificate to Crate and Barrel. He reaches over, bashes her head in with a pink croc, and starts screaming, "I'm going shopping! I'm going shopping!" Actually, Stephanie says she'll share the store credit, and everyone skips off happily into the sunset.
But not before summoning the groom's team, whose time with the judges begins with a review of duties. Lisa, looking uncannily like Christopher Penn in her bandana, made the cake. Dale handled the beef, the roasted potatoes, and the ragu, while Nikki made pesto (was it invisible? That would be impressive) and the pasta (did she make the orecchiette as well as the tortellini? Because that's not the sense I got). Spike made the sea bass, and did some stuff with vegetables. Colicchio wants to know who led this motley crew on an Italian menu, and Nikki pipes up with an emphatic "Definitely not me," which draws a look from Padma that signals she's more confused than usual. Nikki explains that, while her teammates looked to her for guidance and opinions, in no way did she assume the role of executive chef, okay? When Gale Gand asks Lisa about the cake, she jumps in to explain that the groom was very specific: nothing extravagant that would outshine the bride's cake, emphasis on taste rather than looks -- just like his brand new wife, bada bing! Lisa seems like one of those people who gets defensive before she even knows the question, which screams insecurity -- but I've got a renewed sense of how editing can shape an episode, so that could well just be an edited in bit of character development. Mission accomplished on the homely cake, says Colicchio, but it definitely tasted better than Stephanie's pretty on the outside dessert.
Nikki does buy the team some ground by explaining that the antipasti table was exactly what the groom requested, so Colicchio bypasses that element to critique the sheer number of dishes the groom's team produced, with several that simply weren't tasty. They were dry, though. Specifically, the tortellini was dry and filled with something more appropriate for dessert, the pizza crust was dry and hard, the meat was dry and overcooked (poor Padma's filet, says Gail Simmons, was like a hockey puck), the horseradish cream was tasteless -- it's simple food, says Colicchio, that needs to be well-seasoned and well-executed for it to work. Needless to say, it didn't. When Gale Gand asks about the brick-like bruschetta bread, Dale explains that they toasted on-site, and that, oh yeah, that's another thing he did, with eye-rolling smugness. Spike suggests that Dale unburden himself of whatever large chip he's holding on his shoulder, to which Dale responds that he "hustled." While Nikki maintains that no believes he didn't hustle his ass off, Dale's problem is not how much work he did, but how much work others didn't do, which Colicchio discerns. Rather than simply getting huffy, Spike says, why not go all the way and point fingers if he feels so slighted, so Dale does -- right at Spike and his neglected zucchini, because Dale felt that things would not have gotten done if he didn't do them. No way, says Spike, it was a team effort, we all pitched in, you can't act like God in this challenge, and (here's the capper) I totally worked harder than you (which inspires a highly justified eye roll from Lisa). Also, says Spike, you're a little bitch and my zucchini is both longer and wider than yours.
The judges have it easy this week -- they've been relatively quiet, sitting back and watching the fun. Now Nikki (appearing again suddenly) wanly tries to intervene, and Spike expresses his frustration that he's the only one standing up for them against multitasking Dale. Finally, Gail Simmons asks if Spike wants to know what people thought of the sea bass. Sure, he says. Turns out everyone really liked it. Spike's face spreads into an odd smile, but Dale gets the lasts word: "You should have liked it. It took him three hours to make it." Ha. The four losers head to the back room, where Spike makes a beeline for the wine -- understandable, I'm just watching, and I want a drink.
"What didn't Dale do?" asks Gail Simmons, after the other Gale agrees that Spike's fish, while tasty, doesn't represent enough of a contribution to the menu, and offers her opinion that Spike got bogged down with the vegetables, which unfortunately weren't done very well. Gail Simmons felt that Dale could have worked smarter by editing the list, paring down the menu, and focusing on quality rather than quantity. Nikki, on the other hand, was the real disappointment, says Colicchio -- she knows Italian food, and not only was the food not very good, it wasn't even very Italian. Padma dings her for not using her expertise to guide her team and plan a better menu, while Colicchio goes even further -- she should have asserted herself as the team leader, willing to go down with the ship if she failed. That's what a Top Chef does. What Nikki does, however, is tell Dale that he shouldn't point fingers at the judges' table, because it makes him "that guy," and that the judges won't think more of him because of it. Whatever, Dale was already that guy, and Nikki's on her way out -- she was damned if she did, damned if she didn't ever since the groom professed his love for Italian, because I don't think she has the chops to lead a team to victory.
The judges agree, telling Darling Nikki (I must admit that I've had that song stuck in my head since about halfway through this episode) to pack her knives and vacate the premises, after letting the whole team know that the wide-ranging menu didn't work, that Dale may have a done a lot of work, but a lot of the work was shoddy, that Nikki should have been more of a leader, and that Spike should have contributed more. Spike gives Nikki a hug, and then moves in to hug it out with Dale, and Nikki explains that she's proud, she feels tested, and she's excited to go home to her restaurant and family, full speed ahead, onward and upward. Just once, I'd love to hear a losing contestant say, "Well, that's it, I lost, and now I'll never cook again. I think I'll become a mortician."